Block the US-Afghan Security Agreement!

Block the US-Afghan Security Agreement!

Hamid Karzai is right: it compromises Afghan sovereignty and ensures ten more years of US occupation.

Bob Dreyfuss

Despite strong objections from President Hamid Karzai, the United States insists thatAfghanistan must sign, as written, a Bilateral Security Agreement that sets the framework for another decade of US occupation of that war-torn nation. According to the terms of the proposed accord, the United States will be able to maintain up to nine military bases, along with 8,000–12,000 troops (and a smaller contingent of European and other forces), through 2024. Over Afghan opposition, the agreement states that US troops will not be subject to Afghan law for criminal acts—even war crimes. Among the sensible points raised at the eleventh hour by Karzai: that US forces be prohibited from conducting night raids of Afghan homes and that Washington start peace talks between Afghanistan, Pakistan and the Taliban.

A gathering of more than 2,500 Afghan tribal leaders, clerics and national and provincial officials endorsed the accord after a four-day loya jirga, or council, convened by Karzai. But the president himself balked, saying he would sign it only after further negotiation, and perhaps not until after next April’s presidential election—which, Washington says, would be far too late. That dispute, like many others involving Karzai over the past decade, will probably be resolved in America’s favor because Washington holds all the cards. “We can continue to disagree, but at the end of the day, we are the ones who have the troops,” said a US official. So a war that President Obama has repeatedly said is “winding down” may go on for another ten years.

There are crucial questions Obama has failed to address: If the more than 100,000 US troops that occupied Afghanistan after his escalations of 2009 failed to neutralize the Taliban and its allies, how will a far smaller US contingent accomplish that task? How will the Afghan security forces, which have already absorbed $54 billion in US aid since 2002, gain enough strength with another decade of American cash infusions of up to $6 billion a year? Perhaps most important: Where is the US diplomatic strategy to secure an accord between the Afghan government, non-Taliban opposition forces and the Taliban itself?

In fact, diplomacy—especially involving Pakistan, which supports the Taliban; India, which backs the non-Pashtun elements of the old anti-Taliban Northern Alliance; and Iran—is the only way to end the war. Recently the White House learned how effective diplomacy can be in seemingly intractable conflicts. First, Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry veered away from airstrikes against Syria, instead making a deal with Russia to eliminate Syria’s chemical weapons and move toward a Geneva peace conference. Then, ignoring protests from hawks, neoconservatives and many members of Congress, Obama and Kerry reached a historic interim accord with Iran on its nuclear program. Despite off-again, on-again efforts to talk with the Taliban, to Karzai’s frustration, the White House hasn’t pursued a political solution in Afghanistan with the same vigor.

In the meantime, the bilateral agreement could fall apart. A similar effort to establish a security accord with Iraq did collapse, leading to the withdrawal of all US troops. Part of the reason for that failure was the refusal of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and Iraq’s Parliament to agree to some of the same provisions that Karzai finds troubling, including legal immunity for foreign troops. But unlike Iraq, which has vast oil resources, Afghanistan is utterly dependent on foreign aid. Twelve years after the start of the war, Afghanistan is still a basket case, severely limiting Karzai’s ability to follow Maliki’s example. Karzai has spent years walking a political tightrope, objecting to night raids by US Special Forces, assailing American airstrikes that have killed many civilians—once even threatening to join the Taliban himself. Indeed, in his speeches to the loya jirga, Karzai stressed that civilian casualties are an explosive issue. He’s right; in October, on the twelfth anniversary of the war, a special issue of The Nation was devoted to a detailed report on civilians killed by US and allied forces in Afghanistan since 2001. It included a comprehensive, interactive online database highlighting hundreds of incidents, as well as articles exposing the failure of the Pentagon to institutionalize lessons learned about targeting of civilians and the ways civilian casualties help fuel the insurgency.

As shown by popular support in the United States for the diplomatic deals involving Syria and Iran, an exhausted American electorate has no appetite for war. In Congress, the Progressive Caucus and other antiwar members have sharply criticized the proposed Afghan pact. “The possibility of a military presence into 2024 is unacceptable,” said Representative Barbara Lee. “There is no military solution in Afghanistan. After thirteen years and more than $778 billion invested in an unstable country and the corrupt Karzai government, it’s time to bring our troops and tax dollars home.”

Lee and others, including Senator Jeff Merkley, are trying to mobilize antiwar sentiment to force an up-or-down vote on the Afghan agreement. Americans concerned about endless war in Central Asia ought to let members of Congress and the White House know that what’s working with Syria and Iran ought to work for Afghanistan, too.

Casualties inflicted by US forces have taken a serious toll in Afghanistan, as Bob Dreyfuss and Nick Turse documented in an article earlier this year for The Nation.

http://www.thenation.com/article/177388/block-us-afghan-security-agreement#

The Greatest Danger to Israel

The Debacle

The Greatest Danger to Israel is the Stupidity of Its Leaders

by URI AVNERY

The greatest danger to Israel is not the putative Iranian nuclear bomb. The greatest danger is the stupidity of our leaders.

This is not a uniquely Israeli phenomenon. A great many of the world’s leaders are plain stupid, and always have been. Enough to look at what happened in Europe in July 1914, when an incredible accumulation of stupid politicians and incompetent generals plunged humanity into World War I.

But lately, Binyamin Netanyahu and almost the entire Israeli political establishment have achieved a new record in foolishness.

Let us start from the end.

Iran is the great victor. It has been warmly welcomed back into the family of civilized nations. Its currency, the rial, is jumping. Its prestige and influence in the region has become paramount. Its enemies in the Muslim world, Saudi Arabia and its gulf satellites, have been humiliated. Any military strike against it by anyone, including Israel, has become unthinkable.

The image of Iran as a nation of crazy ayatollahs, fostered by Netanyahu and Ahmadinejad, has disappeared. Iran now looks like a responsible country, led by sober and shrewd leaders.

Israel is the great loser. It has maneuvered itself into a position of total isolation. Its demands have been ignored, its traditional friends have distanced themselves. But above everything else, its relations with the US have been seriously damaged.

What Netanyahu and Co. are doing is almost unbelievable. Sitting on a very high branch, they are diligently sawing through it.

Much has been said about the total dependence of Israel on the US in almost all fields. But to grasp the immensity of the folly, one aspect in particular must be mentioned. Israel controls, in effect, the access to the US centers of power.

All nations, especially the smaller and poorer ones, know that to enter the halls of the American Sultan, in order to get aid and support, they have to bribe the doorkeeper. The bribe may be political (privileges from their ruler), economic (raw materials). diplomatic (votes in the UN), military (a base or intelligence “cooperation”), or whatever. If it is big enough, AIPAC will help to gain support from Congress.

This unparalleled asset rests solely on the perception of Israel’s unique position in the US. Netanyahu’s unmitigated defeat on US relations with Iran has badly damaged, if not destroyed, this perception. The loss is incalculable.

Israeli politicians, like most of their colleagues elsewhere, are not well versed in world history. They are party hacks who spend their lives in political intrigues. If they had studied history, they would not have built for themselves the trap into which they have now fallen.

I am tempted to boast that more than two years ago I wrote that any military attack on Iran, either by Israel or the US, is impossible But it was not prophesy, inspired by some unknown deity. It was not even very clever. It was just the result of a simple look at the map. The Strait of Hormuz.

Any military action against Iran was bound to lead to a major war, something in the category of Vietnam, in addition to the collapse of world oil supplies. Even if the US public had not been so war weary, in order to start such an adventure one would not only have to be a fool, but practically mad.

The military option is not “off the table” – it never was “on the table”. It was an empty pistol, and the Iranians knew this well.

The loaded weapon was the sanctions regime. It hurt the people. It convinced the supreme leader, Ali Husseini Khamenei, to completely change the regime and install a new and very different president.

The Americans realized this, and acted accordingly. Netanyahu, obsessed with the bomb, did not. Worse, he still does not.

If it is a symptom of madness to keep trying something that has failed again and again, we should start to worry about “King Bibi”.

To save itself from the image of utter failure, AIPAC has started to order its senators and congressmen to work out new sanctions to be instituted in some indefinite future.

The new leitmotif of the Israeli propaganda machine is that Iran is cheating. The Iranians just can’t do otherwise. Cheating is in their nature.

This might be effective, because it is based on deeply rooted racism. Bazaar is a Persian word, associated in the European mind with haggling and deception.

But the Israeli conviction that the Iranians are cheating is based on a more robust foundation: our own behavior. When Israel started in the 1950s to build up its own nuclear program, with the help of France, it had to deceive the whole world and did so with stunning effect.

By sheer coincidence – or perhaps not – Israel’s Channel 2 TV aired a very revealing story about this last Monday (just two days after the signing of the Geneva accord!) Its most prestigious program, “Fact”, interviewed the Israeli Hollywood producer, Arnon Milchan, a billionaire and Israeli patriot.

In the program, Milchan boasted of his work for Lakam, the Israeli intelligence agency which handled Jonathan Pollard. (Since then it has been dismantled).  Lakam specialized in scientific espionage, and Milchan did invaluable service in procuring in secret and under false pretences the materials needed for the nuclear program which produced the Israeli bombs.

Milchan hinted at his admiration for the South African apartheid regime and at Israel’s nuclear cooperation with it. At the time, a possible nuclear explosion in the Indian Ocean near South Africa mystified American scientists, and there were theories (repeated only in whispers) about an Israeli-South African nuclear device.

A third party was the Shah of Iran, who also had nuclear ambitions. It is an irony of history that Israel helped Iran to take its first atomic steps.

Israeli leaders and scientists went to very great length to hide their nuclear activities. The Dimona reactor building was disguised as a textile factory. Foreigners brought to tour Dimona were deceived by false walls, hidden floors and such.

Therefore, when our leaders speak of deception, cheating and misleading, they know what they are talking about. They respect the Persian ability to do the same, and are quite convinced that this will happen. So are practically all Israelis, and especially the media commentators.

One of the more bizarre aspects of the American-Israeli crisis is the Israeli complaint that the US has had a secret diplomatic channel with Iran “behind our back”.

If there were an international prize for chutzpah, this would be a strong contender.

The “world’s only superpower” had secret communications with an important country, and only belatedly informed Israel about it. What cheek! How dare they?!

The real agreement, so it seems, was not hammered out in the many hours of negotiation in Geneva, but in these secret contacts.

Our government, by the way, did not omit to boast that it knew about this all the time from its own intelligence sources. It hinted that these were Saudi. I would rather suspect that it came from one of our numerous informants inside the US administration.

Be that as it may, the assumption is that the US is obliged to inform Israel in advance about every step it takes in the Middle East. Interesting.

President Obama has obviously decided that sanctions and military threats can only go so far. I think he is right.

A proud nation does not submit to open threats. Faced with such a challenge, a nation tends to draw together in patriotic fervor and support its leaders, disliked as they may be. We Israelis would. So would any other nation.

Obama is banking on the Iranian regime-change that has already started. A new generation, which sees on the social media what is happening around the world, wants to take part in the good life. Revolutionary fervor and ideological orthodoxy fade with time, as we Israelis know only too well. It happened in our kibbutzim, it happened in the Soviet Union, it happens in China and Cuba. Now it is also happening in Iran.

So what should we do? My advice would simply be: if you can’t beat them, join them.

Stop the Netanyahu obsession. Embrace the Geneva deal (because it is good for Israel). Call off the AIPAC bloodhounds from Capitol Hill.Support Obama. Mend the relations with the US administration. And, most importantly, send out feelers to Iran to change, ever so slowly, our mutual relations.

History shows that yesterday’s friends may be today’s enemies, and today’s enemies can be tomorrow’s allies. It already happened once between Iran and us. Apart from ideology, there is no real clash of interests between the two nations.

We need a change of leadership, like the one Iran has begun to embark on. Unfortunately, all Israeli politicians, left and right, have joined the March of Fools. Not a single establishment voice has been raised against it. The new Labor Party leader, Yitzhak Herzog, is part of it as much as Ya’ir Lapid and Tzipi Livni.

As they say in Yiddish: The fools would have been amusing, if they had not been our fools.

URI AVNERY is an Israeli writer and peace activist with Gush Shalom. He is a contributor to CounterPunch’s book The Politics of Anti-Semitism.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/11/29/the-greatest-danger-to-israel-is-the-stupidity-of-its-leaders/

Who Will Protect Libyans Now?

Who Will Protect Libyans Now?

Libya’s Hell, Enabled by Canadian Humanitarians

by MURRAY DOBBIN

Who will protect Libyans now? One of the darkest and most shameful chapters in Western military intervention continues to play out in spades in Libya. Recent news from Benghazi revealed that one of the (literally hundreds) of murderous militias opened fire on peaceful, white-flag-bearing protesters (protesting militias), killing at least 20 and wounding over 130. And they didn’t use just small arms — it was rocket propelled grenades, machine guns and even an anti-aircraft gun. It was, even for a horribly violent context, a disgusting slaughter of innocents.

But we hear nothing from the international choir, led here by Lloyd Axworthy, which sang the “responsibility to protect” (R2P) hymn at the top of their lungs two years ago. The R2P, established by the UN in 2005, has lofty principles but in practice has been used as an excuse for any brutal assault on sovereign nations that serves the capitalist interests of the first world. Responsibility to protect states that sovereignty is not a right, but rests on the responsibility of governments to protect their populations. It is triggered by evidence of any one of four “mass atrocity” crimes: war crimes, genocide, crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing.

None of these, of course, prevailed at the time of the Security Council’s vote in favour of establishing a “no fly” zone to protect civilians from Gadhafi’s fighter jets. But China and Russia abstained because of Western promises of going no further. That, of course, was a Big Lie as the real purpose soon revealed itself and regime change became the end game. When the country could have managed a ceasefire, NATO and Canada declared that could only happen if Gadhafi was gone in complete violation of Resolution 1973. And Canada happened to choose this particular conflict to invest heavily in — both morally and in material support. Stephen Harper made a huge show of our bombing efforts (over 1000 sorties) and boasted that Canada was “punching above its weight” – spending over a million dollars on a ceremony celebrating our role.

What is so infuriating in the history of this hideous “mission” is the complete lack of remorse or shame at what has been “accomplished.” Just like Iraq and Afghanistan, there are no regrets: Imperialism — especially “humanitarian imperialism” — will never admit to its crimes. But it can’t deny the facts, and for citizens attracted to the notion of “responsibility to protect,” the facts are important so that the next time this convenient principle is trotted out there will be more skepticism.

The key facts? There was no “mass rape” ordered by Gadhafi, a claim repeated many times by Hillary Clinton (and eventually refuted by Amnesty International, the UN and even the U.S. Army). There was no bombing of protesters (a fact admitted to by the CIA’s Robert Gates). There was no plan for a “massacre” in Benghazi. Gadhafi offered amnesty to any insurgents who laid down their arms — in contrast the “no mercy” theme played by the Western powers. All of these facts are to be found in Slouching Towards Sirte: NATO’s War on Libya and Africa by Maximilian Forte.

Despite the facts, the stark image of Gadhafi “massacring peaceful protesters” was eagerly promoted by the Western media. Forte refutes this, establishing that rebels from the very beginning “torched police stations, broke into the compounds of security services, attacked government offices and torched vehicles.” Even then the government did not respond militarily but only with police. It wasn’t until rebels began to occupy the Benghazi army barracks that the situation escalated to civil war.

Fast forward to the sickening results of the R2P intervention and you will understand where this reckless and cynical military adventure fits in the recent record of NATO countries (Germany abstained in the R2P vote to its everlasting credit) in the Muslim world. The current situation in Libya is so out-of-control that chaos and bloodshed rule virtually everywhere. The Muslim Brotherhood Prime Minister Ali Zeidan was even kidnapped (briefly) by one of the many militias he actually hired to try to maintain a semblance of security (the army and police are in total disarray). The newly elected Congress has ceased to function as the opposition parties have walked out in protest over the Zeidan government’s authoritarian style — leaving it with little moral authority.

Tribal militias are now organizing to take on the Islamist government effectively imposed on the country by the U.S. The central government has virtually no authority outside Tripoli, and even there control over the city is divided up among armed gangs. Services everywhere have all but collapsed and the “government” will run out of money by the end of the year — meaning it will not be able to pay salaries of any kind.

Instead of a new model democracy blathered on about by the warmongers after Gadhafi’s murder, we are fast approaching the situation that has prevailed in Somalia for over a decade: a completely failed state. Once that situation is established it will take a generation or more to return to some kind of normalcy.

The big brains in America’s multi-billion dollar intelligence conglomerate apparently didn’t think of what would happen when dozens of militias, al-Qaida cells and criminal armed gangs raided the many arms depots across the country (in addition to getting hundreds of tonnes of arms from NATO). Libya is now described as the biggest open arms bazaar in the world, where the most sophisticated weapons can be purchased by anyone with enough cash. Setting aside the fact that many of these weapons are finding their way to other conflict areas, there is enough weaponry available to keep the conflict in Libya going for years.

It is not only Western governments and their compliant media who don’t want to talk about the chaos and violence unleashed by our humanitarianism. The transnational corporations which were the intended beneficiaries are saying little, but they cannot be happy. The huge infrastructure projects they were building for Gadhafi are all in limbo and so, too, are the contracts enjoyed by the major oil companies. It was mostly about oil that regime change was conceived. (Gadhafi had threatened them: “We do not trust [Western oil] firms, they have conspired against us… Our oil contracts are going to Russian, Chinese and Indian firms.”)

But the euphoria over the fact that oil facilities were not damaged has now turned to despair as almost no oil is flowing to the EU countries that took the lead on the bombing. All those lunatic militias which the West indiscriminately armed to the teeth are now occupying the oil fields, and production has plummeted. For a while it was normal — 1.4 million barrels a day. But then the armed guards hired by the Brotherhood government to protect eastern oilfields decided to seize them. That was followed shortly after by a similar seizure of the southern fields by another tribal group. Production is now down to 150,000 barrels a day, with only 80,000 being exported. Without that 1.4 million a day, the central government is rapidly draining the country’s cash reserves.

This is the state of “democratic” Libya — a hideous “Arab winter” if ever there was one. As I recounted in an earlier column, it is crystal clear why Gadhafi was removed. And it wasn’t just the oil. Gadhafi had been responsible more than any other African leader for creating independent institutions that challenged those of the West — including an African communications satellite with low fees, the African Investment Bank, the African Monetary Fund and the African Central Bank. All of these latter institutions were a direct threat to Western financial capital.

The collateral damage done by our humanitarian “liberation” includes the regime (however repressive) that boasted Africa’s highest standard of living, a literacy rate above 90 per cent, the lowest infant mortality rate and the highest life expectancy of all of Africa, free medical care and education, and the highest Human Development Index of any country on the continent. All of this is now threatened. Neither Western politicians (including the NDP and Liberals in Canada who supported the bombing campaign) nor the Western media has ever talked about these war facts and they never will.

While it pales in comparison to the misery inflicted on the people of Libya, the whole sordid tale is also one of the alarming assault on democracy in Canada and elsewhere in the West. Democracy can only work with an informed citizenry. While we were poorly served as citizens by mainstream coverage of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, some of the truth did manage to get out — enough that Canadians were increasingly opposed to the latter and refused to support the former. That’s what can happen when citizens actually have access to the truth.

But the truth is a threat to the U.S. Empire and its junior partners like Harper and ever greater efforts will be made to deny it to us. This time, our allegedly democratic governments and their compliant media managed to cover up the ugly truth — and continue to do so. We should all be worried.

MURRAY DOBBIN, now living in Powell River, BC has been a journalist, broadcaster, author and social activist for over forty years.  He can be reached at murraydobbin@shaw.ca

It's Important to Know How the Stories We Tell Ourselves -- True, or Not-- Shape our World... for Better or Worse

When no one knows what comes next, the political advantage goes to the most powerful narrators.

 Marty Kaplan

So where are we in the Iran narrative?

I mean no disrespect to the victims of Iran’s terrorist clients, or the existential fears of Israelis and world Jewry, or U.S. security interests in the Middle East by calling it a narrative. Real events do happen in the real world, but people can’t help trying to fit them into larger stories.  We love to connect the dots.  Storytelling isn’t some atavistic So where are we in the Iran narrative?

Iremnant of our pre-scientific past; it’s how our brains are hardwired.

Today, with the advantage of hindsight, a reasonably explanatory Iran narrative would connect these dots:  In 1951, Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh nationalizes the British-owned oil industry.  In 1953, Mossadegh is ousted in a coup arranged by the CIA and MI6, and we put the Shah on the throne.  In 1979, he – and we – were thrown out by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and Shia revolutionaries, and it’s been ugly between us and them ever since.  Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad never denied his desire to see Israel annihilated, which made it especially scary that he was barreling toward a nuclear bomb.  But our sanctions hurt Iran.  He was thrown out, and Iran got a new president, Hassan Rouhani, who sent Jews Rosh Hashanah greetings.  He said he would come to the table, and now there’s a deal.

Good deal, or bad deal?  Here’s where hindsight fails us.  We don’t know the ending of the story yet.  So we have to figure out a way to tell the story going forward without knowing whether Geneva will be the coffin nail in Israel’s security, or if it will be more like the destruction of Syrian weapons, a sign that talk can sometimes be at least as effective as, and always less costly than, military action.

There’s no question facts will play a part in how we rate the deal, but there’s too much input bombarding us to process as data.  What will win the day isn’t the power of facts, but the power of one story or another to feel right – yes, an emotion; we will retroactively find the facts we need to make our path to that feeling seem rational.

The public sphere is where competing storylines slug their way out, it’s where politicians, journalists, experts and yakkers connect the dots, find patterns and fashion narratives.  We take all that in, spoiler-free, in a state of genre-blindness, not knowing whether we’re watching a tragedy or an adventure play out. 

This process is often accused of being powered by political ideology, moral bias, religious dogma or personal psychology, and all that may be true to some degree, but I think the underestimated driver is our innate need for narrative.  Once upon a time isn’t kid stuff; it’s species stuff.

However, stories that feel right may be clueless about reality.  We are chronically required to revise the patterns we see in the past because we’re forced to absorb history’s hairpin turns.  At any given moment, there’s a fair chance that the stories we tell ourselves about the world are goofy.

My first job after graduate school was at the Aspen Institute, which was then deep into a relationship with the Shah of Iran and his wife, Empress Farah Dibah.  In September 1975, their Pahlavi Foundation’s generosity enabled Aspen to invite more than 100 guests to a week at the Aspen Institute/Persepolis Symposium, with trips to Isfahan, Shiraz and Tehran, during which the Shah showed off his reforms and the richness of Iranian cultural history.  The Institute reciprocated by inviting the Shabanou to Aspen, where she (and I, a peon) attended a trout fry on the Roaring Fork River under the eye of SAVAK sharpshooters.  Locals nicknamed her the Shah Bunny.

I can’t find the coffee table book about Iran that I scored during her visit, but I did turn up “Iran: Past, Present and Future,” which arose from the Persepolis Symposium.  Maybe it’s unfair to compare the book with what actually happened in reality, but as for Iran: Past, the name of Mohammad Mossadegh does not appear in the book, and as for Iran: Future, Islam is also MIA.

I forget that level of ignorance is normal.  That’s how untrustworthy our stories are.  That’s also what creates an opportunity to appeal to our passions.  President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry may say the Geneva agreement is a short easing of some sanctions in exchange for a delay in Iran’s nuclear program, during which more negotiations can occur.  But for the counter-narrative to that, there’s Texas Republican John Cornyn, who tweeted, “Amazing what WH will do to distract attention to O-care,” proving that the senator is himself something of an expert on distracting attention. 

To other storyteller-critics of the accord, like Prime Minister Netanyahu, the dot that threatens to come next after Geneva is continuous with a narrative that began in Munich in 1938, with Neville Chamberlain’s appeasement of Hitler; includes the story of Gush Etzion, where Jews living on land they purchased from Arabs in the early 1920s were massacred in 1948; and now threatens to conclude with Israel’s nuclear annihilation. 

For Haaretz columnist Ari Shavit, too, “The Geneva mindset resembles a Munich mindset: It would create the illusion of peace-in-our-time while paving the way to a nuclear-Iran-in-our-time.”  Yet though Shavit’s narrative about Geneva ends where Nethyahu’s does, he gets there via plot points that Netanyahu never would include: the expulsion, torture and killing of Arabs in the 1940s, which he calls in his new book, “My Promised Land,” “the dark secret of Zionism”: “the nation I am born into has erased Palestine from the face of the earth.” 

By contrast, a recent RAND report – “Iran After the Bomb: How Would a Nuclear-Armed Tehran Behave?” – thinks the unthinkable.  Even if Geneva fails, RAND’s story goes, “it is very unlikely that Iran would use nuclear weapons against Israel, given the latter’s overwhelming conventional and nuclear military superiority”; “a nuclear-armed Iran is unlikely to extend its nuclear deterrent to groups such as Hizballah or Hamas.”  If RAND’s story turns out to be wrong, perhaps those dual unlikelihoods will become plot points in a tale about think tank blindness.   But if RAND is right, then a pre-emptive military strike on Iran’s nuke-building capacity will turn out to be at best temporarily effective, and a nuclear-armed Iran will be as determinative of Israel’s existence as a nuclear-armed North Korea is to America’s survival. 

When no one knows what comes next, the political advantage goes to the most powerful narrators.  When no one knows how things will end up, the same events can be construed as signposts toward tragedy or triumph.  The Geneva deal may turn out to advance America’s Middle East interests; it may be a historic blunder; it may make no difference.  But as we lay odds on those outcomes, it’s useful to recall that the lessons of history are more art than science, and the art is the skill of the storyteller

http://www.alternet.org/media/its-important-know-how-stories-we-tell-ourselves-true-or-not-shape-our-world-better-or-worse?paging=off&current_page=1#bookmark

Abe's 'new nationalism' a throwback to Japanese imperialism?

Is Shinzo Abe's 'new nationalism' a throwback to Japanese imperialism?

The escalating standoff in the Pacific is seen by Beijing and Seoul as proof that Japan is reviving its military mindset

Simon Tisdall in Yokosuka

The deepening confrontation between Japan and its giant neighbour,China, over a disputed island chain, which this week sucked in US military forces flying B-52 bombers, holds no terrors for Kenji Fujii, captain of the crack Japanese destroyer JS Murasame.

As a battleship-grey drizzle sweeps across Yokosuka harbour, home port to the Japan maritime self-defence force and the US Seventh Fleet, Fujii stands four-square on his helicopter deck, a totemic red Japanese sun-ray ensign flapping at the flagstaff behind him. His stance exudes quiet purposefulness.

The Murasame, armed with advanced missiles, torpedoes, a 76mm rapid-fire turret cannon and a vicious-looking Phalanx close-in-weapons-system (CIWS) Gatling gun, is on the frontline of Japan's escalating standoff with China and its contentious bid to stand up for itself and become a power in the world once again. And Fujii clearly relishes his role in the drama.

Asked whether he will be taking his ship south, to the hotly disputed waters off the Senkaku islands in the East China sea (which China calls the Diaoyu and claims as its own), Fujii smiles and bows. His executive officer, acting as translator, explains that "for security and operational reasons" the captain cannot comment. The situation there is just too sensitive.

The name Murasame means "passing shower". But Japan's decision last year to in effect nationalise some of the privately owned Senkakus– officials prefer to call it a transfer of property rights – triggered a prolonged storm of protest from China, which has been sending ships to challenge the Japanese coastguard ever since.

So far, there have been no direct armed exchanges, but there have been several close shaves, including a Chinese navy radar lock-on and the firing of warning shots by a Japanese fighter plane.

China's weekend declaration of an exclusive "air defence identification zone" covering the islands was denounced by Tokyo and Washington and sharply increased the chances of a military clash. US B-52 bombers and Japanese civilian airliners have subsequently entered the zone, ignoring China's new "rules".

On Tuesday, Beijing said it had monitored the flights; its next move is awaited with some trepidation.

For Shinzo Abe, Japan's conservative prime minister who marks one year in office next month, the Senkaku dispute is only one facet of a deteriorating east Asian security environment that is officially termed "increasingly severe" and which looks increasingly explosive as China projects its expanding military, economic and political power beyond its historical borders.

One year on, Abe's no-nonsense response is plain: Japan must loosen the pacifist constitutional bonds that have held it in check since 1945 and stand up forcefully for its interests, its friends and its values. The way Abe tells it, Japan is back – and the tiger he is riding is dubbed Abe's "new nationalism".

It is no coincidence that high-level contacts with China and South Koreahave been in deep freeze ever since Abe took office, while the impasse over North Korea has only deepened. Unusually, a date for this year's trilateral summit between Japan, China and South Korea has yet to be announced.

The Beijing and Seoul governments profess to view Abe's efforts to give Japan a bigger role on the world stage, forge security and defence ties with south-east Asian neighbours, and strengthen the US alliance as intrinsically threatening – a throwback to the bad old days of Japanese imperialism.

Abe is also charged with arrogance, chauvinism and historical revisionism, by minimising or ignoring wartime legacies such as thecontroversy over Korean "comfort women" who were forced into prostitution by Japanese troops during the second world war.

Addressing the UN general assembly in September, Abe set an unapologetically expansive global agenda for a newly assertive Japan. Whether the issue was Syria, nuclear proliferation, UN peacekeeping, Somali piracy, development assistance or women's rights, Tokyo would have its say. "I will make Japan a force for peace and stability," Abe said. "Japan will newly bear the flag of 'proactive contribution to peace' [his policy slogan]."

Referring to the initial success of his "Abenomics" strategy to revive the country's economic fortunes, he went on to promise Japan would "spare no pains to get actively involved in historic challenges facing today's world with our regained strength and capacity … The growth of Japan will benefit the world. Japan's decline would be a loss for people everywhere."

Just in case Beijing missed his drift, Abe spelled it out: as a global trading nation, Japan's reinvigorated "national interest" was existentially linked to freedom of navigation and open sea lanes around the Senkakus and elsewhere. "Changes to the maritime order through the use of force or coercion cannot be condoned under any circumstances."

Akio Takahara, professor of international relations and law at Tokyo university, said such statements made clear the Senkaku standoff was potentially precedent-setting for all the countries of the region, including Vietnam and the Philippines, which have their own island disputes with Beijing.

"[Senkaku] must be viewed as an international issue, not just a bilateral issue … and it is very, very dangerous. They [China] must stop the provocations," Takahara said. "If Japan did buckle, it would send a very bad message to China's hardliners, they would be triumphant and the modernisers and reformers would be marginalised."

A senior government official was more terse: "We don't want to see China patrolling the East and South China seas as though they think they own them."

Abe's forcefulness has produced forceful reactions. In a recent editorial, South Korea's Joongang Daily, lambasted him as "one of the most rightwing politicians in Japan in decades". It continued: "Buoyed by the nationalist mood sweeping Japanese society since Abe took the helm of the once-pacifist nation, [rightwing politicians] are increasingly regressing to a militarist path … As a result, the political situation of north-east Asia is becoming shakier than ever."

Pure hyperbole, say Abe's defenders. Tensions were high primarily as a result of China's aggressive bid for hegemonic regional leadership, a senior foreign ministry official insisted, while describing the antagonistic South Korean leadership's anti-Japan behaviour as "strange" and "emotional".

Abe's premise, said government spokeswoman Kuni Sato, was that, after years of restraint, "Japan can now do what other countries do within international law". What Abe was doing was "necessary and justified" in the face of China's diplomatic hostility and rapid military buildup, said Yuji Miyamoto, a former ambassador to Beijing.

"Only three countries don't understand this policy – China, South Korea and North Korea," said Nobuo Kishi, the prime minister's younger brother and senior vice-minister for foreign affairs. In contrast, the members of Asean (Association of South-East Asian Nations) were mostly on board.

Abe's advancing security agenda suggests his second year in office will be even more rumbustious than the first. It includes creating a national security council modelled on the US and British versions (David Cameron and William Hague have offered their advice), a new national security strategy, revamped defence guidelines, and a harsh state secrets law.

Criticised by the UN and the main opposition parties, the proposed lawthreatens long jail sentences for whistleblowers and journalists who break its vague, catchall provisions. Abe has increased the defence budget for the first time in years, is overseeing an expansion of naval and coastguard capabilities (Japan's maritime self-defence force, or navy, is already the second biggest in Asia by tonnage), and has gathered expert support for a reinterpretation of article 9 of Japan's pacifist constitution to allow "collective self-defence" – meaning that if the US or another ally is attacked, Japanese armed forces will join the fight.

On the diplomatic front, Abe is busily wooing his Asian neighbours. Having visited all 10 members of Asean in his first year, he will host a gala Asean summit in Tokyo on 13 December that looks very much like an anti-China jamboree.

He comprehensively outflanked Beijing during this month's typhoon emergency in the Philippines, sending troops, ships and generous amounts of aid, the biggest single overseas deployment of Japanese forces since 1945 – while China was widely criciticised for donating less financial aid that the Swedish furniture chain Ikea.

Abe is also providing 10 coastguard vessels to the Philippines to help ward off Chinese incursions. Improved security and military-to-military co-operation with Australia and India form part of his plans.

Officials insist, meanwhile, that the US relationship remains the bedrock of Japanese security. Taking full advantage of Barack Obama's so-called "pivot to Asia", Abe's government agreed a revised pact in October with the US secretary of state, John Kerry, and the defence secretary, Chuck Hagel, providing for a "more robust alliance and greater shared responsibilities".

With a wary eye on China, the pact envisages enhanced co-operation in ballistic missile defence, arms development and sales, intelligence sharing, space and cyber warfare, joint military training and exercises, plus the introduction of advanced radar and drones. Japan is also expected to buy American advanced weapons systems such as the F35 fighter-bomber and two more Aegis-equipped missile defence destroyers.

Washington is positively purring with pleasure over Abe's tougher stance. "The US welcomed Japan's determination to contribute proactively to regional and global peace and security," a joint statement said. The pact reflected "shared values of democracy, the rule of law, free and open markets and respect for human rights". But Abe's opponents fear the country is developing a new military mindset.

What the Japanese public makes of what seems to amount overall to a landmark post-war shift in the scope and ambition of Japan's regional and global engagement is hard to gauge.

China's disapproval ratings are a record high 94%, but a big majority (80%) of people polled also believe good bilateral relations are important. Many cling to the old pacifist verities but many others now understand the world around Japan is changing fast and unpredictably, said Kuni Miyake of Tokyo's Canon Institute for Global Studies.

"Despite his conservative, hawkish image, Abe is in fact a very pragmatic, reasonable politician. But he is also proud of Japan and he is saying it's OK to be proud," Miyake said.

"A huge power shift is going on in east Asia. Before Abe and the new era, we were day-dreaming. We thought we could follow pacifism, not threaten anybody, have no army, and the world would leave us alone. We were in a bubble. And it worked because of the US alliance, not because of pacifism.

"The next generation doesn't believe that … People are aware that prayers for peace are not enough. We have to deter many potential aggressors. If China insists on being a Pacific power and challenges the US-Japan hegemony at sea, a showdown is inevitable," Miyake said.

For Takahara, the opposite holds true. There were limits to what Japan could do when faced by China's rising power and Abe's approach was fraught with peril. "There is really no choice but to use diplomacy and dialogue to mend ties with China," Takahara said.

"Abe is very rightwing by traditional measures. He is a historical revisionist at heart. He would really like to visit the Yasukuni shrinewhere Japan's war dead are remembered. He is a nationalist … But Abe won't succeed with his 'new nationalism'. We are a post-industrial society. There's no way the youngsters will go along."

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/27/japan-new-nationalism-imperialism-shinzo-abe

THE NATIONAL-SECURITY STATE’S CHILDISHLY DANGEROUS TAUNT AGAINST CHINA

by Jacob G. Hornberger

It didn’t take long for the U.S. national-security state’s “pivot” toward Asia, after its disastrous 12-year foray into the Middle East, to produce a new crisis for Americans. In response to China’s decision to implement a new air zone involving a long territorial dispute with Japan over a group of islands, the U.S. military sent two B-52 bombers flying over the zone to test China’s resolve, proving that China is just a “paper tiger” given that it didn’t shoot the planes out of the sky.

It was a childishly dangerous taunt. What would have happened if China had shot down the planes? Then what? Would the U.S. national-security state have stood idly by, thereby exposing itself to being accused of being a paper tiger? I don’t think so. To show its resolve, the U.S. government would have had to retaliate with some sort of bombing campaign against China.

Don’t forget, after all, that under our system of government the president can now send the entire nation into war without a congressional declaration of war.

More fundamentally, why should an island dispute between China and Japan be any business of the U.S. government? Would you be willing to give up your life to help Japan win its fight for those islands? Are you willing to sacrifice your spouse or your children for the sake of those islands?

Americans have become so accustomed to living under a giant military empire that it doesn’t even occur to many of them to question the entire concept of a worldwide military empire, one that polices the world with B-52s, pouring fuel on ancient conflicts and taunting nations into doing something about it. Such Americans just continue deferring to their old Cold War national-security state, believing that U.S. military officials know best.

Don’t forget that it was a war between Japan and China that motivated President Franklin Roosevelt to provoke the Japanese prior to America’s entry into World War II. Ironically, at that time Roosevelt was taunting the Japanese and taking the side of the China.

I wonder how many Americans realize that treaty obligations, not to mention tens of thousands of U.S. troops that are still occupying Japan notwithstanding that World War II ended a long time ago, require the United States to go to war on the side of Japan if Japan gets into a war with China? How many Americans are ready and willing to involve themselves in that sort of Asian war, especially after more than a decade of warfare in Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Pakistan, and elsewhere?

And where is the money for such a war supposed to come from? Do we really need to remind everyone that the government continues to lift its debt ceiling on a perpetual basis because its expenditures continue to far exceed its income? Do we really need to remind ourselves that the federal government is heading our nation into financial and economic bankruptcy?

Ever since the advent of the national-security state, Americans have lived lives filled with constant crises, chaos, war, strife, conflict, and fear. It’s all so unnecessary. Look at Switzerland, whose foreign policy mirrors that of America’s Founding Fathers. Do you see the Swiss getting embroiled in disputes between China and Japan or between any other nations? No, their government minds its own business and is strictly limited to the defense of the country.

With the war on terrorism fading, the national-security state would love nothing more than to revive its beloved Cold War, once again inculcating the American people with fears of communism and threats of nuclear war. Fear is the coin of the realm when it comes to the national security state. And new enemies — or even old enemies renewed — are always necessary, even if one has to generate them.

Americans have a grand opportunity, one that they had when the Cold War ended. They have the opportunity to dismantle the entire national-security state apparatus and foreign military empire that was engrafted onto our constitutional structure after World War II, without even the semblance of a constitutional amendment. They have the opportunity to embrace, once again, the foreign policy of non-intervention on which our nation was founded.

If Americans choose instead to keep the national-security state and worldwide military empire in existence and to continue embracing an interventionist foreign policy that butts into everyone’s disputes, they had better prepare themselves for a continuation of perpetual crises, chaos, and war, not to mention national bankruptcy.

http://fff.org/2013/11/27/the-national-security-states-childishly-dangerous-taunt-against-china/

MA in art and politics:

MA in art and politics: art that changes the world

Want to use your art to shake things up? Theo Price found a master's in art and politics combined the two things he valued most

Natasha Slee

It was by typing his interests into Google that Theo Price discovered the masters degree he would go on to study: art and politics.

Art and politics might not seem an obvious combination, but when you think about it, contemporary art often does have a political message, says Price who completed the course studying part time at Goldsmiths, University of London

"Art gives you a freedom to explore politics in a way that everyday politics doesn't always allow. Art provides a different perspective."

Price studied a BA in fine art at Sheffield Hallam University, where his interest was sparked by an "art activist" who lectured at his university.

Price says: "That was a big influence on me and inspired me to do a lot of performance and political work."

If you think political art is serious and humourless, think again. "I was a clown for a while," says Price, when talking about what he did for the 10 years between his BA and MA.

"We set up the Clandestine Insurgent Rebel Clown Army: activist clowns. We would 'arrest' politicians at the G8. We toured Palestine, and Sri Lanka after the tsunami, calling for social and environmental justice. It was activism, but through a creative lens."

After a decade of campaigning, the MA presented an opportunity to reflect upon his ideas.

Price says: "I thought it was a good idea, to kick myself up the arse a bit. My projects up to that point had been one-dimensional.

"An MA like art and politics is 80% theoretical, so I knew I'd be thrown a lot of theory I hadn't had the confidence to read before. I wanted to challenge myself."

Price, who is dyslexic, found the required reading a challenge. "I did two hours reading a night," he says.

Receiving a distinction for every essay came as a happy surprise, and made him think again about his academic potential.

He says: "Suddenly you realise you have this theoretical weaponry to inform your work and your position in the world. It's addictive."

Of the 120 credits that make up the art and politics MA, 30 are for project work. Price says: "The tutors call it, 'putting your ideas into the world'. We were taking philosophy for a walk."

Price and four other students chose Millwall Football Club as their project site. After winning the trust of the club, they put on three events:

• A football match between Goldsmiths and Millwall's youth club opened the project, removing barriers between locals and Goldsmiths students.

• An extract from composer Jocelyn Pook's football opera Ingerland, was played during half time of a home game. Price says: "In the opera, there are Millwall chants, so when we played it, loads of fans started joining in. We felt like we'd had a mini-breakthrough."

• A Millwall supporter and former dockworker called Bernie gave a talk in Canary Wharf's HSBC tower, a former docklands site. "We were trying to bring these two worlds together. Bernie was so much more interesting than the bankers."

Price now runs Cobra: A Critical Response, a project that comments on the top-level Cobra meetings called by the government when crises erupt at home and abroad.

Price has drawn artists together to produce work in the aftermath of Algeria's hostage situation in January, the murder of Lee Rigby in May, and the shopping centre massacre in Kenya in September. The project responds to the crisis itself, but also questions whether Cobra meetings are a political tool.

"The last three times Cobra has convened have been because of terrorism. Considering the many other emergencies happening in the world, it's interesting."

Price is a fan of part-time study. He says: "The MA is very intense, and part-time study allowed me to form my perspectives gradually."

He was inspired by theorists more than artists. "How can I reinterpret that theory, how can I use that in the world? That's the game," he says. "Art has got to have an element of intrigue, or cheekiness. Something to capture people's imagination. And then it takes off."

http://www.theguardian.com/education/2013/nov/27/postgraduate-art-and-politics

Senkaku islands row reflects broader tensions between China and Japan

Experts say chances of head-on collision between the world's second and third biggest economies are growing

Simon Tisdall in Tokyo

The potentially explosive struggle between China and Japan for physical control of the energy-rich Senkaku islands in the East China Sea reflects broader security, ideological and historical tensions between the two east Asian leviathans, the world's second and third biggest economies respectively, which could yet produce a head-on collision, Japanese officials and analysts say.

According to a senior government adviser, the security situation in the east Asian region has begun to resemble Europe in the 1930s, when a resurgent, re-arming Germany began to project its power beyond its borders.

China's declared defence budget has expanded five times over in 10 years to $102bn (£63bn) in 2012, almost double Japan's, the adviser said. For its part, Tokyo says it wants to talk, but is busily boosting its military and security capabilities and alliances.

"China tries to present a smile to the world but it will always revert to bullying when it suits it," the adviser said. "They have bigger guns and bigger money than us, but they can't lead. They have no vision for the world … Integrating China into the global mainstream is the biggest challenge of this century. I hope they will be like us one day. But it may not happen."

Yoshiji Nogami of the Japan Institute of International Affairs said European governments and businesses were failing to appreciate or understand the extremely high levels of instability in east Asia, partly because of "wishful thinking" arising from a desire to profit from China's vast markets.

"The US-Japan security alliance is expanding in scope in the South China Sea, not only in the East China Sea. The Australians and the Indians are getting involved, too, so if things deteriorate further, it potentially gets very dramatic," Nogami said.

"China is not going to back off. It views the East China Sea as a core interest. But so too does the US forward-deployed navy and Japan. So how do we manage this clash of core interests? I think the situation can ultimately be managed, but for the next decade or more the atmosphere will be very uncomfortable."

Officials complained that like its predecessors, China's new leadership under its president, Xi Jinping, was willing to whip up residual anti-Japanese sentiment to distract attention from the country's severe social and economic problems. Portraying Japan as a threat also served the People's Liberation Army, which used it to justify increased weapons budgets.

Following acceptance of his "reform" programme at the Communist party's central committee plenum earlier this month, Xi was emerging as the strongest Chinese leader since Deng Xiaoping (who died in 1997), the officials said.

His approach to external (as well as internal) security and defence issues was uncompromising, and on occasion confrontational, the officials said.

There is deep frustration in Tokyo that Beijing does not give more weight to Japanese support for China's development. "There are 20,000 Japanese companies investing in China, mostly in manufacturing, employing 10 million Chinese workers," a senior official said. Two-way trade was very important for both countries, but China's behaviour often jeopardised it, and Japanese businesses were beginning to look elsewhere.

"Japan and China have tremendous communication problems," said Yuji Miyamoto, a former Japanese ambassador to Beijing, pointing to China's suspicions over what it views as reviving nationalism in Japan under conservative prime minister Shinzo Abe. "There is no dialogue at present. Neither leader has an incentive to deal. We need a confidence-building process," he said.

"It is too early to say whether China is a threat to Japan. There are conflicting currents [in the Beijing leadership]. One group definitely wants a superpower position in the world. Other groups say China needs co-operative relationships. I don't know which way it will go. But Japan and the international community still have time to influence China's decision."

For Japan, the unstable outlook in east Asia is compounded by uncertainty over the unpredictable behaviour of nuclear-armed North Korea.

"If Kim [Jong-un, the North Korean dictator] goes crazy, he could blow up everything. Tokyo would collapse," the senior government adviser said. Japan's relations with South Korea are also at a low point, poisoned by renewed recriminations over second world war legacies.

For all these reasons, Miyamoto said, the US-Japan alliance was more important than ever. "We need a long-term regional security framework. But we need the US more, until such a framework can safeguard every country. Because, at present, the situation is so fragile, so unstable, so insecure."

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/27/senkaku-islands-broader-tensions-china-japan