Remembering 911

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The US government and state terrorism

We share this piece for our reader's interest.  Reprinted from AlterNet.org

5 Acts of Terror By the People We Chose to Protect Us

Americans are led to believe in a terrorist threat that may or may not exist while the corporate/military/political complex creates 'terror' to safeguard the assets of the rich.

Photo Credit: Shutterstock.com/ Suzanne Tucker

September 8, 2013  |  

Every clear-thinking American knows that education and jobs are needed more than armed guards in poor neighborhoods. But average Americans are led to believe in a terrorist threat that may or may not exist, and that in any case is greatly exaggerated, while the corporate/military/political complex creates new forms of terror to safeguard the assets of the rich.
1. War Terror

It started with our leaders comparing notes on Iraq:

Cheney 08/26/02: There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction.
Cheney 09/14/03: We never had evidence that he had acquired a nuclear weapon.

Powell 02/05/03: Iraq today has a stockpile of between 100 and 500 tons of chemical weapons agents.
Powell 09/13/04: I think it's unlikely that we will find any stockpiles.

Bush 05/29/03: We found the weapons of mass destruction.
Bush 10/08/04: I wasn't happy when we found out there wasn't weapons.

In the first  Iraqi war, two air missions per minute were conducted over 43 days, with the equivalent of  seven Hiroshima bombsdropped on a largely defenseless country. Much of the slaughter was caused by  "dumb bombs" that fell on civilian areas. U.S. troops attacked retreating Iraqi soldiers with cluster bombs and  napalm as American pilots, adopting metaphors such as 'turkey shoot' and 'fish in a barrel,' conducted target practice from above. Some Iraqis were  buried alive by bulldozers that spread tons of sand over them.

In the end, at least  190,000 Iraqi lives were destroyed in a war that cost over $2.2 trillion. A  Johns Hopkins study puts the tally much higher, with an estimate of 650,000 Iraqi deaths.

2. Drone Terror

In Pakistan, civilians can hear the  droning in the sky all day long. Said one resident: "I can't sleep...when the drones are there...I hear them making that sound, that noise. The drones are all over my brain." A humanitarian worker added, "I was in New York on 9/11...This is what it is like."

When bombings kill townspeople, their family and friends are often afraid to run to their aid, because standard procedure is to bomb the first responders. Afterwards the funerals are sometimes bombed.

A Pew survey reported that  75%of Pakistanis consider us their enemy. A former advisor to General Petraeus stated, "Every one of these dead noncombatants represents an alienated family, a new desire for revenge, and more recruits for a militant movement.." Indeed, militant groups have rapidly been forming, such as  Lashkar, which has been attacking U.S. troops across the border in Afghanistan. The sentiment goes beyond Pakistan. A spokesperson for Yemen, also  under attack, told a U.S. Senate committee, "What radicals had previously failed to achieve in my village, one drone strike accomplished in an instant: There is now an intense anger and growing hatred of America."

The disease is spreading. There are now 737  U.S. Military Bases around the world, and over 2.5 million military personnel. Since 9/11 about 100 new  generals and admirals have been added to the ranks of top brass, all with private jets and chefs and guards and secretaries and drivers.

Africa, already swollen with a U.S. military presence, is under further  siege by the Pentagon.  The Economist speaks of "Afrighanistan," calling it "the next front of the global war on terror."

3. Unconstitutional Terror

The Fourth Amendment guarantees the "right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures."

Since 9/11, numerous measures have been employed in the name of national security: The Patriot Act, Homeland Security, the National Security Agency, and the National Defense Authorization Act. The  Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act has facilitated the monitoring of foreign communications in the name of anti-terrorism.

Internet privacy has been threatened by  proposals like the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect IP Act (PIPA). Privacy is at risk with the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA), passed in the House.

In addition, new  techniques such as Iris Scans, License Plate Recognition,  GPS devices in pharmaceutical products, and  Facial Recognition Technology invade our privacy.  Drones are flying over our homes. The National Security Agency is building a  data centerbig enough to store every email, text, phone call, web search, and video in the United States. With the Electronic Communications Privacy Act  on its side, government is authorized to take anything it can get.

4. Terror against Opponents of Unconstitutional Terror

In 1778 the Continental Congress created the first  whistleblower protection law by declaring "it is the duty of all persons in the service of the United States to give the earliest information to Congress or other proper authority of any misconduct, frauds, or misdemeanors committed by any officers or persons in the service of these states."

In 2008 Barack Obama campaigned with a  pledge to "strengthen whistleblower laws to protect federal workers who expose waste, fraud, and abuse of authority in government."

But Bradley Manning was found guilty of espionage for reporting extreme cases of war misconduct. And Edward Snowden faces prison for reporting abuses of the 4th Amendment by the NSA.

The hypocrisy continues with the proposed  Animal and Ecological Terrorism Act, which would have made it an act of terror to report on the terrorizing of animals. And with the efforts of  TransCanada Corporation to convince law enforcement agencies that pipeline protestors are terrorists.

Going even further, FBI documents  reveal that the agency repeatedly monitored Occupy Wall Street activities, viewing them as possible acts of  terrorism.

5. The Terror of Poverty

The largely imagined threat of foreign attacks is diverting billions of dollars into a  Homeland Security fund that safeguards the assets of the rich, while the  poverty rate for black children has risen to almost 50 percent, and  unemployment among blacks has almost doubled the rate of whites.

Meanwhile, paranoia has infiltrated our schools. As K-12  education has been cut by $20 billion over f ive years, and as funding for guidance counselors and school psychologists has dropped to all-time lows, the Department of Justice's COPS Office has awarded over $750 million for the hiring of more than 6,500  police officers for schools, even though studies show that placing armed police in schools actually increases physical dangers to youth.

People burdened by economic oppression and authoritarian rule can begin to understand Frederick Douglass' bitter words to his own country, on behalf of the American slave:  To him your boasted liberty [is] an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciation of tyrants, brass-fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery.

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The crimes of US capitalism

Source: TopCriminalJusticeDegrees.org

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Worker's viewpoint: Which is "our" side in the Syrian conflict?

What is the goal of this revolution and which class leads it?

by Richard Mellor
Afscme Local 444, retired

The situation in Syria is critical.  The Assad regime is hanging on despite calls from Obama's White House for his removal and for those of us not on the ground nor having contacts or reliable sources on the ground, it is very difficult to figure it all out.  I found the previous blog very interesting and it helped me to think more definitively about the situation.

There is no doubt Assad and his regime is a corrupt one.  Like Hussein he is a Baathist. Assad is also an Alawite, a minority religious grouping belonging to Shia Islam like the majority of the Iranian people. The fact that there are so many factional elements in this struggle, Shia, Sunni, Kurd, Christian and when we add to that the ominous presence of US imperialism and Israel on the one hand and Russia and Iran on the other, plus  Islamic fundamentalists, we have quite a mix. The one element missing from that mix is the organized (politically and economically) working class.

I was thinking about this more today as I have been very reluctant to take a position on Syria.  But I have seen numerous statements on the internet and in articles calling for victory to the Syrian Revolution and for a victory for the "Free Syrian Army".  But what revolution are we talking about?  And what is the composition of the so-called "Free Syrian Army."

As far as I can tell, US imperialism is once again supporting any group that might enable it to continue to plunder the resources of the region, namely oil, and increase its presence in the region with regard to Russia and Iran.  The Iranian regime, a backward, undemocratic and misogynistic theocracy supports Assad and his minority regime amid the Sunni majority.  The Syrian Christians from what I have read are extremely concerned about the overthrow of the Assad regime as they have lived in relative security during its rule and the FSA, comprised of it is of many religious Islamic factions including those of the al Qaeda strain, might not be so generous.

But despite the autocratic and corrupt nature of the Assad regime, like Saddam's Iraq, major industries are state owned and the Baath party does have a history, albeit fragmented and turbulent, of support for nationalization and state ownership of major industry. Much of the country's major industry was nationalized and even in agriculture and other sectors, government regulation is considerable. US imperialism isn't supporting the FSA because of its democratic credentials.  Let's not forget the US supported to Mubarak dictatorship for years despite the torture and murders.

Libyan Similarity
The opposition forces trying to overthrow Assad, especially the intervention of US and European imperialism, are not forces that will act in workers' interests as far as I can gather, the ex KGB thugs that run Russia are no friends of the workers of the world either.  It is similar to Libya.  Gaddafi had many friends.  The British trained his secret police and he considered Blair a friend.  "Gaddafi’s son Saif, speaking in his private suite in Mayfair’s five-star Connaught Hotel, told the British Daily Mirror in June 2010":

Tony Blair has an excellent relationship with my father.
For us, he is a personal family friend. I first met him around four years ago at Number 10. Since then I’ve met him several times in Libya where he stays with my father. He has come to Libya many, many times.

This blog opposed the NATO war on Libya but also opposed Gaddafi's murderous regime.  As we commented in our introduction to the previous blog, what inevitably happens when there is no united movement of the working class present as capitalist crisis unfolds is society begins to fragment as we are witnessing in the Middle East.  In to the vacuum steps all sorts of fanatical groupings.  It is important to note that the rise of Islamic fundamentalism was boosted by US foreign policy and the CIA as US capitalism assisted corrupt regimes by helping them wipe out all political opposition from the left.  Al Qaeda is Washington's baby.

With regard to Libya, we said back in 2011:

"So generally my alternative to supporting the pro US/EU Libyan bourgeois alliance, is that workers must support the strengthening of already existing community, workplace and youth communities that have arisen and expanding these formations.  The demand must be for a national constituent assembly to which these committees which would obviously be dominated by workers and youth , would send elected delegates for the purpose of drawing up a new constitution.  This would be a constitution that would represent different class interests than one drawn up by editors of US theoretical journals and businessmen, most who played no role in the heroism and sacrifice that the Libyan workers and youth have shown."

It seems to me that this has to be the position: no support for Assad, no support for the FSA. Western imperialism and NATO does not support a regime or enter such a situation with good intentions and imperialist intervention as occurred in Libya must be opposed by socialists.  Personally speaking I am not convinced by the proclamations that we are seeing a revolution in Syria that will bring democratic reform. The US has 30,000 troops in Bahrain that have sat and watched the murder of peaceful protesters calling for democratic rights we in America take for granted.

The fact is that we are living in a period of capitalist decline.  A period wracked by crisis, one after the other.  The "failed" nation states are examples of this.  Capitalism cannot advance human society.  It's own historical creation, the nation state as we know it, is under threat.  Yes, more so in the former colonial world where nation states were artificially drawn in to existence by the imperialist countries.  But even in Britain we are witnessing the possible break up of a 300 year old  agreement between nations albeit an agreement made between unequal powers but that's how agreements are made between ruling classes.

No section or faction of society based on capitalism and the private ownership of the means of production can resolve the crises affecting nations and the global community.  This includes the looming environmental crisis.  The missing link in all of this is the world's working class.  There is a historic and militant history of working class resistance to capital and to imperialist intervention on the part of the Arab workers.  As I pointed out in a blog the other day, even in the US where we have never had a national mass party of the working class, there have been huge upheavals from the Seattle strike of 1919 to the CIO and the Civil Rights Movement where workers took steps along the road to independence from the capitalist class in ideology and action. The Occupy Movement also helped transform the political debate in the US.   There are always lessons learned.  The working  class is not going away.

Arguing that the working class and only the working class can head off social and environmental disaster will no doubt bring accusations of utopianism especially here in the US where we have not seen movements like those in Europe, Africa and Latin America.  In China, under a dictatorship, workers have waged major battles in the factories and on the land over acquisitions and environmental degradation.

So these are my thoughts about Syria.  I do not support the  Free Syrians as I don't know who they are although I see they have some rather nasty allies and imperialist intervention will always weaken the working class of that country.  These views on Syria are my own, I am not speaking for other writers on this blog. I admit I am not an expert on Syria and welcome any comments about these views from others and am open to hearing why I might be wrong.

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Proponents of ‘First Strike’ Nuclear War against Iran Rob billions from their own Citizens

Reprinted from Center for Research and Globalization

Multibillion Dollar War Budgets: Proponents of ‘First Strike’ Nuclear War against Iran Rob billions from their own Citizens

By Prof Michel Chossudovsky

Global Research, May 08, 2013

RT Op-Edge 10 April 2013

Theme: Global Economy, Militarization and WMD, US NATO War Agenda

In-depth Report: IRAN: THE NEXT WAR?, Nuclear War

While the Pentagon’s modernization budget for the pre-emptive nuclear option is a modest ten billion dollars (excluding the outlay by NATO countries). the budget for upgrading the US arsenal of “strategic nuclear offensive forces” is a staggering $352 billion over ten years. (See Russell Rumbaugh and Nathan Cohn,“Resolving Ambiguity: Costing Nuclear Weapons,” Stimson Center Report, June 2012).

These multi-billion military outlays allocated to develop“bigger and better nuclear bombs” are financed by the massive economic austerity measures currently applied in US and NATO countries.

The war economy is largely funded by compressing all categories of civilian government expenditure. In the US, these refurbished state of the art nuclear bombs are largely funded by the dramatic cuts in Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.

Humanity is at a dangerous crossroads. America is a “Killer State”. The gamut of economic austerity measures impoverish the American people while generously funding the “Killer State” through multi-billion dollar contracts with Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon et al.
War preparations to attack Iran are in “an advanced state of readiness”. Hi tech weapons systems including nuclear warheads are fully deployed.At the height of an Economic Depression, “War is Good for Business”.

Escalation is part of the military agenda. While Iran, is the next target together with Syria and Lebanon, the US-NATO military agenda also threatens Russia, China and North Korea.
The Western media, the Washington Think Tanks, the scientists and politicians, in chorus, obfuscate the untold truth, namely that war using nuclear warheads threatens the future of humanity.
The real threat to global security emanates from the US-NATO-Israel alliance.

The main actors in the Iran pre-emptive nuclear warfare

Thermo-nuclear weapons are deployed by the three “official” Nuclear Weapons States (NWS) of the Atlantic Alliance, namely the US, the UK and France. The official NWS status is established under the terms of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
Five other NATO member countries (categorized under the NPT as“non-nuclear states”), namely Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy and Turkey, possess an arsenal of B61 tactical nuclear warheads or “mini-nukes” (Made in America) which are deployed under national military command and are targeted at Iran. The B61 can be delivered by a variety of different aircraft.
Are these five countries in violation of the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty of which they are signatories?
In relation to ongoing war plans, the US-NATO-Israel military alliance includes a total of nine countries which possess a nuclear weapons arsenal:

The three official NWS (US, UK, France) plus the five“Undeclared Nuclear States” (Belgium, Germany, Netherlands, Italy and Turkey) plus the State of Israel (Undeclared Nuclear State). With the exception of Israel, these countries are signatories of the NPT.

Pre-emptive Nuclear Warfare

While reports tend to depict the tactical B61 bombs as a relic of the Cold war, the mini nukes are the preferred weapons system for pre-emptive nuclear war. Were an attack directed against Iran to be launched involving the deployment of B61 bunker buster nuclear bombs, these five countries, with Turkey and Italy in the forefront, would play a major strategic role.

The involvement of these five “non nuclear states” as major actors in a US sponsored pre-emptive nuclear war raises the issue of definition and categorization of nuclear weapons states. In the words of Time Magazine:

“Is Italy capable of delivering a thermonuclear strike?…
Could the Belgians and the Dutch drop hydrogen bombs on enemy targets?…

Germany’s air force couldn’t possibly be training to deliver bombs 13 times more powerful than the one that destroyed Hiroshima, could it?…

Nuclear bombs are stored on air-force bases in Italy, Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands — and planes from each of those countries are capable of delivering them.” (“What to Do About Europe’s Secret Nukes.” Time Magazine, December 2, 2009)

The Time report is careful not to address the fundamental question. Are Turkey and Italy nuclear weapons states? The B61s are described as a leftover from the Cold War. The issue of post 9/11 pre-emptive warfare is not mentioned:

“These weapons are more than a historical oddity, says Time. They are a violation of the spirit of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) … that provides a legal restraint to the nuclear ambitions of rogue states.” (Ibid).

While Iran does not possess nuclear weapons capabilities as confirmed by the latest US National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), the nuclear weapons potential of these five countries –including delivery procedures– are formally acknowledged.
These five countries possess WMDs, yet they do not constitute–in the eyes of public opinion– a threat to global security. Moreover, at no time have these five countries been designated as “rogue states” or “undeclared nuclear weapons states”.

US and NATO military documents attest to the fact that the B61 is the weapon of choice of pre-emptive nuclear war as opposed to the larger thermo-nuclear bombs of the Cold War era. Moreover, were military action to be launched against Iran, these five countries would play a key role in the delivery of B61 bunker buster bombs with nuclear warheads.

The US had originally supplied some 480 B61 thermonuclear bombs to these five “non-nuclear states”, as well as to the United Kingdom, which is categorized as a Nuclear Weapons State (NWS). (See map below)

Casually disregarded by the Vienna based UN Nuclear Watchdog (IAEA), the US has actively contributed to the proliferation of nuclear weapons in Western Europe and Turkey. While, some of these bombs were decommissioned as a result of political pressures, particularly in Belgium and Germany, the US –in liaison with NATO– has launched a multi-billion dollar modernisation program of its tactical nuclear weapons arsenal.

According to the National Resources Defense Council (August 2007), the number of B61 nuclear bombs in Europe has been reduced from 480 to 350, following the removal of 130 bombs from the Ramstein airbase in Germany.

As part of this European stockpiling and deployment, Turkey, which is a partner of the US-led coalition against Iran along with Israel, possesses some 90 thermonuclear B61 bunker buster bombs at the Incirlik air base. (National Resources Defense Council, Nuclear Weapons in Europe, February 2005). This is all the more significant in view of the “reconciliation” and renewed bilateral military cooperation between Ankara and Tel Aviv in the wake of President Obama’s March visit to Israel.

The stockpiling and deployment of tactical B61 (including the B61-11 earth penetrating warhead) in these five “non-nuclear states” are intended for targets in the Middle East. In accordance with “NATO strike plans”, these thermonuclear B61 bunker buster bombs (stockpiled by the“non-nuclear states”) could be launched against Iran, Syria and Russia:

“The approximately 480 nuclear bombs in Europe [350 according to 2007 estimate] are intended for use in accordance with NATO nuclear strike plans, the report asserts, against targets in Russia or countries in the Middle East such as Iran and Syria.

The report shows for the first time how many U.S. nuclear bombs are earmarked for delivery by non-nuclear NATO countries. In times of war, under certain circumstances, up to 180 of the 480 nuclear bombs would be handed over to Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Turkey for delivery by their national air forces. No other nuclear power or military alliance has nuclear weapons earmarked for delivery by non-nuclear countries.”

Does this mean that Iran or Russia, which are potential targets of a nuclear attack originating from one or other of these five so-called non-nuclear states should contemplate defensive pre-emptive nuclear attacks against Germany, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands and Turkey? The answer is no, by any stretch of the imagination.

While these “undeclared nuclear states” casually accuse Tehran of developing nuclear weapons, without documentary evidence, they themselves have capabilities of delivering nuclear warheads, which are targeted at Iran. To say that this is a clear case of“double standards” by the IAEA and the “international community” is a understatement.

(Source: National Resources Defense Council, Nuclear Weapons in Europe , February 2005)

While political pressures have been exerted in recent years towards decommissioning the stockpile of tactical nuclear weapons, the arsenal of B61 bunker buster bombs with nuclear warheads remains fully operational. In the case of a conflict with Iran, mini nukes in the five non nuclear states would be actively deployed in liaison with NATO, which has fully endorsed the doctrine of nuclear pre-emption. According to the Pentagon:

… keeping these weapons in Europe is that they allow NATO members to participate in shaping alliance nuclear policy [i.e. pre-emptive nuclear doctrine]. In this view, transatlantic ties are strengthened when the risks and costs of deploying and securing nuclear weapons are shared between the US and the respective host nations. (Quoted in “Parting words: Gates and tactical nuclear weapons in Europe”. Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, 14 July 2011)

Modernising the Mini-Nukes Arsenal

The decommissioning of the B61 nukes stockpiled in Western Europe and Turkey is a smokescreen. The European tactical nuclear weapons project is not being phased out as some reports have suggested. Quite the opposite. In 2010, the US National Nuclear Security Administration initiated a program “to refurbish and extend the life of the B61 bomb” at an initial estimated cost of 4 billion dollars (Ibid). By 2012, the mini nukes refurbishing program had skyrocketed to $10 billion. (US Department of Defence, Case Independent Cost Assessment for B61 LEP, Washington, July 13, 2012)
Described by the Federation of American Scientists, as “a gold plated nuclear bomb project”, this initiative consists in modernizing the existing pre-emptive nuclear arsenal of B61 tactical nuclear weapons deployed in the five undeclared nuclear states. Moreover, a new version of the B61 bunker buster bomb is envisaged: the B61-12. The latter is to be developed for deployment in Western Europe and Turkey with the backing of NATO and the German government, (Federation of American Scientists, November 2012).
The Obama administration and Congress have pushed the program forward despite the enormous cost … of refurbishing such complex weapons … Advocates, including the Obama administration..

Germany: Nuclear Weapons Producer

Among the five “undeclared nuclear states”, “Germany remains the most heavily nuclearized country with three nuclear bases (two of which are fully operational) and may store as many as 150 [B61 bunker buster ] bombs” (National Resources Defense Council, Nuclear Weapons in Europe. In accordance with “NATO strike plans”, these tactical nuclear weapons are also targeted at the Middle East.

While Germany is not categorized officially as a nuclear weapons state, it produces nuclear warheads for the French Navy. It stockpiles tactical nuclear weapons (Made in America) and it has the capabilities of delivering nuclear weapons. Moreover, The European Aeronautic Defense and Space Company – EADS , a Franco-German-Spanish joint venture, controlled by the powerful Daimler Group is Europe’s second largest military producer, supplying France’s M51 nuclear missile.
Germany imports and deploys tactical nuclear weapons from the US. EADS produces nuclear warheads which are exported to France. Yet Germany is classified as a non-nuclear state.

Dangerous Cross Roads

The tactical nuclear weapons deployed by the five non declared nuclear states are under national command and could be used in a pre-emptive US-NATO sponsored nuclear attack against Iran.
Tactical nuclear weapons are also deployed by Israel.
While it is unlikely that nuclear weapons would be used at the outset of an attack, they could be envisaged as part of a scenario of military escalation.

It is, therefore, important that public opinion in Western Europe, Turkey and Israel be made aware of the consequences of pre-emptive warfare and that political pressures be exerted on the governments of these 5 countries, with a view to blocking the deployment of the B61 nuclear warheads in their respective military bases as well as withdrawing outright from ongoing US-NATO pre-emptive war plans directed against Iran.

Tactical nuclear weapons are in essence slated to be used against non-nuclear states in the middle East. Their use was contemplated in both the Iraq war in 2003 as well against Libya in 2011.
The focus on tactical nuclear weapons (mini-nukes) as part of the conventional war arsenal, does not mean that the the US and its allies have scrapped the idea of using their arsenal of larger strategic thermonuclear weapons. While the latter would not be used against a non-nuclear state in the Middle East, they are deployed and targeted against Russia, China and North Korea.


For those who believe the use of thermonuclear nuclear weapons belongs to a bygone era, think twice.

For further details on the dangers of Nuclear War, see the author’s most recent book: Towards a World War III Scenario:The Dangers of Nuclear War, Global Research, Montreal, 2011.

Originally published by RT-Edge. The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.

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US and Israel Middle East policy threatens us all.

by Richard Mellor, Afscme Local 444, retired

I picked up a Wall Street Journal this morning and the first headline I see is: “US Bulks Up to Combat Iran.” .  It seems the war boys at the Pentagon have spent $400 million of our money upgrading the “Massive Ordinance Penetrator”, or MOP for short or  “bunker buster” bomb in more popular jargon.

I am confused.  Has Iran threatened to invade the United States?  Are the Iranians preparing to bomb our cities and towns? 

It doesn’t appear so.  The concern is that Iran has a nuclear program and Israel, the only state in the region with nuclear weapons, hundreds of them by all accounts,  opposes any other nation achieving nuclear statehood.  The Zionists have threatened many times to bomb Iran unilaterally.

The US admits that Iran has repeatedly announced that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes. “..Iran refines fuel it maintains is intended for civilian use but the U.S. and its allies believe is destined for a nuclear weapons program.”, says the Wall Street Journal. “Its allies”primarily means Israel, but no matter what Iran says, both Washington and Tel Aviv will not accept it; being the only one armed in a conflict is a handy thing.  The possession of a nuclear arsenal though is the safest protection against US imperialist aggression.  Iranian bases do not surround the US. Iranian warships and submarines do not patrol the California coastline or have a major presence in Baja or the Gulf of Mexico.  Iran is not a threat to US workers and our families.  Iran is a threat to Dick Cheney and all the coupon clippers that profit from the oil business just like Unions are a threat to them. If the Mullahs were willing to share the loot and do Wall  Streets bidding, the oppression, lack of democracy, wouldn’t prevent a strong friendship between Tehran and Washington from developing. The US has stood idly by as an absolute monarchy has crushed violently a movement for reform in neighboring Bahrain where the US has 30,000 troops.

It appears the warmongering and threats that emanate from Washington and the Pentagon are driven by Tel Aviv.  US officials believe the “enhanced” bunker busting device, “..decreases the chances that Israel will launch a unilateral bombing campaign against Iran this year….” the WSJ reports.

US officials have been falling over themselves in their efforts to show their pro Zionist credentials, even as the Europeans have warmed somewhat to the plight of the Palestinians cramped in to the Gaza concentration camp or spread throughout the state, often at the mercy of the fascistic settler movement that the Israeli military protects. .

“President Obama and Mr Hagel have used recent visits to Israel to stress Israel’s right to decide for itself whether to strike Iran.” the WSJ reports.  The problem with this is that the consequences of such an action affects the entire world.  The reason the Zionists could take such action is that US Imperialism is behind them.  It would be easy to prevent Israel from "unilaterally" bombing anyone, we could simply stop supplying them with heavy equipment, weapons and money

These US politicians, and some celebrities like Madonna for example, visit Israel and don’t go to Gaza.  These people are complicit in the racist and brutal assault on the Palestinian people and their culture.   Why would US policy be dictated by what this tiny little enclave called Israel decides?   Israel could not possibly do what it does in the region without the financial support and weaponry it receives from the US taxpayer.  It is a murderous and racist regime that is the elephant in the room, the main destabilizing factor in the region.

As the Arab spring has shown, the Zionist regime is the only reliable ally for US imperialism in the region that allows the continued plunder of the region’s main resource, oil.  The revolutionary potential of the Arab masses is well understood by the folks at the Pentagon.  US imperialism will and has supported any regime that will allow its plunder of the region to continue unabated and even the brutal Saudi thugs are not seen as the most secure allies if and when the Saudi masses along with its imported labor force moves in to more open conflict with the regime.  The US supplies these thugs with the weaponry and technological know how to keep the masses at bay but there is a strong Arab identity encompassing million of workers and this is always a threat. 

Israel, once referred to by the British governor of Jerusalem as British Imperialism’s “Loyal little Ulster in the Middle East” after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, is the safest bet as a launching pad to defend US capitalism’s interests in the region.  Israel, the persecuted minority surrounded by a sea of hostility.  The siege mentality is useful to some, just like the Zionists benefiting from anti-semitism, peace would be an obstacle to plunder and peace can never be achieved on a permanent basis under capitalism.

After the US overthrew the democratic secular regime of Mohammed Mossadegh in 1953, Washington installed the murderous Shah, known to us as the Shah of Iran.  He slaughtered any opposition to his puppet regime and was renowned for his torture chambers and his secret police, the SAVAK.   Democratic secular forces were driven underground or in to the protective custody of the Mosques, those that weren’t tortured and murdered by the Shah and his US partners.

The anti-democratic misogynistic theocracy that governs Iran is a direct result of British and US Imperialist meddling in the region. The Iranians have good reason to be suspicious of western intentions.  No worker or trade Unionist can support such a regime, but this writer for one is not afraid of Iran.  The US and its Zionist allies in the region are the most destabilizing factor in the region. Even in the Syrian conflict, it appears the US is following the same disastrous road but they are driven by the internal forces of capitalism to pursue this road.

For workers while offering no support to the Mullahs it is in our interests to build links with and strengthen the Iranian workers movement which has a militant and rich history, particularly the oil workers of Abadan. But for this writer, it is not the Mullahs I fear but the strategists at the Pentagon and the few thousand unelected leaders that govern the US and direct foreign and domestic policy.

Workers are under assault in the US, people have been evicted from their homes, denied health care, lost jobs.  The future is one of further austerity as US capitalism puts its own workers on rations to pay for its imperialist ventures. There is real danger if we do not step to the plate.  Bombing Iran would be a global disaster.  It would strengthen Islamic fundamentalism and weaken international worker solidarity. It is in our interests to actively intervene to stop the war plans of the folks in Washington and the Pentagon. The Iranian workers have a long history of struggle for economic and political freedom; they are our allies, or potential allies depending on our relationship to those who will likely decide to wage war against a another country killing many workers in the process, there and here.  We cannot allow capitalists and bankers to negotiate on our behalf, be the global face of America.  Iranians can’t eat oil; they have to sell it.  Our goal must be to negotiate with them as workers, equally and with the goal of improving the lives of everyone.

Present US foreign policy is simply an extension of domestic policy. The policy of austerity for workers and the middle class in the quest for profits for a few. It is not our policy and will lead to disaster if workers do not enter the stage with force.

Down with Wall Street, down with the Mullahs.  Build international working class solidarity

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Rios Montt trial: Just one of the small fry.

Guatemalans set up a “disappeared wall” during one of the protests to demand the trial of Ríos Montt. Photo: Natasha Pizzey-Siegert source

by Richard Mellor
Afscme Local 444 retired

Today, the trial of one of Central America’s most murderous dictators begins in Guatemala. Efrain Rios Montt is being charged with genocide and crimes against humanity for his role in the murder of as many as 200,000 people, mostly members of the Mayan community, during Guatemala’s civil war that lasted 26 years from 1960 to 1996.

As with other stooges of US capitalism and the CIA in Latin America, hopefully Rios Montt will get his just rewards. But we see this all the time, secondary figures like Rios Montt, Slobodan Milosevic, Assad being labeled war criminals, if these people are guilty of crimes against humanity what about the people that were behind them?

The US through the CIA supplied the Guatemalan dictatorship with arms along with the Israelis. Ronald Reagan said of Rios Montt, "President Ríos Montt is a man of great personal integrity and commitment. ... I know he wants to improve the quality of life for all Guatemalans and to promote social justice."

US capitalism’s interference in the affairs of Guatemala has deep roots. In 1954 a CIA sponsored coup overthrew the democratically elected government of Jacobo Arbenz on behalf of the United Fruit Co. and other big landowners. Arbenz had introduced land reforms that threatened the domination of the United Fruit Company over Guatemalan society. Only 2% of landowners owned 72% of the arable land, much of it unused. United fruit alone held 600,000 acres of mostly unused land. The Guatemalan colonel that the CIA selected to replace Arbenz immediately outlawed hundreds of trade unions and returned more than 1.5 million acres to United fruit Co.

Instrumental in planning the coup were the Dulles brothers, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles and his brother, Allen Dulles who was director of the CIA. These two also helped orchestrate the CIA coup that overthrew the secular democratic government of Mossadegh in Iran in 1953 and replaced him with the murderous Shah. They were former partners of United Fruit’s main law firm in Washington. By 1985 some 75,000 people were dead or had disappeared at the hands of the Guatemalan dictatorship; a huge amount in this tiny country. Some 150,000 Indians fled to Mexico and beyond. Many of the brothers and sisters we see on the streets as day laborers are from this area.

Hilary with Mubarak:  a friend of the family.

It is the support the US gives these undemocratic regimes that allows civil conflict to go on for so long causing tremendous suffering for the population.  The regime of Hosni Mubarak, the murderous Egyptian dictator was also a recipient some $2 billion of US taxpayer money.  As Egyptians were fighting for democratic rights and an end to Mubarak’s tyranny and torture chambers, Hilary Clinton, then US Secretary of State told Egyptian TV that "We consider Egypt to be a friend."  And that "I really consider President and Mrs. Mubarak to be friends of my family. So I hope to see him often here in Egypt and in the United States."

Behind Rios Montt and the slaughter of 200,000 Guatemalans in this conflict stood George HW Bush, Oliver North, Ronald Reagan and all these other far more important war criminals.  The same with Mubarak, Milosevic, Gaddafi whose police were trained by the British. 

We must not lose sight of this when these small fry are paraded to the world as orchestrators of crimes against humanity and genocide.  They are never from Britain or the US.  The US predatory war in Iraq has slaughtered hundreds of thousands of Iraqi’s and displaced hundreds of thousands more.  The western support for the so-called Syrian opposition is them yet again linking up with very dubious characters as they did with Bin Laden and others; it is not workers they look to, but any section of the ruling class or religious hierarchy that will allow multinational corporations to continue to plunder the region’s resources. .  Let’s also not forget that up until 1999, every Taliban government official was on the payroll of the US government. 

The world has yet to enjoy the pleasure of seeing mass murderer Henry Kissinger brought to the dock.  The blood of Rene, Schneider, the constitutionalist Chilean general is on Kissinger’s hands, as is Allende’s and the deaths of some 3 million Vietnamese.

While Guatemalan’s should rejoice at Rios Montt being brought to trial these events are of limited significance as long as their masters roam free.

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The Revolution Will Not Be Televised: Chavez, the U.S., and the 2002 Coup

Here is a documentary about Hugo Chávez and the U.S.-orchestrated coup attempt  of April 2002. It was filmed by a crew from the Irish national television broadcaster RTE, who were in Venezuela to do a feature on Chávez and, fortuitously, were  able to record a full-length video documentary of the coup.  The images of the events presented in this video  contradict explanations given by Chávez's opposition, the mass media, and the US State Department, and the White House. They provide compelling evidence that the coup was the result of a conspiracy between various old guard and anti-Chávez factions within Venezuela and the United States.

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Stan Goff on what it means to join the US military

Sound advice from Stan Goff. This was recorded in 2007 but it's obviously still relevant and worth sharing. Stan Goff was a Master Sgt.in the US Special Forces.His website is http://www.feralscholar.org/blog/

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Ecuador's balancing act on the oil pipeline

The oil industry's gift to Ecuador

My knowledge of the situation in Ecuador is limited but as I read this interesting piece from Professor James Petras, a couple of things stood out.  One is that it's quite clear that income can be wrung out of the global oil giants, something we in the US need to recognize. Correa has increased oil tax on multinationals from 20% to 85%, no small change,  and much of the added revenue has been used to improve social conditions for a large and diverse section of Ecuadorian society.  But this progress is entirely dependent on high oil prices and hardly stable as 50% of Ecuador's export earnings come from the sale of this one commodity.

But for now, Correa and others in the region have been able to "buy" a certain amount of stability.  However, this situation is a very precarious one, subject to global economic conditions and this deal with the global energy giants. I think the other issues are the inability of US imperialism to simply dictate policy in this region and especially to force policy through military or partial military intervention relying more on covert CIA type activities. The US is bogged down in the Middle East, expanding its role in Africa against Islamic forces and in Asia to contain China. The Chinese presence in Latin America has also changed the situation there. Then there is Venezuela and Bolivia.

I cringe when people like Prof Petras refers to groups like the FARC as "Marxist" as from what I know of FARC, their approach is more guerrilla based, but it is interesting as he points out that this deal with the energy giants has marginalized more radical social movements but will continue to create continued environmental disasters and clashes with the Indigenous Movement over land acquisition and pollution.
These scenarios have been played out many times before as individual nations under the yoke of imperialism and the global market try to find a national solution to a global problem and I would think that the revolutionary tradition of the Latin American masses will exert itself again in the period ahead. (RM)

Ecuador: Left-Center Political Regimes versus Radical Social Movements

 
James Petras :: 11.02.13

Introduction: On February 17, 2013, national elections will take place in Ecuador in which incumbent left-center President, Rafael Correa, is likely to win with an absolute majority against opposition candidates covering the political spectrum from Right to Left.

Since he was first elected in 2006, Correa has won a string of elections, including presidential elections (2009), a constitutional referendum, a constituent assembly and a ballot on constitutional amendments. Correa’s electoral successes occur despite the opposition from the main Indian organizations, CONAIE (Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador) and CONFENIAE, the principle public sector teachers unions, environmental NGOs and numerous radical intellectual, academics and trade union activists. He also has routed the traditional pro-US right-wing and liberal parties, successfully defeated and prosecuted the subversive intent of the mass media moguls and survived an aborted police-military coup in 2010. Unquestionably Correa has demonstrated his capacity to win repeated elections and even increase his margin of victory.

The electoral successes of Correa raise fundamental issues which transcend the immediate context of Ecuadorean politics and reflect a general pattern throughout Latin America. These issues include: (1) the relation between mass social movements and left of center electoral parties and politicians. (2) The relation between pro-active extractive capitalist development strategies (mining, oil, agro-business), inclusionary social policies and anti-imperialist regional foreign policies. (3) The inverse relation between the growth and consolidation of a left-center regime and the decline and weakening of radical social movements. (4) The problem of the initial convergence and divergence between radical social movements and left-center political leaders; as they move from ‘opposition’ to political power. (5) The shifts in power between movements and electoral politicians, with the former exercising greater capacity to mobilize during the period of opposition to the Right and the latter dominating and dictating the political agenda subsequent to securing electoral office.

The Politics of Post Neo-Liberalism
Correa’s “citizen based” electoral movement, operates from positions in government and eschews any ‘class framework’. In fact in its broadest terms, it appeals to and directs government programs to both the urban poor and the big foreign petroleum multi-nationals; the small and medium size business people and the Guayaquil business elite; workers in the informal sector and the public sector professionals and employees, the returning immigrants from Europe (especially Spain) and the construction, real estate and communication elite.

In foreign policy Correa has supported and has the backing of the Cuban and Venezuelan governments and is a member of ALBA; it has received large scale low interest loans from China (in exchange for oil investment and trade agreements) and retains commercial ties with the US and EU. Correa has backed greater Latin American integration and signed off on major public-private petrol contracts with US and European oil companies. He claims to be a socialist but condemns the Marxist FARC and praises the Colombian regimes’ ‘neo-liberalism’; questioned the illegal foreign debt (lowering it by 60%) and at the same time retains the dollar as Ecuador’s currency and opens indigenous territories to foreign capital exploitation.
In a word Correa’s “post neo-liberal policies” combine ‘nationalist populist’ and neo-liberal policies more than a program for the 21st century socialism that he proclaims.

Perspectives on President Correa’s Government
The national-populist extractive policies and development strategy of the Correa regime has polarized opinion across the hemisphere and within Ecuador. On the extreme right Washington and its mass media acolytes view Ecuador as a radical ‘socialist regime’. They take at face value Correa’s embrace of “21st century socialism”, in large part because of his ties to Venezuela, membership in ALBA, renegotiation of the foreign debt and Ecuador’s giving political asylum (in its British embassy) to Julian Assange, the Wilkileak’s leader.

Echoing Washington’s ‘radical leftist’ label are the traditional and newly minted rightist parties (Sociedad Patriotica) who have been marginalized by Correa’s electoral successes. Their critique of Correa’s early nationalist policies, renegotiating the debt and prevailing oil contracts, is now tempered by his recent large scale, long term investment agreement with several foreign multinational petroleum companies. The Ecuadorean oligarchy while publically condemning Correa are privately busy negotiating public-private procurement agreements especially in communications, infrastructure and banking.

The Indian movement, CONAIE, peasants, the teachers union, the ecology-NGOs and some smaller leftist parties oppose Correa for his “sellout” to the big oil companies, his authoritarian centralized power, the expansion of exploitation in the Amazon region and territorial encroachment and threats to Indian lands, water and health.

In contrast to internal opposition from the social movements, the vast majority of leftist parties and center-leftist regimes in Latin America, led by Cuba and Venezuela, are staunch supporters and allies of the Correa regime based primarily on his anti-imperialist policies, support for regional integration and opposition to US interventionist and destabilization policies in the region.
Internationally Correa has widespread support among progressives in the US and Europe especially for his early policies questioning the legality of the foreign debt, his rhetorical proposal to conserve the Amazon in exchange for cash transfers from the EU/US, his renegotiations of the oil contracts and his anti-imperialist pronouncements. Most important, Correa has secured long term large scale financial aid from China in exchange for exploitation of its oil resources.

Buttressed by allies in Latin America and Asia, Correa has effectively resisted pressures from the outside from the US. Internally, Correa has built a formidable bloc of social and political forces which has effectively countered opposition from the oligarchical right as well as from the once powerful radical social movements. The sustained popular majorities backing Correa from 2006 to the present 2013 are based essentially on several factors - substantial increases in social expenditures benefiting popular constituencies and nationalist policies increasing state revenues. The entire Correa paradigm, however, is based on one singular factor – the high price for oil and the boom in commodity prices which finances his strategy of extractive capital led growth and expenditures for social inclusion.

The Social Bases of Correa’s Popularity
Correa’s electoral victories are directly related to his populist social policies financed by the substantial oil revenues resulting from the high prices and huge increase from the renegotiation of the oil contracts with the multi-nationals – an increase from a 20% to an 85% tax. Correa increased the health budget from $561 million in 2006 to $774 million in 2012, about 6.8% of the national budget. Clinics have multiplied, the price of medications has been reduced as a result of a joint venture with the Cuban firm Enfarm, and access to medical care has vastly improved. Educational spending has increased from 2.5% of GDP in 2006 to 6% in 2013, including a free lunch program for children. The regime has increased state subsidies for social housing, especially for low income classes as well as returning immigrants. To lower unemployment, Correa has allocated $140 million in micro credits to finance self-employment, a measure especially popular among workers in the “informal sector”. By effectively reducing the debt to foreign creditors by two-thirds (debt service runs to 2.24% of GDP), Correa has increased the minimum wage and pensions for low income retirees thus expanding the social security system.

Anti-poverty subsidies, payments of $35 monthly (increased to $50 two weeks before the Elections) to poor families and the disabled and low interest loans have allowed Correa to gain influence and divide the opposition movements in the countryside. Business elites especially in Guayaquil and the middle and upper echelon of the public sector especially in the petrol sector, have become important contributors and backers of Correa’s electoral machine.

As a result of State subsidies, contracts and the backing of business and banking sectors and the weakening of the opposition media elites, Correa has built a broad electoral base that transverses the class spectrum. The entire ‘popular alliance’ is, however, highly dependent on Correa’s pact with extractive multi-nationals. His electoral success is a result of a strategy based on the revenue from a narrowly based export sector. And the export sector is highly dependent on the expansion of oil exploitation in the Amazon region which adversely affects the livelihood and health of the indigenous communities, who in turn are highly organized and in a permanent ‘resistance mode”.

The Contradictions of Extractive Capitalism and Populist Politics: The Threats and Challenges to Social Movements
The oil sector accounts for over 50 percent of Ecuador’s export earnings and over one-third of all tax revenues. Production has oscillated around 500,000 barrels a day, with increasing shares sold to China and a decreasing percentage to the US. In February 2013 Ecuador signed contracts for $1.7 billion in investments to boost output in the Amazon fields with Canadian, US, Spanish and Argentine multi-nationals in association with the Ecuadorean state company Petroecuador.

The biggest oil investments in the history of Ecuador promise to increase the levels of oil spills, contamination of Indian communities and intensification of the conflicts between CONAIE and its ecological and movement allies and the Correa regime. In other words as Correa sustains and consolidates his majoritarian electoral support outside of the Amazon and adjoining regions with increased social expenditures based on rising oil revenues, he will further dispossess and alienate the movements of the interior.

Social inclusion of the urban masses and promotion of an independent foreign policy are based on an alliance with foreign extractive multi-nationals which undermine the habitation and economy of small producers and Indian communities.

The history of petroleum exploitation contamination up to the present day provides little evidence to support President Correa’s claims of environmental safeguards. Texaco/Chevron oil exploitation in the Amazon contaminated millions of acres, dispossessed scores of Indian communities and sickened thousands of inhabitants resulting in a judiciary award of $8 billion dollars in favor of the 30,000 indigenous people adversely affected.

Recently Correa’s proposed oil contracts with multi-nationals to exploit 13 blocks in the pristine Amazon region covering millions of acres and inhabited by seven Indian nationalities, without consulting the indigenous communities thus contravening his own newly written constitution. Powerful mobilizations, led by CONAIE and CONFEIAE (the Ecuadorean Confederation of Amazonian Indian Nationalities) on the 28th of November 2012 in Quito and in the regions targeted for exploitation, has caused several oil majors to delay drilling. In the face of determined Indian resistance, Correa has shown the authoritarian side of his regime: threatening to dispatch the military to occupy and forcibly impose a kind of ‘martial law’, raising the prospects of prolonged political warfare.

While Correa can and does win national elections and routs his electoral opposition in the big cities, he faces a resolute organized majority in the Amazon and adjoining regions. Correa’s dilemma is that unless he diversifies the economy and reaches a compromise via consultation with CONAIE, his dependence on new oil ventures drives him toward de facto alliance with the traditional export elites and greater dependence on the military and police.

The Latin American Context
Correa’s bet on an export strategy based on primary goods has created a potentially dynamic mega cycle of growth but it is increasingly dependent on high world prices for oil. Any significant decline in price would immediately lead to a precipitous fall in social expenditures, erode his social coalition and strengthen the opposition from the right and the radical social movements. Correa’s repeated electoral successes and his widespread support across the progressive and anti-imperialist political spectrum, has seriously weakened the radical social movements a pattern that has been repeated throughout Latin America.

In the previous decade, roughly the period of the 1990’s to the early years of the 21st century, the radical social movements took center stage in toppling rightwing, US backed neo-liberal regimes. Ecuador was no exception: CONAIE and its urban allies ousted the incumbent neo-liberal President Mahuad in January 21, 2000, and joined with Correa in driving the Lucio Gutierrez regime from power in April 2005. Similar mass struggles and social mobilizations ousted neo-liberals in Argentina and Bolivia, while movement backed center left politicians took power in Uruguay, Brazil, Paraguay and Peru.

Once ensconced in power the center-left regimes adopted a commodity led export strategy, embraced partnerships with the MNC and built broad electoral conditions which marginalized the radical social movements; with the aid of increased revenues they substituted populist transfer payments for structural transformations.

Nationalist foreign policies were combined with alliances with big commodity based MNC. To the extent that class struggles emerged, the populist leaders condemned them and even accused their leaders of “conspiring with the Right” – thus questioning the legitimacy of their demands and struggles.

The post neo-liberal center-left regimes in Latin America, with their populist politics of ‘inclusion’ have been far more effective in reducing the appeal and influence of the radical mass social movements than the previous US backed repressive neo-liberal regimes.

Those social movements which opted to support and join the center-left regimes (or were co-opted) became transmission belts for extractive policies. Confined to administrating the regime’s anti-poverty programs and defending the extractive capitalist model, the co-opted leaders argued for higher tax revenues and social expenditures, and, occasionally, called for greater environmental controls. But ultimately the “insider strategy”, adopted by some social leaders, has led to bureaucratic subordination and the loss of any specific class loyalties.

Conclusion
National-populism is and will be challenged from within by its ‘allies’ among the MNC who will increasingly influence their ‘public sector partners’ and, from the ‘outside’, by the pressures from the world market. In the meantime as long as commodity prices hold and the nationalist-populist leaders continue their ‘inclusive’ social programs, Latin American politics will remain relative stable and the economy will continue to grow, but it will continue to face resistance from the alliance of eco-social and indigenous movements.

What lessons can be drawn from the past two decades of social movement – populist electoral party alliances? The message is both clear and ambiguous. Clearly movements which do not have an independent political perspective will lose out to their electoral allies. However, there is no question that because of movement action, the populist electoral class has legislated significant social expenditures benefiting the popular classes and pursued a relative independent foreign policy – an ambiguous legacy or unfinished history?

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JSoc: Obama's secret assassins

We reprint this piece from the British Guardian for our reader's interest.

JSoc: Obama's secret assassins

The president has a clandestine network targeting a 'kill list' justified by secret laws. How is that different than a death squad?

Naomi Wolf
guardian.co.uk, Sunday 3 February 2013 09.00 EST

 

US Navy Seals on a night mission in the Middle East. Seal Team 6, which killed Osama bin Laden, is a secret elite unit that works closely with the CIA. Photograph: John Moore/Getty Images

The film Dirty Wars, which premiered at Sundance, can be viewed, as Amy Goodman sees it, as an important narrative of excesses in the global "war on terror". It is also a record of something scary for those of us at home – and uncovers the biggest story, I would say, in our nation's contemporary history.

Though they wisely refrain from drawing inferences, Scahill and Rowley have uncovered the facts of a new unaccountable power in America and the world that has the potential to shape domestic and international events in an unprecedented way. The film tracks the Joint Special Operations Command (JSoc), a network of highly-trained, completely unaccountable US assassins, armed with ever-expanding "kill lists". It was JSoc that ran the operation behind the Navy Seal team six that killed bin Laden.

Scahill and Rowley track this new model of US warfare that strikes at civilians and insurgents alike – in 70 countries. They interview former JSoc assassins, who are shell-shocked at how the "kill lists" they are given keep expanding, even as they eliminate more and more people.

Our conventional forces are subject to international laws of war: they are accountable for crimes in courts martial; and they run according to a clear chain of command. As much as the US military may fall short of these standards at times, it is a model of lawfulness compared with JSoc, which has far greater scope to undertake the commission of extra-legal operations – and unimaginable crimes.
JSoc morphs the secretive, unaccountable mercenary model of private military contracting, which Scahill identified in Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army, into a hybrid with the firepower and intelligence backup of our full state resources. The Hill reports that JSoc is now seeking more "flexibility" to expand its operations globally.

JSoc operates outside the traditional chain of command; it reports directly to the president of the United States. In the words of Wired magazine:

"JSoc operates with practically no accountability."

Scahill calls JSoc the president's "paramilitary". Its budget, which may be in the billions, is secret.
What does it means for the president to have an unaccountable paramilitary force, which can assassinate anyone anywhere in the world? JSoc has already been sent to kill at least one US citizen – one who had been indicted for no crime, but was condemned for propagandizing for al-Qaida. Anwar al-Awlaki, on JSoc's "kill list" since 2010, was killed by CIA-controlled drone attack in September 2011; his teenage son, Abdulrahman al-Awlaki – also a US citizen – was killed by a US drone two weeks later.

This arrangement – where death squads roam under the sole control of the executive – is one definition of dictatorship. It now has the potential to threaten critics of the US anywhere in the world.
The film reveals some of these dangers: Scahill, writing in the Nation, reported that President Obama called Yemen's President Saleh in 2011 to express "concern" about jailed reporter Abdulelah Haider Shaye. US spokespeople have confirmed the US interest in keeping him in prison.

Shaye, a Yemeni journalist based in Sana'a, had a reputation for independent journalism through his neutral interviewing of al-Qaida operatives, and of critics of US policy such as Anwar al-Awlaki. Journalist colleagues in Yemen dismiss the notion of any terrorist affiliation: Shaye had worked for the Washington Post, ABC news, al-Jazeera, and other major media outlets.

Shaye went to al-Majala in Yemen, where a missile strike had killed a group that the US had called "al-Qaida". "What he discovered," reports Scahill, "were the remnants of Tomahawk cruise missiles and cluster bombs … some of them bearing the label 'Made in the USA', and distributed the photos to international media outlets."

Fourteen women and 21 children were killed. "Whether anyone actually active in al-Qaida was killed remains hotly contested." Shortly afterwards, Shaye was kidnapped and beaten by Yemeni security forces. In a trial that was criticized internationally by reporters' groups and human rights organizations, he was accused of terrorism. Shaye is currently serving a five-year sentence.
Scahill and Rowley got to the bars of Shaye's cell to interview him, before the camera goes dark (in almost every scene, they put their lives at risk). This might also bring to mind the fates of Sami al-Haj of al-Jazeera, also kidnapped, and sent to Guantánamo, and of Julian Assange, trapped in asylum in Ecuador's London embassy.

President Obama thus helped put a respected reporter in prison for reporting critically on JSoc's activities. The most disturbing issue of all, however, is the documentation of the "secret laws" now facilitating these abuses of American power: Scahill succeeds in getting Senator Ron Wyden, who sits on the Senate intelligence committee, to confirm the fact that there are secret legal opinions governing the use of drones in targeted assassinations that, he says, Americans would be "very surprised" to know about. This is not the first time Wyden has issued this warning.

In 2011, Wyden sought an amendment to the USA Patriot Act titled requiring the US government "to end practice of secretly interpreting law". Wyden warns that there is now a system of law beneath or behind the law that we can see and debate:

"It is impossible for Congress to hold an informed public debate on the Patriot Act when there is a significant gap between what most Americans believe the law says and what the government is using the law to do. In fact, I believe many members of Congress who have voted on this issue would be stunned to know how the Patriot Act is being interpreted and applied.
"Even secret operations need to be conducted within the bounds of established, publicly understood law. Any time there is a gap between what the public thinks the law says and what the government secretly thinks the law says, I believe you have a serious problem."

I have often wondered, since I first wrote about America's slide toward fascism, what was driving it. I saw the symptoms but not the cause. Scahill's and Rowley's brave, transformational film reveals the prime movers at work. The US executive now has a network of secret laws, secret budgets, secret kill lists, and a well-funded, globally deployed army of secret teams of assassins. That is precisely the driving force working behind what we can see. Is fascism really too strong a word to describe it?
• This article originally referred to Scahill and Rowley's documentary as Secret Wars; this was amended to Dirty Wars at 5.20pm ET on 3 February. The phrase "US kill list" in the subhead was also amended to "kill list" in order to remove possible ambiguity.

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