People in (shattering) glass houses...

"I refer... to Russia's intimidation of its sovereign neighbours, its use of oil and gas as a political weapon... its threat to target peaceful neighbours with nuclear weapons... and its persecution - or worse - of Russian journalists and dissidents." Thus spake Condoleeeza yesterday, in a speech evidently attended by people who've been living in Western Sahara or the Papuan rain forest for the past 8 years - anyplace bereft of world news feeds. She went on to add, "What has become clear is that the legitimate goal of rebuilding Russia has taken a dark turn - with the rollback of personal freedoms, the arbitrary enforcement of the law [and] the pervasive corruption at various levels of Russian society." One also has to assume that no one in attendance recently spent a week in St.Paul-Minneapolis, where US cops arrested hundreds of political demonstrators along with more than a few journalists.

It seems like a waste of time to deconstruct these remarks, so i'll just note that under Condi's watch, the US has built a wall along its border with Mexico, tried to overthrow the sovereign govt of Venezuela and the democratically elected govt of Palestine (and recently Bolivia as well - or so it appears), succeeded in overthrowing Aristide in Haiti, Saddam in Iraq and the Taliban govt in Afghanistan, maintained its support for Karimov in Uzbekistan - the list of dark turns is long and, after eight years, feels too tedious to type out. i might add that these only touch on the international-level hypocrisy in her speech; when we look at what's gone on inside the US' borders, it just gets more hypocritical - shamefully so. This kind of rhetoric makes americans look like total idiots to the rest of the world; it's no small wonder that Putin's grin won't go away and NATO heads of state are counting the days till Condi & C0. pack up their rolodexes and return to their old jobs in the corporate sector.

This is getting downright CREEPY... the next revelation (pun definitely intended) will be that Sarah Palin is actually a Raelian. Given the extent to which the republican party has fucked things up on planet Earth, it actually makes a whole lot of sense that bizarre religious fundamentalists strike them as viable candidates. While i can get into the imagery of Sarah's great-grandma taming a stegasouras, it's not a graphic i would hold up to indicate i understood anything about the realities of the 21st century.

The advantage to being poor is that when the whip comes down, you stay sane while those who've been living in the bubble of runaway wealth falter and freak. That's now gotta include the inept deciders in the oval office, as evidenced in this statement by the US Secretary of the (now defunct?) Treasury. "Henry Paulson, assured the public they could remain confident in the 'soundness and resilience' of the financial system. He reserved the right to bail out struggling firms but said: 'We don't take lightly ever putting taxpayers' money on the line to support a financial institution.'" After the Bear Stearns bailout, who does he think he's kidding here? No, i think finally they're starting to lose it and another debt-dependent war isn't going to solve the problem.

Lame Phuck #2

Breaking news on the BBC informs us that Pakistani soldiers have taken a stand against US troops attempting to cross the Afghan border into Waziristan. It's about time someone said NO to the Pentagon, but perhaps the bigger issue here is what the Confounder and Thief thinks he's doing by sending US troops into yet another hostile country. As far as i can tell, the objective of the flailing W Dick administration is to destabilize as many countries as possible before they leave office: Iraq, Iran, Georgia, Pakistan, Afghanistan - hard to say who's next on the list but i wouldn't be surprised to read that Cheney's decided to stop over in Baku on his way back from Georgia. (Enticing more Russian troops to set up camp close to the Iranian border may look like a way to put a wedge in Russian-Iranian relations, but Putin is so much cooler and shiftier than W, the chances of seeing the Russians get buried in a meaningless regional conflict that destroys their ties with Tehran seem pretty slim.) The reason for sending more US forces to Afghanistan is now blatantly clear, even while attempts to start fighting inside Pakistan's territory have surely been pulled out of the Bush dynastic ass. One wonders if this will give Sen. Obama pause the next time he waxes urgent about putting his foot down with the Pakistanis. In the long term, Pakistan probably deserves as much of a political overhaul as the US, but in the short term, this isn't gonna happen at gunpoint - one of the many ironies may be that with US forces now grouping along its border and launching attacks inside the country, Pakistan's many internal divisions may actually dissipate under a common banner: US OUT NOW!

Another irony, pointed out in the Times of India, is that if Little Bush opts to go to war in Pakistan, US forces will be facing their own sophisticated weaponry. " In July, the Bush administration sought to shift $226.5 million in US counterterrorism aid for the F-16 upgrades." Pretty groovy, eh? Nothing like having your own misguided missiles come back to kill your troops. Irony No. 3 is that these raids across the border are inciting Pakistani tribes to join forces with the Taliban - or at least that's what they're threatening, according to this report.

That W still has the cajones to say he's made great progress in the so-called "war on terror" goes far beyond being disingenuous. He's either living in a dream world or just rubbing our noses in the fact that we've all be screwed. Impeachment looks increasingly mild, given the havoc this asshole has wreaked around the world.

Canada: The next red state?

For all those Canadians wishing you had the opportunity to vote in the US elections and make sure the crazies don't win, just be patient because it seems your time is coming. In less than 20 years, the Canadian military will be fully "integrated" with the Pentagon, though it might make more sense to use the term "subsumed" since it's hard to imagine that folks south of the border who came up with this plan see it as a way to put the burden of directing the world's robocops onto Ottowa's shoulders. Check out the video, it's pretty chilling.

Following up on my recent post about the US-India nuclear deal, Reuters is reporting today that at least 40 private companies (Indian) are now lobbying their government to allow privately owned and operated nuclear power plants. It's a nice idea, diversifying the energy sector and not putting the entire financial burden of that on the state. i'd put it in the same league as applauding oil companies for their leadership in finding a way out of our addiction to petroleum. As a wise man once said, "To hell with facts! We need stories!" One story we can always depend on hearing from the private sector is that in the event of fiscal or material meltdown, the burden of bailout and clean-up must fall on the shoulders of the state.

This is yet another facet of the nuke industry's self-deception. Clean and efficient electricity production? Sure, as long as one doesn't take into account uranium mining and processing, spent nuclear fuel reprocessing, transportation hazards, long-term waste storage (let's say 24,000 years minimum), rampant plant cost overruns and impacts of any accidental releases or Chernobyl style meltdown. You can bet that as soon as detectors in Abu Dhabi start picking up high levels of cesium, the Indian government would be asked to step in and manage the emergency response. (If i remember correctly, Exxon was not in charge of trying to salvage the oil-soaked animals who happened to find themselves in the Valdez' spill zone... notice any kind of pattern here?) These nuke people are just living in a dream world and yes, i'd certainly add Candidate Obama to the list of dreamers. Building NPPs in a country whose basic infrastructure is either collapsing or on the verge of collapse is pure stupidity. Building them in countries which are disastrously impacted by earthquakes, monsoons, hurricanes and tsunamis increases the stupidity variable ten-fold. They consume a huge amount of resources to build and maintain, leave a wake of environmental havoc, and pose too great a risk in a world run by incompetent extremists.

......

Few days later. Reading this again, i realized that i neglected to point out that the US "civilian" nuclear power industry was privatized from the get-go and is a good case in point against privatization. elsewhere. The weapons manufacturing network is a joint private-public venture: GE, Dupont, Westinghouse.... all of whom also profit from the civilian nuke sector. (Ironically, in some aspects the two were more distinct in the USSR than the US.) The nuke lobby likes to claim that the number of accidents and other mishaps at US NPPs is very low, but they are not including the weapons plants, managed by the very same corporations. These places are so dirty, their workers suffer the same health crises as veterans of atomic tests, and the only reason we know so much more about the nightmare that is Hanford, et al. and have seen so much more effort put into cleaning them up is because they are ultimately owned by the DOE. Investigating the history of any NPP, one sees a lot more near disasters than might be expected and a whole lot less transparency. The companies have not built up the piggy banks they are required by law to have - a set percentage of plant costs, annually - to collectively pay for a permanent waste storage site. Cooling ponds are filling up, the current nuke waste dump has or will soon reach capacity and stop accepting wastes - this is a big problem, and the taxpayers are going to end up paying the utilities again (essentially) to deal with it because inaction is not an option.

Energy production is too crucial and complex to manage on the basis of profits. On the basis of economics - sure, of course, we must - but even that needs to come through a democratic decision-making process, which is not what private energy companies are about. Remain ever vigilant, the guys are not to be trusted on any continent.

Check out this photo in the LA Times. Incredible!! Natural inhabitants are reclaiming lost territory in wake of housing market collapse. The next evolutionary step: interspecies cohabitation? They're looking smug, but i imagine that's how anyone living in the LA foothills and not paying taxes would look. Conceptually, it's a charmer.

Did John McLame really describe Iraq War vet Adam Kokesh as "noise" and "static"?
Wow, what a heroic way to show your support for the troops.

Peace Committee of Georgia

Seems like something Code Pink might have issued about the US...

Declaration of the Georgian Peace Committee

Once more Georgia was launched into a situation of chaos and bloodshed. A new fratricide war exploded with renewed strength on Georgian soil. To our great disillusion, the alerts of the Georgian Peace Committee and of progressive personalities of Georgia on the pernicious character of the militarization of the country and on the danger of a pro-fascist and nationalist policy had no effect.

The authorities of Georgia, organized, again, a blood war, feeling the support of some western countries and of regional and international organizations. The shame poured by the current holders of the power over the Georgian people will take decades to be cleansed.

The Georgian army armed and trained by American instructors and using also American armaments, subjected the city of Tskhinvali to a barbaric destruction. The bombings killed Ossetians civilians, our brothers and sisters, children, women and elderly people. Over two thousand inhabitants of Tskhinvali and of its surroundings died.

There also died hundreds of civilians of Georgian nationality, both in the conflict zone as well as on the entire territory of Georgia. The Georgian Peace Committee expresses its deep condolences to the relatives and friends of those who have perished.

The entire responsibility for this fratricidal war, for thousands of children, women and elderly dead people, for the inhabitants of South Ossetia and of Georgia falls exclusively to the current President, to the Parliament and to the Government of Georgia. The irresponsibility and the adventure ship of the Saakachvili regime have no limits. The President of Georgia and his team, undoubtedly, are criminals and must be held responsible. The Georgian Peace Committee, together with all the progressive parties and social movements of Georgia, is going to struggle so that the organizers of this monstrous genocide have a severe and legitimate punishment.

The Georgian Peace Committee declares and asks the broad public opinion not to identify the current Georgian leadership with the people of Georgia, with the Georgian nation, and appeals to all to support the Georgian people in the struggle against the criminal regime of Saakachvili.

We appeal to all the political forces of Georgia, the social movements and the people of Georgia to unite in order to free the country of the anti popular regime, russianfobic and pro-fascist of Saakachvili!

The Georgian Peace Committee

Tbilissi, 11th of August de 2008

(Unofficial translation)

Armed Anthropologists

The idea that the Pentagon can win this bogus 'war on terror' by bringing anthropologists into the battlefield seems yet another indicator of the dementia that has permeated Washington since the Bush junta came to power (at least). Writing in this week's issue of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, my former comrade from Lawrence Livermore nuclear weapons lab protests, Hugh Gusterson, discusses two new programs initiated by Robert Gates, Minister of War: the Human Terrain Team system and Project Minerva. According the Gusterson, the American Anthropological Association has already condemned the first of these and expressed reservations about the second being managed through the war department (as opposed to the National Federation of Scientists, which normally funds social scientists' work on behalf of the federal govt). Anthropologists are widely known to have collaborated with the military during the US-Vietnam war and certainly played a shameful role in the conquest of African and North American territories (et al.) - attempting to quantify savagery in support of colonialism or even genocide - so conceptually and in fact, this is hardly a new idea.... but putting them in military camo and arming them? i know what all my anthropology professors would have said about that: insane, immoral and intellectually infantile.

As Gusterson rightly points out, "Embedded anthropologists are on shaky ethical terrain because they cannot realistically get free consent from their interlocutors while dressed in camouflage and traveling with U.S. soldiers in Humvees. Similarly, they cannot control the use of the information they collect for the military, and thus, cannot ensure it isn't used to harm communities they study." In an illegal war, such activity should put the anthros in the same war criminal category as their counterparts in psychology who "monitor" the torturing of prisoners. It's not anywhere near as sexy as spying on people, which was what happened in Vietnam; imagining how any individual scientist could even consider this to be serious anthropological work on any level boggles the mind.

The Pentagon would be better served by sending anthropologists into AIPAC to gain an understanding of how decision-makers in Washington are so willingly and readily compliant with the zionist agenda. Certainly this falls within the purview of understanding the cultural roots of terror? Discussing terrorism with Arabs, i have always found Israel to be their starting point, and the US' support for israeli terror a close second in justifying the actions of Muslims opting to spread the violence into equal shares for all. That there's never been much equity/balance in this equation is also part of the cultural framework behind it. If i were an Iraqi anthropologist, i'd be very interested in studying how the american military has come to see culture as more operative than history in the current phase of this conflict - or why they believe that culture and history can be separated to promote further conquest and occupation in the Middle East today.

Yet another "height of hypocrisy" from Washington

Al-Jazeera is reporting that the US is pushing to remove the ban on nuclear materials trade with India. The hypocrisy here should be obvious: India is no longer a signatory to the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT), already possesses nuclear weapons, and is not open to IAEA inspections because it is not part of the NPT regime. Compare this to Iran's nuclear status and therein lies the rub.

According to al-Jazeera, "Diplomats close to the suppliers group talks say that France, Russia, Canada, Brazil and South Africa are in favour of an agreement." Let's take a guess as to which countries are engaged in marketing their nuclear technologies in new Delhi, should the exemption for purchase be granted. As far as the US nuclear industry goes, this is one way to build up the necessary wad of investment cash for the much-touted maniacal rejuvenation of the US nuclear power industry - it's been well over 20 years since any new plants were built - on top of the normal military tech profiteering that helps firms like Lockheed Martin maintain their company yachts. The US Congressional Research Service published an interesting report about US-India relations last year; start reading on p. 31 if you'd like to see how many billions in weapons are being sold and to get some idea of Israel's role in assuring the flow of arms into Asia continues to increase.

Pepe Escobar Simplifies the Insanity

Escobar's report speaks for itself, so i'm not going to write much. He calls it Full Spectrum Dominance, a term which actually originated with the US SAC (Strategic Air Command) in their Vision 2020 report (late 1990s, early 2000) and detailed the need for the US to control space militarily. Eventually our piping periodista Pepe gets around to this, bringing in the missile defense shield the US is pushing on the new NATO countries (Poland and Czech Republic are to actually get the anti-missile missiles systems, other countries like Hungary and Romania provide related infrastructural needs). Now, before you start having nightmares that Ronald the Raygun has risen from the dead, think back to that period and like John McCain, you'll probably agree: the Cold War geopolitical framework was a lot easier for voters to warp their brains around than the War on Terror for Oil framework. Enough of this elusive taliban shit, snakey Gulf sheikhs and should or shouldn't psychologists be involved in torture. i'm tired of Guantanamo, i want another Cuban missile crisis. White people threatening other white people makes so much more sense, even to the non-white people who are wrecked in the process.

A Day in the Life

Vladimir Voinovitch, who penned the brilliant satire, Moskva 2042, as well as the Svejk knock off yet classic in its own right, The Life and Extraordinary Adventures of Private Ivan Chonkin, has long been a great favorite of mine. (Feeling bad you forgot my birthday? Send me another book by VV and all will be forgiven.) In my limited universe of Russian writers, Chonkin could probably not have been written had Alexander Solzhenitzyn not first offered up the story of Ivan Denisovich more than a decade prior - how could anyone dare to satirize the insanity of the soviet system before first having a thorough slog through its dark, gulag-muzzled side? In my late teens and early 20s, poured through all the Solzhenitzyn i could find - no minor task (referring here to the reading, not the finding) - an education in the mentalities of the coerced and the coercers, the nature of totalitarianism, blahblahblah in sum they had a strong effect on me simultaneous to being enmeshed in a world of collectivist ideals. So we're sorry to see the writer pass on, but we remember him for his passion and the skill to use it in ways that unquestionably benefitted both the world of literature and the thinkers of freedom. My vodka glass goes belly up in a toast to the greatest of Russia's literary bulldogs.

How creepy to also read today that Berlusconi is putting soldiers on the streets of Rome. The creepiness is not only in the shades of tyranny this implies, but because part of the PM's stated rationale is to protect the Italians from those nasty, no-good immigrants, apparently creeping onto Italy's shores with godzilla-like intentions. Actually, right now the stated problem is not so much those coming by sea, but the overland-travelling Roma, (seen far and wide as the scourge of Europe - yes, still) in spite of thousands of these Roma holding Italian citizenship. The Minister of Defense "dismissed claims that the soldiers would scare tourists or residents, saying the troops could help address citizens' concerns about security." Personally, i don't think tourists are all that likely to ask soldiers with machine guns whether a particular gelaterria presents a clear and present danger, but maybe i'm too jilted when it comes to interacting with so-called security forces. The rounding up of "undesirables" and creation of fear among minority populations - including political minorities - under any circumstance, is one of the things Solzhenitzyn explored in excruciating detail. The message always seemed clear enough to me: it is the shades of grey that put the T into state tyranny.

When Berlucsoni indicated that other cities were also going to have soldiers decorating their sidewalks, a Sicilian mayor asked, "Have we all gone mad?" Evidently his town hasn't had a murder since the 1960's, which is noteworthy given that island's history. Wanna bet that with soldiers on the streets and the carbinieri free to do other interesting things, this bit of statistical reverie might soon be broken? i've yet to attend a demonstration where the rioting wasn't started by the cops, and i can't imagine why anyone in their right mind would believe that expanding the reach of the il-Duce death eaters now with military backup, would bring Italians more peace, or peace of mind. Ok, at least he isn't hiring Blackwater to do the job.... Alas, another day in the life of 21st century Europe. In yet other uplifting news, we're told that nearly half the world's primates are facing extinction. Do we think the fascists are in the soon-to-be-extinct or the not-yet-pegged-for-extinction half? What role does free will play in extinction, anyway?

The Prince of Darkness still shits in his sleep

This blog has mostly steered clear of what's happening in Iraq, not because i don't care, or don't follow the madness that continues to consume Babylon. Au contraire, it is (in fact) the subject of most of the non-fiction tomes i'm able to get my hands on here; i find books are more penetrating and accessible, since they tend to try and offer something analytical about the bigger picture rather than magnify the horrific details of the day to day insanity. Also, to be honest, on some level i'm still in the same fetal weeping position into which i collapsed on the day the invasion began, way back when. (At the time, people said i was over-reacting; 6 years later, i have to admit that what's happened has surpassed even my most morose expectations.) It's hard to know where to start discussing Iraq now, since everything i find myself wanting to say is either riddled with fungal emotion or seems to require a hefty amount of 'background' - folks like Dahr Jamail do that for a living minus the despair, and do a much better job of it than i'll ever be able to.

However, i really can't let the revelation of Richard Perle's dealings in Iraqi oil go unremarked. The Prince of Darkness rises from the cubicle of his office over at American Enterprise Institute or wherever the hell he's been ensconced since the Pentagon revoked his parking space, and aims to make a pretty penny on oil concessions in Kurdistan. That's just so rich, eh? Given Perle's ties to Israel and Israel's ties to the Kurds, on top of US demands that American oil companies get to control the rejuvenation of broken down Iraq's oil industry, i suppose we can hardly be surprised to see him capitalizing on his own debacle. Still, i have to register my utter DISGUST at his totally SHAMELESS PROFITEERING; if there were any justice in this world, he'd be sharing a cell with Mr. Karadzic discussing ways to faith heal his evil little soul (hahaha).

This story was broken yesterday by the Washington Post, but isn't fully accessible there without a subscription. A synopsis here says that Perle is part of a consortium led by Turkish AK Group International, which puts an even more demented spin on the whole situation. Why the Kurds are allowing a Turkish company to come in is beyond my comprehension, but that's the Prince of Darkness for you: no offense exists which cannot be mitigated by fiscal 'diplomacy' or some such Mephistophelan backdrop. Mr. Perle is among that rare breed of en flagrant ideologue who can hypnotize people into believing evil is evolutionary, insurgent wars are missions accomplished and girls blowing themselves up in marketplaces indicates the time is right for foreign investment. Irbil or bust: don't you really really really want to see him go there and dare to walk down the street???

The Price of Mud

Somebody please tell me this isn't really happening, because i don't know how much more guilt i can Zen into oblivion every time i consume a piece of fresh fruit. Haitians are now eating mud cakes as a dietary staple. ("Bad Haitians! How dare you make me feel wretched for living in a land of affordable produce plenty!") Guardian reporter Rory Carroll uses the term misery index when discussing the state of impoverishment in Haiti, a nice economist-friendly indicator to tell us where on the scale of getting fucked by global capitalism a population finds itself. i'd like to think this is his own phrase, yet i fear that it's probably taken from some World Bank report used to justify the continuing strangulation of a functioning society in Haiti and who knows where else: we're past the First World -Fourth World framework now, it's all misery without much company. Does one hope to move up or down the misery index? i've been thinking about this all morning and still can't be sure.

Adding to the insanity of this situation, Carroll writes:

Trucked in from a clay-rich area outside the capital, Port-au-Prince, the mud is costlier but cakes still sell for 1.3p each, about the only item immune from inflation. "We need to raise our prices but it's their last resort and people won't tolerate it," lamented Baptiste, the Cité Soleil baker.

Yes, you read that correctly, mud bakers want to raise their prices... i suppose to cover the ever-rising fuel costs related to trucking the clay into the city. This so sickening and disheartening, i am virtually stupified, speechless. Time to take out our pencil-margined copies of Fanon once again and consider the circular nature of oppression and despair. If i weren't so busy this week, i'd track down the 1970's film Burn! with Marlon Brando, just for a little shot of dominant paradigm subversion - but without the popcorn, that would be too cynical under the circumstances.

Bomb in Budapest

Unlike those going off in Gujarat, Baghdad and Istanbul, the 4 tonne bomb found near the Danube this morning was dropped on the city in WWII and just never exploded. The police had to clear a 1 km radius - 15.000 residents - before the defuse or detonate squad could come in and deal with it. In the past month, two Hungarian bomb squad personnel have died in Afghanistan, so the risk of this one going off was apparently taken quite seriously. News reports now say the "great bomb wasn't dangerous" and tomorrow the excavators can go back to digging up more acreage for more office buildings... more details here and here if you read hungarian.

Lights out in morning rush

So i don´t feel like a total slacker even though there isn´t much time right now to write - and what i´d really like to be writing about this morning is this article about Palestinians torturing each other - thought i´d at least turn people on to Le Clan du Néon. Cute young miscreants, sure to inspire.

A quick shout out to friends and comrades in Baltimore, who are now in the midst of an unraveling police surveillance scandal. Though never integrated into a terrorist investigation of any merit, anti-war and anti-death penalty groups were nonetheless being illegally 'monitored' (like a heartbeat?) by Maryland State Police. Here's a report from the Sun on pressure to hold state hearings on the matter. It will be interesting to see the type of information they were collecting, and whether these clever little insect spies were employed in gathering it.

Have a look at what the lurked upon are up to: National Campaign for Nonviolent Resistance, Baltimore Coalition Against the Death Penalty, Committee to Save Vernon Evans.

Foray into Tibetan history

Just finished reading an article on Tibetan military history by the ever-cynical though often insightful (in spite of his best intentions, apparently) Gary Brecher, who writes a column called The War Nerd for The Exile. Thought i'd pass it on in case anyone reading this is interested in the topic. Here's an excerpt on Britain's invasion of Tibet in the early 20th century:

Younghusband marched into Tibet in December 1903 with a force of Sikhs and Gurkhas—pretty scary mix, like rottweiler plus pit bull. And the Gurkhas were definitely the pit bulls in that pair. Sikhs are very tough but not blood-crazy. The Gurkhas were not only devoted lovers of knife-work, especially on POWs, but ancient enemies of the Tibetans. It didn’t take much to push them to a massacre. The Tibetans knew the British were dangerous and tried not to resist at all. But as the British force pushed farther and farther into Tibet, the local commanders decided to resist. That was a mistake. This wasn’t Tony Blair’s cool Britannia they were dealing with.

His comparison with the Chinese invasion, put in the historical contest of early Tibetan challenges to Chinese hegemony (going back to the first millenium AD), offers up some food for thought and basically lays to rest the premise that Tibet has, historically, been part of China and thus the current occupation by the Chinese govt/PLA just sets things right again at the higher elevations of the Asian continuum. Even if Brecher's account is full of falsehoods (which it may well be; i am - admittedly - no expert on this subject and am unlikely to acquire any expertise on it in either the near or distance future), i do not believe that rectifying the injustices of present day foreign occupations can be managed through a deep historical lens. In terms of finding a path to justice and reconciliation in Tibet in the 21st century, the present is the best we have to work with - and what's fair for the future. When native people talk about thinking of the seventh generation, they are referring to those yet to be born, not those who have already passed into the annals of history and the shifting sands of their bindings.

Criminals & Collaborators: Random thoughts on Karadzic’s capture

It was one of those synchronistic mornings: i put on Radiolina, sat down for the morning news scan and, lo and behold, Radovan Karadzic has been arrested. As reactions from various European entities slowly began to accumulate and the details of his arrest and litanies of his crimes started popping up on all international news sites, i’ve got Manu Chao filling the air space with POLITIK KILLS and i’m just thinking how true that is, no matter which angle of time one chooses to consider things from.

Various EU personages – notably all from the West of Europe – were lauding the Serbian government for catching this guy not merely because of his crimes, which are well-known and well-documented, but because of the commitment demonstrated in meeting a condition set by the EU for Serbia to move towards accession into their fracturing ranks. The same countries that basically let Karadzic carry on with his siege of Sarajevo for years and vacated Sebrenica just in time to miss the massacre, are now patting President Tadic on the back, saying ‘job well done’ by which i suppose they mean ‘thanks for catching a man who made our own negligence more blatant than we’re ever going to fully admit.’ Call me cynical, but everything i’ve ever read about what was happening under Karadzic’s vicious watch makes it abundantly clear that these events were happening on the EU/NATO’s watch, as well. If inaction is a form of action, then letting a war criminal execute his plans has got to qualify on some level as also being a criminal act. Need i add that some of these same individuals – Merkel, Sarkozy, Brown – are still digesting the 18 course meals they enjoyed alongside George Bush in Japan? Excuse me while i go ask my friends from Fallujah whether they agree that the worst of the world’s war criminals is finally behind bars.

However, far be it for me to rain on the parties underway in Sarajevo and elsewhere, since there is definitely cause for celebration. Aleksander Hemon wrote an excellent piece for Balkan Insight about the capture and had this to say about Karadzic:

He fully existed only when organising the genocide, he was invisible and irrelevant before it, and has been invisible ever since. Karadzic’s star shone only against the dark skies of a vast crime. This is why Karadzic is still popular among the Serbs in the Republika Srpska and Serbia proper: like a mythological being, he came out of nowhere to do what needed to be done—wipe out the “Turks” and create an eternal, heavenly kingdom, completing the mythological job started hundreds of years ago in the Battle of Kosovo. He did not care what the world might say—for the world is but a minor distraction in the eternal Serbian struggle to survive and live as the celestial people; he was ever willing to sacrifice even his moral well being for the people.

That there are still people who would publicly support Karadzic boggles the mind a bit, but even the most misguided mythological quests take a long time to lose their appeal (again, i’d note here W’s self-perception of being a superhero tasked with catching Islamic ‘evildoers’). According to al-Jazeera, "Heavily armed Serbian security forces were deployed around the war-crimes court in Belgrade where Karadzic was taken and dozens of Karadzic supporters were reportedly seen gathering near the building chanting 'Karadzic Hero!' and 'Tadic Traitor!' Several were arrested after attacking reporters." Really, what is there to say about this except that these folks should hunker down for the long haul, because their hero is most definitely going to spend the rest of his life behind bars. Innocent until proven guilty? Hey, at least he's getting a trial, which is more than one can say for the 10,000 Palestinians being held in Israeli jails.

In the film 9'11"01, a c ollection of 11 meditations on 9/11- all 11 minutes long – the contribution from Danis Tanovic of Bosnia-Herzegovina has always stuck in my mind as a very realistic look at where we are in the history of human affairs… or, perhaps, where we’ve always been? Tanovic’s piece shows the women of Sebrenica holding their daily march asking for justice; at a minimum, asking for answers. There are just a handful of onlookers, it seems little more than an meditative act. After watching them parade in funereal fashion with their signs and despairing lamentations, we see some of them in a little restaurant watching the news reports of the WTC attacks - in the most subdued way, as if they were seeing a car accident. Although the film concludes with these women standing again in the town square to express their sympathy for the newest victims of unbridled violence, the message seems pretty clear: ‘Hello? America? We are all suffering here. This is not a novel situation, it is simply more of the same.’

For these women - like so many others in the world where terrible atrocities continue to unfold, e.g. Burma - whatever happens to Karadzic is only going to put a dent in their grief. This is not to say that he shouldn’t be brought in shackles to The Hague, that the thousands of people who’ve survived his attempted genocide should be deprived of watching his demise in the official historical records. Personally, i would even suggest that before they lock him up for good and throw away the key, he should be made to run a gauntlet in which every survivor, or surviving family member, has the opportunity to spit on him and scream whatever they like in his face. Let’s just remember that war crimes trials are political trials, in which those most victimized are never those who hold the most power. Yes, there are more of these criminals from the Bosnian war still to be tracked down, and i do sincerely hope they are tracked down; it’s never too late to punish an evildoer - that includes Mssrs. Cheney, Bush, Rumsfield and Wolfowitz. i suppose what i’m trying to say here is that as always, we must remain ever vigilant and remember that those who may be the most vocal admirers of the criminal court’s actions now may also be those most fearful of having their own crimes likewise turn up in the dock.