November 12, 2002 - December 7, 2002
Patently absurd: It is now the turn of ATTA
Posted: Saturday, December 7, 2002
By Devinder Sharma
At a time when the World Trade Organization (WTO) is forcing developing countries to implement the trade-related intellectual property rights regime, the United States patent on "a method for producing atta flour -- typically used to produce Asian breads such as chapatti and roti " -- exposes the absurdity of the entire patenting regime.
A broad-based US patent (# 6,098,905, dated Aug 8, 2000) was granted to a Nebraska-based private company, ConAgra Inc. Interestingly, the so-called inventers - Ali Salem, Sarath K. Katta and Sambasiva R. Chigurupati - have Asian ancestry. Their 'invention', if at all it can be called an invention, relates to a method for producing wheat flour or atta. The novel method that they have created for making wheat flour and subsequently patented 'covers changes, variations, modifications, and other uses and applications which do not depart from the spirit and scope of the invention'.
And what have they invented - a method to produce atta that includes "passing an amount of wheat through a device designed to crack the wheat so as to produce an amount of cracked wheat, followed by passing the cracked wheat through at least two smooth rolls designed to grind the cracked wheat into flour, with the smooth roll importantly grinding the wheat to a smaller particle size and shearing the wheat to cause starch damage in the finished atta flour." Isn't that a great 'invention' that merits a US patent? Isn't this similar to the manufacturing process being used by thousands of roller flourmills (many of them modernized) that exists throughout South Asia?
Since the 'inventors' have drawn a patent that covers the 'spirit and scope' of the invention, any modification and variation to this 'invention' too is patented. In other words, ConAgra has in one broad sweep ensured that the wheat flourmills throughout Asia (and in several other parts of the world) come under its monopoly control over the technology they have been using. With many big and even multinational food companies (including giants like Cargill) moving into the atta segment, ConAgra can literally make hay while we continue to consume chapattis and rotis. The patent application accepts that the requirement for wheat flour in countries like India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Indonesia will grow in the years to come, and so therefore the company sees a huge market.
The patent application uses all the scientific jargons that are normally used in establishing novelty and its industrial application. Preliminary tests were conducted at the Kansas State University (US) and subsequent tests were carried out by the United Milling Systems of Denmark and of course at the ConAgra Milling Research facility in Omaha, Nebraska. One wonders why the company didn't think it proper to conduct these trials in India and by involving the best judge of the atta technology - the housewives. Their preference for a particular brand of atta is based on the kind and quality of chapattis that it makes. Fundamentally, a housewife will tell you that the best atta is the one, which is not 'hot' when it comes out from the flourmill.
In India, a majority of the big atta mills use the roller processing. Some like Golden Seal, Annapurna and Captain Cook use the stone milling technology. Interestingly, the starch damage percentage in the stone milling technology is much higher than the roller mills - 15 per cent against 5 to 9 per cent in rolling mills. This makes it suitable for the dough making, and at the same time the protein percentage hovers between 10-11 percent, almost equal or higher than the roller mills. Many of the roller mills in India use three rollers to crack wheat grains and grind the atta and therefore find nothing novel in the patent.
This is not the first time that the US or for that matter many other developed countries have granted patents that makes a mockery of the entire IPR regime. And that too at times when the patent system claims to look into three specific criteria - novelty, utility and its non-obviousness - before granting a monopoly control over a technological invention or method. Multinational Nestle has already been granted a European patent on vegetable pulao and parboiled rice. When asked what was novel about the patent, all that the multinational replied was that it has developed a 'unique' method of cooking vegetable pulao. In a country where hundreds of different recipes for making vegetable pulao already exists, one wonders what is the 'uniqueness' that Nestle claims to have developed. Patent examiners should have thrown out such a process patent application at first sight.
More recently, George Williamson Ltd., of England had filed for a patent on the entire manufacturing process of tea, from the plucking of leaves to its final packaging in chests, prompting the Tea Board of India to launch an offensive to counter the monopoly control over a process that has been in vogue throughout the country. So much so that a drug multinational, Burrough Welcome, has drawn a patent on the commonly used Oral Rehydration Therapy (ORT) by health workers. Irrespective of the fact that the therapy has been in vogue for ages in the developing countries but was first reported in an academic research paper in Bangladesh in 1971-72, and since then even the UNDP gives recognition to the Bangladesh researchers for the 'invention'. With a minor tinkering, the drug multinational subsequently got the patent.
Many IPR experts believe that one way to counter such unfair patents is to document the traditional knowledge that already exists and to make that available to the patent offices throughout the globe. What is not being understood is that it is perfectly right to 'educate' the patent lawyers who want to learn of the 'prior art' that exists elsewhere but what about those who refuse to see beyond a patent application. After all, it is difficult to imagine that the patent examiners in the US Patent & Trade Mark Office had never known what wheat flour is and so wasn't even aware of the process of producing it. There is something called 'common sense', and that cannot be built by producing digital libraries on traditional knowledge and commonly used production processes.
(Devinder Sharma is a New Delhi-based food and trade policy analyst)
Printer friendly version
Send page by E-Mail
How Kenyans see the land crisis in Zimbabwe
Posted: Friday, December 6, 2002
From Final Call.Com
WEB POSTED 03-12-2002
NAIROBI (PANA)—Like hundreds of thousands of his compatriots, Michael Karanja, who lives on the fringes of one of the large scale White-owned agricultural farms in Kenya’s Thika District, some 30 miles east of Nairobi—has been following with keen interest the ensuing feud in Zimbabwe between Pres. Robert Mugabe and White land holders. Mr. Karanja is especially interested in the European Union’s sanctions against Pres. Mugabe.
He says Mr. Mugabe is right to want to re-allocate stolen and unused land now owned by Whites to Black war veterans. Mr. Karanja also says that other African leaders are doing a disservice to the continent by not coming out openly to support an embattled freedom fighter.
"Mugabe is being vilified for standing up for the rights of his people. This land, the so-called farmers in Zimbabwe are now claiming to be theirs, was taken from Africans in a way of robbery, because they do not have the supporting documents to show that they rightfully bought it from Africans," charged Mr. Karanja, a 59-year-old father of six. And he is not alone.
Pres. Mugabe might be unpopular to the West and White Zimbabwean community, but he appears to be gaining support in Kenya where the issue is quite emotive because of the similarities in the two countries’ cases.
The Lancaster House (London) served as the venue for independence talks for the two countries—Kenya’s in 1960s and 1970s for Zimbabwe.
So, to the ordinary man on the street, scholars, politicians and even journalists in Kenya, Pres. Mugabe is right and Western powers are applying double standards to protect their cousins.
The rallying cry for the independence fathers in both countries was land, which they felt was wrongly wrenched from Africans.
Like in Zimbabwe, the White Kenyan settler community owns the choice agricultural land leaving the majority Black population on less productive areas.
Dennis Akumu, a former Pan-African Trade Unionist and ex-MP, is a key member of the Pan-African Reparations Movement (PARM), a group that has been vocal in support of Pres. Mugabe’s cause.
"People the World over are talking of equity, transparency and democracy. But these three virtues cannot exist in a country where the majority have been marginalized and their leaders ostracized (for pointing out the injustice)," he says.
John Kamau, editor of the Nairobi-based Rights Features Service, an NGO on human rights issues, agrees with Mr. Akumu.
According to Mr. Kamau, "there is no way any sane government in the world would allow 98 percent of its population to live in near penury while less than two percent own parcels of land they do not even need."
He argues that at the Lancaster House Conference, it was made clear that the White farmers had up to 1990 to either develop their land or give it up to the Zimbabwean government.
The same document gave the government the right to nationalize all land not developed or nationalized, he said.
Mr. Kamau dismisses the argument that the EU sanctions were imposed because of Pres. Mugabe’s "dictatorial" rule, saying the West has never cared about who is elected president in Africa so long as he played by their rules.
"Haven’t we had Idi Amin Dada (Uganda), Marcius Nguema (Equatorial Guinea), Mobutu Sese Seko (ex-Zaire) and Siad Barre (Somalia)? An elementary student of history would tell you that these (people) were maintained by Western support," he added.
Veteran journalist Phillip Ochieng, in a Sunday Nation article titled, "Fleet Street’s Jungle Justice in Zimbabwe," accuses the Western press of conspiracy against Pres. Mugabe.
Rejecting the forceful taking over of farms by Black Zimbabweans, Mr. Ochieng, however, feels the reporting is biased.
"But from what moral (ground) can you preach law and fair elections to them (Zimbabweans)? Fair elections? Why haven’t you applied sanctions on George W. Bush for rigging himself to the most powerful office in the free world?" he asked.
Whether Pres. Mugabe succeeds in his mission or not, he appears to be enjoying large support from Kenyans, who may not influence developments in his troubled country.
Printer friendly version
Send page by E-Mail
Harare's concerns genuine, says envoy
Posted: Thursday, December 5, 2002
Diplomatic Reporter, www.herald.co.zw
INCOMING Dutch ambassador to Zimbabwe Dr Johannes Heinsbroek yesterday said Harare has genuine concerns over its differences with the European Union.
Dr Heinsbroek was speaking in a meeting with President Mugabe at State House after presenting his credentials.
Sources who attended the meeting said the ambassador was responding to Cde Mugabe who had wondered how Netherlands could be dragged into the fight between Zimbabwe and her former colonial master Britain.
Netherlands and the rest of the European Union have ganged up against Zimbabwe and imposed sanctions at the instigation of Britain.
Britain has been campaigning for Harare's isolation because of the Government's resolve to correct colonial imbalances by redistributing land, which was forcibly grabbed from locals by white settlers, mostly British descendants.
According to the sources, President Mugabe noted that relations between Netherlands and Zimbabwe were chequered saying it was difficult to explain the strain in ties between the two countries.
"I don't know how the Netherlands would want us to relate? But not through the medium of Britain.
"Where have we gone wrong? Our problem with the United Kingdom is clear, they are our former colonial master.
"We do not understand how the Netherlands could be dragged into a fight that is British, pretending there are issues of human rights and good governance. I don't know . . . ," the sources quoted President Mugabe as having told Dr Heinsbroek.
In response, the sources said, Dr Heinsbroek said it was important that Zimbabwe and Netherlands engaged in talks to restore good relations.
He pledged to work towards improving relations between the two countries.
"Zimbabwe has genuine concerns and Europe also has her own concerns and we just have to talk. It is important that we have to talk.
"We must prevent an exchange of monologues. We can start with preparatory talks so we can restore our relations," the sources quoted Dr Heinsbroek saying.
Speaking to journalists after the meeting, Dr Heinsbroek said it was important for Zimbabwe and Europe to talk noting that both sides had concerns, which should be addressed.
Cde Mugabe also said relations between the two countries could improve.
"Things cannot be worsened for all time. Bilateral relations have to improve at some time."
The sources added that Cde Mugabe told the Dutch ambassador that there was no perfect democracy in the world.
He said the Dutch had a monarch while Zimbabwe had its own system of governance and wondered why Netherlands wanted to change Harare's system.
Cde Mugabe said even the Lancaster House constitution that the British helped craft at Zimbabwe's independence was not perfect.
He told Dr Heinsbroek that British Prime Minister Mr Tony Blair thinks he can rule Zimbabwe but Harare would resist any attempts to undermine its sovereignty.
"Even if Mugabe goes there will be people who will take over and resist any attempt to put authority on our sovereignty," the President reportedly said.
He said Zimbabwe respected the sovereignty of Europe and it expected the same of Europe.
"The days of Machiavellian are gone and countries wanted to be sovereign and democratic. I am supposed to be under sanctions… whatever that means in the eyes of Europe. But we are in year 2002. Are we that backward?"
Three other new ambassadors - Mr Tsaneshiye Iyama of Japan, Archbishop Joseph Edward Adams of the Vatican and Mauritian High Commissioner Mr John Dacruz - also presented their credentials to Cde Mugabe.
United Nations Secretary General Mr Kofi Annan's special envoy for HIV/Aids, Mr Stephen Lewis, also met Cde Mugabe to discuss the effects of the pandemic in Zimbabwe and how the country was fighting the scourge.
Mr Lewis is on a six-nation tour of Southern Africa to assess the HIV/Aids situation in relation to the drought gripping the region.
He said their talks also touched on how the UN could help the countries procure anti-retroviral drugs.
Mr Lewis said he was gratified that the Government was reconsidering plans, announced in the 2003 national budget, to gradually scrap the Aids levy.
Reproduced from:
http://www.herald.co.zw/index.php?id=16580&pubdate=2002-12-06
Printer friendly version
Send page by E-Mail
Alexander Pushkin: Russian-African genius
Posted: Tuesday, December 3, 2002
By Selwyn Cudjoe, July 4, 1999
WHEN I arrived in the United States in the 1960s-ages ago, it seems-one of the first books I encountered was JA Rogers's World's Great Men of Color. In the 1950s Rogers, a Jamaican, went from house to house selling his books in Harlem, trying to get his people to realise that Africa and Africans had made enormous contributions to the world. In that book I learned that writers such as Alexander Pushkin, Alexandre Dumas, Samuel Coleridge and Robert Browning were of black ancestry, an astonishing fact to someone cradled in a colonial education. It was the 1960s, an age of Black Power; a time when most of us came into a better awareness of our people and ourselves.
On June 6, Russia was ablaze in festivity as it celebrated the 200th anniversary of Pushkin's birth. As a London Times headline puts it, "Pushkin Mania rages: Russians cash in on bicentenary of their poet's birth". Reporting from Moscow, Anna Blundy noted: "Russia has been swept by Puskhinmania in preparation for tomorrow's bicentenary of the poet's birth...Russians all know long tracts of Pushkin's work by heart, and Sunday's festival is the dominant theme of most television, and radio broadcasts, newspaper articles and advertising campaigns."
Pushkin remains Russia's playful and elusive genius, a combination of Shakespeare and Mozart rolled into one. He holds the same status in Russian literature as Shakespeare has in the English language. Eugene Onegin, Pushkin's classic verse novel of 1833, has become a work to which Russian writers pay obeisance. Each school child knows it by heart and recites it at the drop of a hat.
During the weeks that led up to Pushkin's second centenary, a member of the public read out one line of Eugene Onegin and told viewers how many days there were to go before Pushkin's birthday. I only wish that we could do a similar thing for Maxwell Philip, CLR James or VS Naipaul.
But greatness or not, at the beginning of the 19th century, Pushkin's Africanness was an issue.
Throughout his life, his pronounced African features-thick lips, dark skin and kinky hair-remained an issue and Pushkin was acutely aware of them. Yet, he always took pride in his African ancestry.
In her new book on Pushkin, Elaine Feinstein tells us that Abram Petrovich Gannibal, Pushkin's great-grandfather, born in Northern Abyssinia (Ethiopia) in the 1690s, was of royal stock. Pushkin claimed that his great grandfather was a prince who lived a luxurious life. He was abducted from Ethiopia when he was eight years old by a "Frenchman collecting animals and other curiosities for Louis XIV" of France. Shipped to Istanbul, he was placed in the Sultan's seraglio where the Russian ambassador found him and sent him back to Russia as a present to Peter the Great (Pushkin, pp 17-18).
In the Russian court, Abram became a great favourite of Peter the Great. The Tsar became so attached to this precocious and intelligent child that he had him baptised into the Orthodox Church at Vilno where the Tsar himself became his godfather and the queen of Poland his godmother.
Feinstein reports that when Abram's brother, a person of standing in the African world, arrived to claim Abram, the Tsar refused to part with him. Sending him to study military strategy in France, Abram returned to Russia in 1725 and was given a commission in the Tsar's own regiment. When Elizabeth, the Tsar's daughter, came to the throne, Abram was made a Major General and granted an estate in Mikhaylovskoe in a province of Russia.
As he grew up, Pushkin took great pride in his great-grandfather and his Africanness which he openly embraced and celebrated in Eugene Onegin. Even so, Pushkin suffered from a sense of his own "ugliness" and the taunts of his classmates. At the lycee where he studied when he was 12, he was nicknamed "monkey". However some of his school friends called him "the Frenchman" because they thought he was a "mixture of a monkey and a tiger".
This "stain" of his blackness remained with him. In 1827, he returned to his family mansion in Mikhaylovskoe where he began his unfinished novel, The Negro of Peter the Great, based on the life of his great grandfather. In this highly fictionalised account of his ancestor Grannibal, Pushkin centred his story on "a Negro's wife, who is unfaithful to her husband, gives birth to a white child and is punished by being shut up in a convent". Even as he tells this gripping story, the sexual prowess of the black man in a white world assumes much importance.
Perhaps, it is wise that Pushkin did not finish telling this story. It would have had to come up against the scurrilous attacks of those who preferred to believe that he came from a slave background. In fact, he was forced to defend Abram's honour against the calumny of Fruddy Bulgarin, a crusading journalist. Putting the question in verse, Pushkin said: "Filyarin says he understands/That my black granddad, Gannibal/ Bought for a bottle of rum, once fell/Into a drunk sea captain's hands." To this, he responded: "My grandfather, so cheaply bought,/ The Tsar himself treated with trust/And gave him welcome at his court./ Black, but never again a slave."
Pushkin, it was rumoured, was a renowned womaniser. Yet when, in 1837, it was reported that a French officer, D'Anthes, was messing with his wife, Pushkin challenged him to a duel and was killed at the age of 38. Yet, he remains the people's poet, Russia's answer to Shakespeare and someone about whom we in T&T ought to know a lot more.
Printer friendly version
Send page by E-Mail
US rapped for stance on Zimbabwe's land
Posted: Monday, December 2, 2002
Herald Reporter
NEW York City councillors have attacked the United States government for its position on Zimbabwe's land issue which they say is heavily influenced by a biased former colonial power, Britain.
"We cannot expect Britain to have a neutral position on the land issue," the councillors said in a report compiled after a two-week fact-finding tour in Zimbabwe.
The report urges US to immediately lift travel restrictions against Government officials and help kick-start dialogue between Zimbabwe and Britain.
"It would be difficult for the Zimbabwean officials to state their case to the world if they are restricted from travelling to other countries.
"How can the US have dialogue with North Korea and Iraq, in the interest of peace, while preventing Zimbabwean officials from travelling to articulate their position?"
The US, they said, was supposed to be neutral and help resolve the dispute between Zimbabwe and Britain instead of taking sides.
"Without an independent US position, it will be difficult to act as an honest broker," they said.
"Some of the people in Zimbabwe are eager for independent facilitators to be involved."
Britain, the country most hostile to the land reform pogramme, has also been asked to assess its strategy of dealing with Zimbabwe.
"We urge the British government to reconsider its position and agree to compensate white farmers for their land," the councillors said.
"In the process, it should also discuss compensation for the expropriation of the land from the original African population."
The councillors said they had found that there were double standards when Western countries, especially Britain and the US, talked about democracy and human rights in Africa.
Zimbabwe, they said, had fallen victim to such double standards and was being called undemocratic, but democracy was thriving in the country.
They called for increased commercial contacts and visits by ordinary Americans to Zimbabwe, including the media, to observe the changes occurring in the Southern African country.
They said their investigations had established that the land issue was irreversible while media accounts on the programme were mostly exaggerated.
"We found a country where all sides agree that land reform is an idea whose time has come," said the councillors.
New farmers, they said, were grateful to the Government for having been provided with land while there was still a role being played by white farmers who had accepted the new dispensation and were willing to accept the policy of one farmer, one farm.
"In our meetings with various stakeholders affected by the land reform programme, we found that allegations by the media against it are largely unsubstantiated and are actually exaggerations or distortions of what is actually happening there.
"We also found that despite a steady flow of Western media reports of lawlessness, free-for-all land grab of commercial farms, this is not the case at all."
The city fathers said they were convinced that increased agricultural production, with the newly acquired lands by new farmers, would lead to economic growth in Zimbabwe.
The projected famine that threatened not only Zimbabwe but all of southern Africa, could not be substantially attributed to the land reform as had been charged in some quarters.
The real cause of the famine was drought that affected food production in the last season.
"The role of commercial farmers in staple food production has also been exaggerated by Western media reports.
"White commercial farmers had long since abandoned crop farming and turned to other more lucrative industries such as horticulture, tobacco, paprika, citrus, game ranching and safari services," they said.
It was also stated in the report that allegations that President Mugabe was giving land to his friends were surprising considering the number of people resettled.
At least 300 000 families have benefited under the Model A1 scheme, while 40 000 others were allocated plots under the A2 Model.
"In light of that fact, we find the charge that President Mugabe only gives land to his 'cronies' not credible.
"We are hard pressed not to believe that anyone could have that many 'cronies.'"
The councillors said they found a reasonably vibrant free Press in Zimbabwe, contrary to international reports that the media was routinely suppressed.
The delegation was led by New York City Council Member Charles Barron and consisted of other councillors and journalists.
It held meetings with President Mugabe, several Government ministers, members of opposition parties, farmers and Non-Governmental Organisations.
Reproduced from:
http://www.herald.co.zw/index.php?id=16468&pubdate=2002-12-02
Printer friendly version
Send page by E-Mail
President: Be fully geared for farming
Posted: Friday, November 29, 2002
Herald Reporter
PRESIDENT Mugabe has urged newly-resettled farmers to use their ploughs to till the land in preparation for the coming agricultural season, instead of waiting for tractors from the Government.
He said it was imperative for people to be fully geared for the season since time was running out.
"It is encouraging to note that in some areas, crops have already started to grow.
"There are some areas which have not been ploughed, particularly in resettlement areas.
"In the rural areas, some have already started to plough. Do not wait for tractors. Those with cattle must start to plough maybe one or two hectares in the areas, in which they have been resettled."
The President said this when he officially opened a science and administration block at Chikaka Secondary School in Zvimba.
He urged those with tractors to assist those who were struggling to till the land owing to lack of equipment.
He said Zimbabweans should remain united to overcome challenges facing the country. MORE
Printer friendly version
Send page by E-Mail
A Briefing On The History Of U.S. Military Interventions
Posted: Sunday, November 24, 2002
by Professor Zoltan Grossman
Assistant Professor of Geography
University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, USA, 2001
KILLING CIVILIANS TO SHOW THAT KILLING CIVILIANS IS WRONG
Since the September 11 attacks on the United States, most people in the world agree that the perpetrators need to be brought to justice, without killing many thousands of civilians in the process. But unfortunately, the U.S. military has always accepted massive civilian deaths as part of the cost of war. The military is now poised to kill thousands of foreign civilians, in order to prove that killing U.S. civilians is wrong.
The media has told us repeatedly that some Middle Easterners hate the U.S. only because of our "freedom" and "prosperity." Missing from this explanation is the historical context of the U.S. role in the Middle East, and for that matter in the rest of the world. This basic primer is an attempt to brief readers who have not closely followed the history of U.S. foreign or military affairs, and are perhaps unaware of the background of U.S. military interventions abroad, but are concerned about the direction of our country toward a new war in the name of "freedom" and "protecting civilians."
The United States military has been intervening in other countries for a long time. In 1898, it seized the Philippines, Cuba, and Puerto Rico from Spain, and in 1917-18 became embroiled in World War I in Europe. In the first half of the 20th century it repeatedly sent Marines to "protectorates" such as Nicaragua, Honduras, Panama, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic. All these interventions directly served corporate interests, and many resulted in massive losses of civilians, rebels, and soldiers. Many of the uses of U.S. combat forces are documented in "A History of U.S. Military Interventions Since 1890".
U.S. involvement in World War II (1941-45) was sparked by the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, and fear of an Axis invasion of North America. Allied bombers attacked fascist military targets, but also fire-bombed German and Japanese cities such as Dresden and Tokyo, party under the assumption that destroying civilian neighborhoods would weaken the resolve of the survivors and turn them against their regimes. Many historians agree that fire- bombing's effect was precisely the opposite--increasing Axis civilian support for homeland defense, and discouraging potential coup attempts. The atomic bombing of Japan at the end of the war was carried out without any kind of advance demonstration or warning that may have prevented the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians.
The war in Korea (1950-53) was marked by widespread atrocities, both by North Korean/Chinese forces, and South Korean/U.S. forces. U.S. troops fired on civilian refugees headed into South Korea, apparently fearing they were northern infiltrators. Bombers attacked North Korean cities, and the U.S. twice threatened to use nuclear weapons. North Korea is under the same Communist government today as when the war began.
During the Middle East crisis of 1958, Marines were deployed to quell a rebellion in Lebanon, and Iraq was threatened with nuclear attack if it invaded Kuwait. This little-known crisis helped set U.S. foreign policy on a collision course with Arab nationalists, often in support of the region's monarchies.
In the early 1960s, the U.S. returned to its pre-World War II interventionary role in the Caribbean, directing the failed 1961 Bay of Pigs exile invasion of Cuba, and the 1965 bombing and Marine invasion of the Dominican Republic during an election campaign. The CIA trained and harbored Cuban exile groups in Miami, which launched terrorist attacks on Cuba, including the 1976 downing of a Cuban civilian jetliner near Barbados. During the Cold War, the CIA would also help to support or install pro-U.S. dictatorships in Iran, Chile, Guatemala, Indonesia, and many other countries around the world.
The U.S. war in Indochina (1960-75) pit U.S. forces against North Vietnam, and Communist rebels fighting to overthrow pro-U.S. dictatorships in South Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. U.S. war planners made little or no distinction between attacking civilians and guerrillas in rebel-held zones, and U.S. "carpet-bombing" of the countryside and cities swelled the ranks of the ultimately victorious revolutionaries. Over two million people were killed in the war, including 55,000 U.S. troops. Less than a dozen U.S. citizens were killed on U.S. soil, in National Guard shootings or antiwar bombings. In Cambodia, the bombings drove the Khmer Rouge rebels toward fanatical leaders, who launched a murderous rampage when they took power in 1975.
Echoes of Vietnam reverberated in Central America during the 1980s, when the Reagan administration strongly backed the pro-U.S. regime in El Salvador, and right-wing exile forces fighting the new leftist Sandinista government in Nicaragua. Rightist death squads slaughtered Salvadoran civilians who questioned the concentration of power and wealth in a few hands. CIA-trained Nicaraguan Contra rebels launched terrorist attacks against civilian clinics and schools run by the Sandinista government, and mined Nicaraguan harbors. U.S. troops also invaded the island nation of Grenada in 1983, to oust a new military regime, attacking Cuban civilian workers (even though Cuba had backed the leftist government deposed in the coup), and accidentally bombing a hospital.
The U.S. returned in force to the Middle East in 1980, after the Shi'ite Muslim revolution in Iran against Shah Pahlevi's pro-U.S. dictatorship. A troop and bombing raid to free U.S. Embassy hostages held in downtown Tehran had to be aborted in the Iranian desert. After the 1982 Israeli occupation of Lebanon, U.S. Marines were deployed in a neutral "peacekeeping" operation. They instead took the side of Lebanon's pro-Israel Christian government against Muslim rebels, and U.S. Navy ships rained enormous shells on Muslim civilian villages. Embittered Shi'ite Muslim rebels responded with a suicide bomb attack on Marine barracks, and for years seized U.S. hostages in the country. In retaliation, the CIA set off car bombs to assassinate Shi'ite Muslim leaders. Syria and the Muslim rebels emerged victorious in Lebanon.
Elsewhere in the Middle East, the U.S. launched a 1986 bombing raid on Libya, which it accused of sponsoring a terrorist bombing later tied to Syria. The bombing raid killed civilians, and may have led to the later revenge bombing of a U.S. jet over Scotland. Libya's Arab nationalist leader Muammar Qaddafi remained in power. The U.S. Navy also intervened against Iran during its war against Iraq in 1987-88, sinking Iranian ships and "accidentally" shooting down an Iranian civilian jetliner.
U.S. forces invaded Panama in 1989 to oust the nationalist regime of Manuel Noriega. The U.S. accused its former ally of allowing drug-running in the country, though the drug trade actually increased after his capture. U.S. bombing raids on Panama City ignited a conflagration in a civilian neighborhood, fed by stove gas tanks. Over 2,000 Panamanians were killed in the invasion to capture one leader.
The following year, the U.S. deployed forces in the Persian Gulf after the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, which turned Washington against its former Iraqi ally Saddam Hussein. U.S. supported the Kuwaiti monarchy and the Muslim fundamentalist monarchy in neighboring Saudi Arabia against the secular nationalist Iraqi regime. In January 1991, the U.S..and its allies unleashed a massive bombing assault against Iraqi government and military targets, in an intensity beyond the raids of World War II and Vietnam. Over 200,000 Iraqis were killed, including many civilians who died in their villages, neighborhoods, and bomb shelters. The U.S. continued economic sanctions that denied health and energy to Iraqi civilians, who died by the hundreds of thousands, according to United Nations agencies. The U.S. also instituted "no-fly zones" and virtually continuous bombing raids, yet Saddam was politically bolstered as he was militarily weakened.
In the 1990s, the U.S. military led a series of what it termed "humanitarian interventions" it claimed would safeguard civilians. Foremost among them was the 1992 deployment in the African nation of Somalia, torn by famine and a civil war between clan warlords. Instead of remaining neutral, U.S. forces took the side of one faction against another faction, and bombed a Mogadishu neighborhood. Enraged crowds, backed by foreign Arab mercenaries, killed 18 U.S. soldiers, forcing a withdrawal from the country.
Other so-called "humanitarian interventions" were centered in the Balkan region of Europe, after the 1992 breakup of the multiethnic federation of Yugoslavia. The U.S. watched for three years as Serb forces killed Muslim civilians in Bosnia, before its launched decisive bombing raids in 1995. Even then, it never intervened to stop atrocities by Croatian forces against Muslim and Serb civilians, because those forces were aided by the U.S. In 1999, the U.S. bombed Serbia to force President Slobodan Milosevic to withdraw forces from the ethnic Albanian province of Kosovo, which was torn a brutal ethnic war. The bombing intensified Serbian expulsions and killings of Albanian civilians from Kosovo, and caused the deaths of thousands of Serbian civilians, even in cities that had voted strongly against Milosevic. When a NATO occupation force enabled Albanians to move back, U.S. forces did little or nothing to prevent similar atrocities against Serb and other non-Albanian civilians. The U.S. was viewed as a biased player, even by the Serbian democratic opposition that overthrew Milosevic the following year.
Even when the U.S. military had apparently defensive motives, it ended up attacking the wrong targets. After the 1998 bombings of two U.S. embassies in East Africa, the U.S. "retaliated" not only against Osama Bin Laden's training camps in Afghanistan, but a pharmaceutical plant in Sudan that was mistakenly said to be a chemical warfare installation. Bin Laden retaliated by attacking a U.S. Navy ship in Yemen in 2000. After the 2001 terror attacks on the United States, the U.S. military is poised to again bomb Afghanistan, and possibly move against other states it accuses of promoting anti-U.S. "terrorism," such as Iraq and Sudan. Such a campaign will certainly ratchet up the cycle of violence, in an escalating series of retaliations that is the hallmark of Middle East conflicts. Afghanistan, like Yugoslavia, is a multiethnic state that could easily break apart in a new catastrophic regional war. Almost certainly many more civilians would lose their lives in this tit-for-tat war on "terrorism" than the 5,000 civilians who died on September 11.
Common Themes
Some common themes can be seen in many of these U.S. military interventions.
First, they were explained to the U.S. public as defending the lives and rights of civilian populations. Yet the military tactics employed often left behind massive civilian "collateral damage." War planners made little distinction between rebels and the civilians who lived in rebel zones of control, or between military assets and civilian infrastructure, such as train lines, water plants, agricultural factories, medicine supplies, etc. The U.S. public always believe that in the next war, new military technologies will avoid civilian casualties on the other side. Yet when the inevitable civilian deaths occur, they are always explained away as "accidental" or "unavoidable."
Second, although nearly all the post-World War II interventions were carried out in the name of "freedom" and "democracy," nearly all of them in fact defended dictatorships controlled by pro-U.S. elites. Whether in Vietnam, Central America, or the Persian Gulf, the U.S. was not defending "freedom" but an ideological agenda (such as defending capitalism) or an economic agenda (such as protecting oil company investments). In the few cases when U.S. military forces toppled a dictatorship--such as in Grenada or Panama--they did so in a way that prevented the country's people from overthrowing their own dictator first, and installing a new democratic government more to their liking.
Third, the U.S. always attacked violence by its opponents as "terrorism," "atrocities against civilians," or "ethnic cleansing," but minimized or defended the same actions by the U.S. or its allies. If a country has the right to "end" a state that trains or harbors terrorists, would Cuba or Nicaragua have had the right to launch defensive bombing raids on U.S. targets to take out exile terrorists? Washington's double standard maintains that an U.S. ally's action by definition "defensive," but that an enemy's retaliation is by definition "offensive."
Fourth, the U.S. often portrays itself as a neutral peacekeeper, with nothing but the purest humanitarian motives. After deploying forces in a country, however, it quickly divides the country or region into "friends" and "foes," and takes one side against another. This strategy tends to enflame rather than dampen a war or civil conflict, as shown in the cases of Somalia and Bosnia, and deepens resentment of the U.S. role.
Fifth, U.S. military intervention is often counterproductive even if one accepts U.S. goals and rationales. Rather than solving the root political or economic roots of the conflict, it tends to polarize factions and further destabilize the country. The same countries tend to reappear again and again on the list of 20th century interventions.
Sixth, U.S. demonization of an enemy leader, or military action against him, tends to strengthen rather than weaken his hold on power. Take the list of current regimes most singled out for U.S. attack, and put it alongside of the list of regimes that have had the longest hold on power, and you will find they have the same names. Qaddafi, Castro, Saddam, Kim, and others may have faced greater internal criticism if they could not portray themselves as Davids standing up to the American Goliath, and (accurately) blaming many of their countries' internal problems on U.S. economic sanctions.
One of the most dangerous ideas of the 20th century was that "people like us" could not commit atrocities against civilians.
German and Japanese citizens believed it, but their militaries slaughtered millions of people. *British and French citizens believed it, but their militaries fought brutal colonial wars in Africa and Asia.
Russian citizens believed it, but their armies murdered civilians in Afghanistan, Chechnya, and elsewhere.
Israeli citizens believed it, but their army mowed down Palestinians and Lebanese.
Arabs believed it, but suicide bombers and hijackers targeted U.S. and Israeli civilians.
U.S. citizens believed it, but their military killed millions in Vietnam, Iraq, and elsewhere.
Every country, every ethnicity, every religion, contains within it the capability for extreme violence. Every group contains a faction that is intolerant of other groups, and actively seeks to exclude or even kill them. War fever tends to encourage the intolerant faction, but the faction only succeeds in its goals if the rest of the group acquiesces or remains silent. The attacks of September 11 were not only a test for U.S. citizens attitudes' toward minority ethnic/racial groups in their own country, but a test for our relationship with the rest of the world. We must begin not by lashing out at civilians in Muslim countries, but by taking responsibility for our own history and our own actions, and how they have fed the cycle of violence.
A century of US military interventions
Printer friendly version
Send page by E-Mail
A History Of Bio-Chemical Weapons
Posted: Sunday, November 24, 2002
By Zoltan Grossman, Jan 24, 2002
History of bio-chemical warfare from 800 BC to 2001 AD
400s BC.: Spartan Greeks use sulfur fumes against enemy soldiers.
1346: Crimean Tatars catapult plague-infected corpses into Italian trade settlement.
1500s: Spanish conquistadors use biological warfare used against Native peoples.
1763: British Gen. Jeffrey Amherst orders use of smallpox blankets against Native peoples during Pontiac's Rebellion.
1800s: Smallpox and other diseases ravage Native American communities; U.S. officials use quarantine techniques to isolate diseases in white communities, but not in Native villages.
1907: Hague Convention outlaws chemical weapons; U.S. does not participate.
1914: World War I begins; poison gas produces 100,000 deaths, 900,000 injuries.
1920s: Britain proposes use of chemical weapons in Iraq "as an experiment" against Kurdish rebels seeking independence; Winston Churchill "strongly" backs "the use of poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes."
1928: Geneva Protocol prohibits gas and bacteriological warfare; most countries that ratify it prohibit only the first use of such weapons.
1935: Italy begins conquest of Abyssinia (Ethiopia), using mustard gas.
1936: Japan invades China, uses chemical weapons in war.
1939: World War II begins; neither side uses bio-chemical arms, due to fears of retaliation in kind.
1941: U.S. enters World War II; President Roosevelt pledges U.S. will not be first to use bio-chemical weapons.
1943: U.S. ship damaged by German bombing raid on Bari, Italy, leaks mustard gas, killing 1000.
1945: Germans use Zyklon-B in extermination of civilians.
Japanese military discovered to have conducted biological warfare experiments on POWs, killing 3000. U.S. shields officers in charge from war crimes trials, in return for data. Soviets take over German nerve gas facility in Potsdam. The Nazis had stockpiles of nerve gas against which the Allies had no defenses, and had also been working on blood agents.
1947: U.S. possesses germ warfare weapons; President Truman withdraws Geneva Protocol from Senate consideration.
1949: U.S. dismisses Soviet trials of Japanese for germ warfare as "propaganda." Army begins secret tests of biological agents in U.S. cities.
1950: Korean War begins; North Korea and China accuse U.S. of germ warfare--charges still not proven. San Francisco disease outbreak matching Army bacteria used on city.
1951: African-Americans exposed to potentially fatal simulant in Virginia test of race-specific fungal weapons.
1952: German chemical weapons researcher Walter Schreiber, working in Texas, exposed as a perpetrator of concentration camp experiments, and flees to Argentina.
1956: Army manual explicitly states that bio-chemical warfare is not banned. Rep. Gerald Ford wins policy change to give U.S. military "first strike" authority on chemical arms.
1959: House resolution against first use of bio-chemical weapons is defeated.
1961: Kennedy Administration begins hike of chemical weapons spending from $75 million to more than $330 million.
1962: Chemical weapons loaded on U.S. planes during Cuban missile crisis.
1966: Army germ warfare experiment in New York subway system.
1968: Pentagon asks for the chance to use some of its arsenal against protesters to demonstrate the "efficacy" of the chemicals. Maj. Gen. J.B. Medaris says, "By using gas in civil situations, we accomplish two purposes: controlling crowds and also educating people on gas. Now, everybody is being called savage if he just talks about it. But nerve gas is the only way I know of to sort out the guys in white hats from the ones in black hats without killing any of them."
1969: Utah chemical weapons accident kills thousands of sheep; President Nixon declares U.S. moratorium on chemical weapons production and biological weapons possession. U.N. General Assembly bans use of herbicides (plant killers) and tear gasses in warfare; U.S. one of three opposing votes. U.S. has caused tear gas fatalities in Vietnamese guerrilla tunnels.
1971: U.S. ends direct use of herbicides such as Agent Orange; had spread over Indochinese forests, and destroyed at least six percent of South Vietnamese cropland, enough to feed 600,000 people for a year. U.S. intelligence sources gives swine-flu virus to anti-Castro Cuban paramilitary group, which lands it on Cuba's southern coast (according to 1977 newspaper reports).
1972: Biological and Toxic Weapons Convention. Cuba accuses CIA of instilling swine fever virus that leads to death of 500,000 hogs.
1974: U.S. finally ratifies 1928 Geneva Protocol.
1975: Indonesia annexes East Timor; planes spread herbicides on croplands.
1979: Anthrax leak from Soviet biological weapons lab kills 60 near Sverdlovsk. Washington Post reports on U.S. program against Cuban agriculture since 1962, including CIA biological warfare component. Anthrax outbreak among Africans in white-ruled Rhodesia (in the last stages of the Zimbabwe independence war) results in 10,000 cases,
182 of them fatal (according to Covert Action Quarterly #43)
1980: U.S. intelligence officials allege Soviet chemical use in
Afghanistan, while admitting "no confirmation." Congress approves nerve gas facility in Pine Bluff, Arkansas. Iraq begins eight-year war with U.S. arch-enemy Iran.
1981: U.S. accuses Vietnam and allies of using mycotoxins (fungal poisons) in Laos and Cambodia. Some refugees report casualties; one analysis reveals "yellow rain" as bee feces. Israel bombs Iraqi nuclear reactor, leading to Iraqi decision to build chemical weapons.
1984: U.N. confirms Iraq using mustard and nerve gasses against Iranian "human wave" attacks in border war; State Department issues mild condemnation, yet restores diplomatic relations with Iraq,
and opposes U.N. action against Iraq. Bhopal fertilizer plant accident in India kills 2000; shows risks of chemical plants being damaged in warfare. President Reagan orders over a half-million M55 rockets retooled so they contain high-yield explosives as well as VX gas. (The Army later claimed that many of these rockets were "unstable" and leaking nerve gas.)
1985: U.S. resumes open-air testing of biological agents. U.S. firms begin supplying Iraq with numerous biological agents for a four-year period (according to a 1994 Senate report).
1986: U.S. resumes open-air testing of biological agents.
1987: Senate ties in three votes on resuming production of chemical weapons; Vice President Bush breaks all three ties in favor of resumption.
1988: Iraq uses chemical weapons against Kurdish minority in Halabjah; U.S. continues to maintain agricultural credits with Iraq; President Reagan blocks congressional sanctions against Iraq.
1989: Paris conference of 149 nations condemns chemical weapons, urges quick ban to emerge from Geneva treaty negotiations; U.S. revealed to plan poison gas production even after treaty signed.
1990: U.S., Soviets pledge to reduce chemical weapons stockpiles to 20 percent of current U.S. supply by 2002, and to eliminate poison gas weapons when all nations have signed future Geneva treaty. Israel admits possession of chemical weapons; Iraq threatens to use chemical weapons on Israel if it is attacked.
1991: U.S. and Coalition forces bomb at least 28 alleged bio- chemical production or storage sites in Iraq during Gulf War, including fertilizer and other civilian plants. CNN reports "green flames" from one chemical plant, and the deaths of 50 Iraqi troops from anthrax after air strike on another site. New York Times quotes Soviet chemical weapons commander that air strikes on Iraqi chemical weapons would have "little effect beyond neighboring villages," but that strikes on biological weapons could spread disease "to adjoining countries." Czechoslovak chemical warfare unit detects Sarin nerve gas during air war. Egyptian doctor reports outbreak of "strange disease" inside Iraq. U.S. troops use explosives to destroy Iraqi chemical weapons storage bunkers after the war.
1992: Reports intensify of U.S. and Coalition veterans of Gulf War developing health problems, involving a variety of symptoms, collectively called Gulf War Syndrome. U.N. sanctions intensify civilian health crisis inside Iraq, making identification of similar symptoms potentially difficult. Two members of anti-government Minnesota Patriots' Council arrested for plan to use ricin chemical against law enforcement officer.
1993: President Clinton continues intermittent bombing and missile raids against Iraqi facilities; U.N. inspectors step up program to dismantle Iraqi weapons. U.S. signs U.N. Chemical Weapons Convention, but approval later blocked in Senate.
1995: Japanese cult launches deadly Sarin nerve gas attack on Tokyo subway system.
1996: Congressional hearings on Gulf War Syndrome focuses on Iraqi storage bunker destruction, rather than other possible causes, and does not call for international investigation of symptoms among Iraqis.
1997: Cuba accuses U.S. of spraying crops with biological agents. Iraq expels U.S. citizens in U.N. inspection teams, which are allowed to continue work without Americans, but choose to evacuate all inspectors. U.S. mobilizes for military action. Senate act implements Chemical Weapons Convention, with a provision that "the President may deny a request to inspect any facility" on national security grounds.
1998: U.S. again bombs alleged Iraqi bio-chemical weapons sites, after Iraq questions role of American U.N. inspector, and restricts inspector access to presidential properties and security. U.S. launches missile attack on pharmaceutical plant in Sudan that it alleges produces nerve gas agents--a claim disputed by most of the international community.
1998-99: Series of anthrax hoaxes against U.S. targets, such as NBC, Washington Post, State Department, White House complex, post offices. Former Aryan Nations member Larry Wayne Harris carries out anthrax hoax to dramatize warning of alleged "Iraqi threat." Three members of Republic of Texas militia group arrested for intention to use anthrax and other biological agents against public officials. Upsurge in anthrax hoaxes against abortion clinics.
2000: "Topoff Exercise" involving federal and state authorities fails to cope with simulated chemical, biological and nuclear attacks in three widely separated metropolitan areas.
2001: U.S. withdraws from July's first round of Biological and Toxic Weapons Convention (BTWC), crippling international efforts to establish global measures against bioogical weapons. In wake of September 11 attacks, anthrax spores sent by mail to multiple political and media targets around the U.S., resulting in anthrax exposures, infections, and deaths. Law enforcement authorities debate whether source of anthrax threat is foreign or domestic. Real anthrax attacks accompanied by enormous increase in anthrax hoaxes by "Army of God" and other groups and individuals.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Compiled from articles in "Z" magazine by Stephen Shalom and Noam Chomsky (February 1991) and Zoltan Grossman (March 1991), from the Council for a Livable World, William Blum's "Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA Interventions Since World War II," ADL Militia Watchdog by Mark Pitcavage (Feb. 1999) and from recent news reports.
Zoltan Grossman is a cartographer/geographer and writer on ethnic relations and geopolitics, based in Madison, Wisconsin.
Printer friendly version
Send page by E-Mail
The History of Bioterrorism in America
Posted: Sunday, November 24, 2002
By Richard Sanders,
Coordinator, Coalition to Oppose the Arms Trade.
January 24, 2002
Who is behind the recent spate of Anthrax attacks? Who would intentionally expose Americans to such deadly germs? To answer these questions, it is useful to know that there have been previous cases bioterrorism in the U.S. Previous incidents of bioterrorism in America since WWII, although more widespread than this year's anthrax-related incidents, received very little media attention.
The identitities of those who planned and perpetrated decades ofbioterror attacks on Americans is known. Although they have admitted their guilt - in written confessions to Congress - they remain immune from prosecution. They are above the law.
In a 1977 special report to Congress, the U.S. Army admitted conducting hundreds of chemical and biological warfare tests, including at least 25 that deliberately targeted the unsuspecting public. The military disclosed evidence that it had released disease-causing germs in at least 48 open-air tests. (U.S. Army Activity in the U.S. Biological Warfare Programs, 1942-1977. Vols 1 and 2, February 24, 1977)
In 1994, Senator John D.Rocke-feller's report (Examining Biological Experimentation on U.S. Military) further revealed that over the previous 50 years, the U.S. military intentionally exposed hundreds of thousands of their own soldiers to dangerous microbes, mustard and nerve gas, radiation, hallucinogens and psychochemicals.
Recent bioterror attacks have prolonged the national crisis sparked on September 11. Widespread concerns about anthrax have served those who wish to promote the draconian laws that are descending upon the U.S. Curiously, the strain of anthrax bacteria being used most likely originates from the U.S. military (Debora MacKenzie, New Scientist, October 24)
The following quotations, compiled from various sources, summarize the shameful but little-known history of the U.S. military's responsibility for exposing Americans to the terror of biological weapons.
-------------------
1943 Fort Detrick:
The U.S. began research on biological weapons at Fort Detrick, MD.1 They studied anthrax, brucellosis, Botulinus toxin, plague, Sclerotium rolfoil, late blight, late blast, brownspot of rice, rinderpest, tularemia, mussel poisoning, coccidioidomycosis, rickettsia, psittacosis, neurotropic encephalitis, Newcastle disease and fowl plague.2
1945 Recruiting Nazis:
The U.S. State Department, Army intelligence and the CIA initiated Project Paperclip to recruit Nazi scientists and offer them immunity and secret identities in exchange for work on top secret, U.S. government projects [including bio-warfare experiments on unwilling human subjects].1
1946 Japanese war criminals:
The U.S. began negotiations with Japan to acquire their germ warfare data. In exchange, Japanese scientists received immunity from prosecution for their war crimes. Dr. Shiro Ishii, a physician and army officer who began experiments in germ warfare in 1932 when Japan invaded Manchuria, formed a biological-warfare unit (Unit 731) that used Chinese soldiers and civilians as test subjects. About 9,000 died of bubonic plague, cholera, anthrax and other diseases. U.S. soldiers captured in the Philippines were sent to Unit 731 so the Japanese could test biological weapons on them.2
1948 Cttee. on Biological Warfare:
The Secretary of Defense's Research and Development Board, requested an evaluation of biological agents as weapons of sabotage. The Committee on Biological Warfare recommended that methods be assessed for disseminating biological agents, with emphasis on special operations. It recommended research to test "innocuous organisms" in ventilation systems, subways and public water supplies. This influenced administrations for 20 years and the U.S. conducted highly-classified scientific tests on unknowing populations throughout the country.
The biological warfare research program in the early 1940s and 1950s involved antipersonnel, anticrop and antianimal studies. Field trials included open-air vulnerability testing, and contamination of public water systems with live organisms such as Serratia marcescens. Covert programs were conducted by the CIA. Pathogenic organisms were tested in Florida and the Bahamas in the 1940s. Chemical anticrop studies evaluated defoliation and crop destruction.3
1949 Germ bombs:
Explosive munitions tests with pathogens were begun.3
1950 The First "open air tests":
The first open-air tests with biological agents were conducted in various locales, including off the coast of Norfolk, Virginia.3
1950 Spraying San Francisco:
The first large-scale, aerosol test was conducted in San Francisco Bay in September 1950, using two species of bacteria (Bacillus globigii and Serratia marcescens). Many experiments used various Bacillus species because of their similarities to B. anthracis.3
On September 26 and 27, 1950, the U.S. Army sprayed S. marcescens from a boat off the coast. On September 29, patients at San Francisco's Stanford University Hospital began appearing with S. marcescens infections.4 Many residents came down with pneumonia-like symptoms and one died. A military, follow-up study showed that nearly every single exposed person became infected with the test organism.5
The death of Edward J. Nevin was associated with this release of S. marcescens.4 (The first lawsuit against the U.S. government was filed by his family [in 1981]. The court decided that the U.S. government could not be sued, under the Federal Tort Claims Act, since the decision to spray S. marcescens was a part of national defense planning.)3
1951 Racist Germs:
Army researchers deliberately exposed a disproportionate number of black citizens to the fungus Aspergillus fumigatus, to see if African Americans were more susceptible to such infection, like they were already known to be to coccidioidomycosis (Coccidioides immitis). Similarly, in 1951, unsuspecting [black] workers at the Norfolk Supply Center, Norfolk, VA, were exposed to crates contaminated with A. fumigatus spores.3
1955 Whooping Cough:
Tampa Bay, FA, experienced a sharp rise in Whooping Cough cases, including 12 deaths, following a CIA bio-war test in which bacteria from the Army's Chemical and Biological Warfare arsenal was released to the environment.5
1951-1969 Dugway Proving Ground:
Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of open-air tests using bacteria and viruses that cause disease in human, animals and plants were conducted at Dugway Proving Ground, a military testing facility about 80 miles from Salt Lake City, Utah. These tests were to determine how the agents spread, survive and effect people and the environment.
It is unknown how many people in the vicinity were exposed to potentially harmful agents during these open-air tests. In 1969, concerns were expressed at a congressional hearing about the possible public health implications of the VEE virus tested there.
University of Utah scientists and doctors are greatly concerned about the potential health consequences not only for military personnel who work and train at Dugway, but also for civilians who live in a nearby small town and Indian reservation. Utah Medical Society physicians complained about the lack of information provided to the medical community.
According to Rutgers University political science professor Dr. Leonard Cole, the use of potentially harmful chemical and biological agents continues at Dugway. He testified that the U.S. Army uses Bacillus subtilis "which is is recognized as a potential source of infection and can cause serious illness in some people when they are exposed to it in large numbers and they inhale large numbers of those microorganisms."4
Mid1950s-early 1970s Project Shad:
The Dugway Proving Ground and Fort Douglas had a secret navy, called Project Shad. Their ships sailed through clouds of germ and chemical agents. Some sailors blame these tests for the cancer and other diseases that they suffer from.6
1956 Operation Transit III:
One of Project Shad's first tests occurred in San Francisco Bay as part of Operation Transit III. In September 1956, plans called for a 40-foot munitions boat to create clouds of Bacillus globigii germs that the Eastman would travel through. Plans called for enough germs to ensure that "a minimum respiratory dose of 10,000 organisms is received on deck." Planners considered B. globigii a safe "simulant" of more dangerous germs. (The U.S. Army still uses it for field testing.)
The tests included dropping "20,000 gallons of BG (B. globigii) slurry" from helicopters.6
1956 to 1958 Testing on Blacks:
The U.S. Army did field tests in the poor black communities of Savannah, Georgia, and Avon Park, Florida, in which mosquitoes were released into residential neighbourhoods from ground level and from planes and helicopters. Many were swarmed by mosquitoes and developed unknown fevers; some even died. After each test, Army personnel posing as public health officials photographed and tested the victims and then disappeared from town. It is theorized that the mosquitoes were infected with a strain of Yellow Fever. Details of the tests remain classified.5
1950s to 1970s Operation Whitecoat:
Many experiments that tested various biological agents on human subjects, referred to as Operation Whitecoat, were carried out at Fort Detrick, MD. The human subjects originally consisted of volunteer enlisted men. However, after the enlisted men staged a sitdown strike to obtain more information about the dangers of the biological tests, Seventh-Day Adventists who were conscientious objectors were recruited for the studies. Because they did not believe in engaging in actual combat, they became human subjects in military research projects that tested various infectious agents. At least 2,200 Seventh-Day Adventists were used in biological testing during the 1950s through the 1970s.4
1962 More on Project Shad:
Training outlines show that Project Shad sailors were briefed on work with germs causing some of the deadliest diseases known, including tularemia, anthrax, parrot fever, Q fever, African swine fever, the plague and botulism.6
1963-1965 Project Shad ships "participated in 111 tests" using nerve agents GB and VX, and biological agents Bacillus globigii, Serratia marcescens and Escherichia coli. (Letter from Maj.Gen. L.J.Del Rosso, Army director of space and special weapons, to Senator Steve Symms, R-Idaho, 1992)6
1966 New York Subway:
From June 7-10, the U.S. Army's Special Operations Division dispensed [Bacillus subtilis var niger3] throughout the New York City subway system. The Army's justification for the experiment was the fact that there are many subways in the USSR, Europe and South America. Details of the experiment are still classified.5 More than a million were exposed when army scientists dropped lightbulbs filled with the bacteria onto ventilation grates.1
1987 Continued Research:
The Department of Defense admitted that, despite a treaty banning research and development of biological agents, it continues to do research at 127 facilities and universities in the U.S.1
Sources:
1. "A History of Secret Human Experimentation," Health News Network, http://www.healthnewsnet.com/humanexperiments.html
2. "Beyond AIDS: The West's Covert Chemical-Biological Warfare Programs" http://www.wakeupmag.co.uk/articles/biochem.htm
3. David R. Franz, D.V.M., PH.D., Cheryl D. Parrott and Ernest T. Takafuji, M.D., M.P.H., "The U.S. Biological Warfare and Biological Defense Programs" (Ch.19) http://ccc.apgea.army.mil/Documents/
4. Examining Biological Experimentation on U.S. Military, The Rockefeller Report (1994) http://www.trufax.org/trans/roc23.html
5. "Beyond AIDS: The West's Covert Chemical-Biological Warfare Programs" http://www.wakeupmag.co.uk/articles/biochem.htm
6. Lee Davidson, "Secrets at Sea: Cloud of Secrecy Lifting on Dugway Navy's Tests of Germ and Chemical Agents in the Pacific during Vietnam War" (October 22, 1995) Registry of Atomic Testing Survivors http://people.ne.mediaone.net/kknowlto/navy.htm
Printer friendly version
Send page by E-Mail
A century of US military interventions
Posted: Saturday, November 23, 2002
Compiled by Zoltan Grossman
(revised October 8, 2001)
From Wounded Knee to Afghanistan a century of US military interventions
U.S. military spending ($343 billion in the year 2000) is 69 percent greater than that of the next five highest nations combined. Russia, which has the second largest military budget, spends less than one-sixth what the United States does. Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Cuba, Sudan, Iran, and Syria spend $14.4 billion combined; Iran accounts for 52 percent of this total.
The following is a partial list of U.S. military interventions from 1890 to 2000. This guide does NOT include demonstration duty by military police, mobilizations of the National Guard, offshore shows of naval strength, reinforcements of embassy personnel, the use of non-Defense Department personnel (such as the Drug Enforcement Agency), military exercises, non-combat mobilizations (such as replacing postal strikers), the permanent stationing of armed forces, covert actions where the U.S. did not play a command and control role, the use of small hostage rescue units, most uses of proxy troops, U.S. piloting of foreign warplanes, foreign disaster assistance, military training and advisory programs not involving direct combat, civic action programs, and many other military activities.
Among sources used, besides news reports, are the Congressional Record (23 June 1969), 180 Landings by the U.S. Marine Corps History Division, Ege & Makhijani in Counterspy (July-Aug. 1982), and Daniel Ellsberg in Protest & Survive. "Instances of Use of United States Forces Abroad, 1798-1993" by Ellen C. Collier of the Library of Congress Congressional Research Service.
SOUTH DAKOTA
1890 (-?)
Troops
300 Lakota Indians massacred at Wounded Knee.
ARGENTINA
1890
Troops
Buenos Aires interests protected.
CHILE
1891
Troops
Marines clash with nationalist rebels.
HAITI
1891
Troops
Black workers revolt on U.S.-claimed Navassa Island defeated.
IDAHO
1892
Troops
Army suppresses silver miners' strike.
HAWAII
1893 (-?)
Naval, troops
Independent kingdom overthrown, annexed.
CHICAGO
1894
Troops
Breaking of rail strike, 34 killed
NICARAGUA
1894
Troops
Month-long occupation of Bluefields.
CHINA
1894-95
Naval, troops
Marines land in Sino-Jap War.
KOREA
1894-96
Troops
Marines kept in Seoul during war.
PANAMA
1895
Troops, naval
Marines land in Colombian province.
NICARAGUA
1896
Troops
Marines land in port of Corinto.
CHINA
1898-1900
Troops / Boxer Rebellion fought by foreign armies.
PHILIPPINES
1898-1910(-?)
Naval, troops
Seized from Spain, killed 600,000 Filipinos.
CUBA
1898-1902(-?)
Naval, troops
Seized from Spain, still hold Navy base.
PUERTO RICO
1898(-?)
Naval, troops
Seized from Spain, occupation continues.
GUAM
1898(-?)
Naval, troops / Seized from Spain, still used as base.
MINNESOTA
1898(-?)
Troops
Army battles Chippewa at Leech Lake.
NICARAGUA
1898
Troops
Marines land at port of San Juan del Sur.
SAMOA
1899(-?)
Troops
Battle over succession to throne.
NICARAGUA
1899
Troops / Marines land at port of Bluefields.
IDAHO
1899-1901
Troops / Army occupies Coeur d'Alene mining region.
OKLAHOMA
1901
Troops
Army battles Creek Indian revolt.
PANAMA
1901-14
Naval, troops
Broke off from Colombia 1903, annexed Canal Zone 1914-99.
HONDURAS
1903
Troops
Marines intervene in revolution.
DOMINICAN REP.
1903-04
Troops
U.S. interests protected in Revolution.
KOREA
1904-05
Troops
Marines land in Russo-Japanese War.
CUBA
1906-09
Troops / Marines land in democratic election.
NICARAGUA
1907
Troops
"Dollar Diplomacy" protectorate set up.
HONDURAS
1907
Troops
Marines land during war with Nicaragua.
PANAMA
1908
Troops / Marines intervene in election contest.
NICARAGUA
1910
Troops
Marines land in Bluefields and Corinto.
HONDURAS
1911
Troops / U.S. interests protected in civil war.
CHINA
1911-41
Naval, troops
Continuous occupation with flare-ups.
CUBA
1912
Troops / U.S. interests protected in Havana.
PANAMA
19l2
Troops / Marines land during heated election.
HONDURAS
19l2
Troops / Marines protect U.S. economic interests.
NICARAGUA
1912-33
Troops, bombing
20-year occupation, fought guerrillas.
MEXICO
19l3
Naval / Americans evacuated during revolution.
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
1914
Naval / Fight with rebels over Santo Domingo.
COLORADO
1914
Troops / Breaking of miners' strike by Army.
MEXICO
1914-18
Naval, troops
Series of interventions against nationalists.
HAITI
1914-34
Troops, bombing
19-year occupation after revolts.
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
1916-24
Troops
8-year Marine occupation.
CUBA
1917-33
Troops / Military occupation, economic protectorate.
WORLD WAR I
19l7-18
Naval, troops
Ships sunk, fought Germany
RUSSIA
1918-22
Naval, troops
Five landings to fight Bolsheviks.
PANAMA
1918-20
Troops
"Police duty" during unrest after elections.
YUGOSLAVIA
1919
Troops
Marines intervene for Italy against Serbs in Dalmatia.
HONDURAS
1919
Troops
Marines land during election campaign.
GUATEMALA
1920
Troops
2-week intervention against unionists.
WEST VIRGINIA
1920-21
Troops, bombing
Army intervenes against mineworkers.
TURKEY
1922
Troops
Fought nationalists in Smyrna (Izmir).
CHINA
1922-27
Naval, troops
Deployment during nationalist revolt.
HONDURAS
1924-25
Troops
Landed twice during election strife.
PANAMA
1925
Troops / Marines suppress general strike.
CHINA
1927-34
Troops / Marines stationed throughout the country.
EL SALVADOR
1932
Naval / Warships sent during Farabundo Marti revolt.
WASHINGTON DC
1932
Troops / Army stops WWI vet bonus protest.
WORLD WAR II
1941-45
Naval,troops, bombing, nuclear
Fought Axis for 3 years; 1st nuclear war.
DETROIT
1943
Troops
Army puts down Black rebellion.
IRAN
1946
Nuclear threat
Soviet troops told to leave north (Iranian Azerbaijan).
YUGOSLAVIA
1946
Naval / Response to shooting-down of U.S. plane.
URUGUAY
1947
Nuclear threat
Bombers deployed as show of strength.
GREECE
1947-49
Command operation
U.S. directs extreme-right in civil war.
CHINA
1948-49
Troops
Marines evacuate Americans before Communist victory.
GERMANY
1948
Nuclear threat
Atomic-capable bombers guard Berlin Airlift.
PHILIPPINES
1948-54
Command operation
CIA directs war against Huk
Rebellion.
PUERTO RICO
1950
Command operation
Independence rebellion crushed in Ponce.
KOREA
1950-53
Troops, naval, bombing, nuclear threats
U.S.& South Korea fight China & North Korea to stalemate; A-bomb threat in 1950, & vs. China in 1953. Still have bases.
IRAN
1953
Command operation
CIA overthrows democracy, installs Shah.
VIETNAM
1954
Nuclear threat
Bombs offered to French to use against siege.
GUATEMALA
1954
Command operation, bombing, nuclear threat CIA directs exile invasion after new govt nationalizes U.S. company lands; bombers based in Nicaragua.
EGYPT
1956
Nuclear threat, troops
Soviets told to keep out of Suez crisis; MArines evacuate foreigners
LEBANON
1958
Troops, naval / Marine occupation against rebels.
IRAQ
1958
Nuclear threat
Iraq warned against invading Kuwait.
CHINA
1958
Nuclear threat
China told not to move on Taiwan isles.
PANAMA
1958
Troops / Flag protests erupt into confrontation.
VIETNAM
1960-75
Troops, naval, bombing, nuclear threats Fought South Vietnam revolt & North Vietnam; 1-2 million killed in longest U.S. war; atomic bomb threats in 1968 and 1969.
CUBA
1961
Command operation CIA-directed exile invasion fails.
GERMANY
1961
Nuclear threat Alert during Berlin Wall crisis.
CUBA
1962
Nuclear threat, Naval
Blockade during missile crisis; near-war with USSR.
LAOS
1962
Command operation
Military buildup during guerrilla war.
PANAMA
1964
Troops / Panamanians shot for urging canal's return.
INDONESIA
1965
Command operation Million killed in CIA-assisted army coup.
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
1965-66
Troops, bombing Marines land during election campaign.
GUATEMALA
1966-67
Command operation Green Berets intervene against rebels.
DETROIT
1967
Troops / Army battles Blacks, 43 killed.
UNITED STATES
1968
Troops / After King is shot; over 21,000 soldiers in cities.
CAMBODIA
1969-75
Bombing, troops, naval Up to 2 million killed in decade of bombing, starvation, and political chaos.
OMAN
1970
Command operation U.S. directs Iranian marine invasion.
LAOS
1971-73
Command operation, bombing U.S. directs South Vietnamese invasion; "carpet-bombs" countryside.
SOUTH DAKOTA
1973
Command operation Army directs Wounded Knee siege of Lakotas.
MIDEAST
1973
Nuclear threat World-wide alert during Mideast War.
CHILE
1973
Command operation CIA-backed coup ousts elected marxist president.
CAMBODIA
1975
Troops, bombing Gas captured ship, 28 die in copter crash.
ANGOLA
1976-92
Command operation CIA assists South African-backed rebels.
IRAN
1980
Troops, nuclear threat, aborted bombing Raid to rescue Emba-ssy hostages; 8 troops die in copter-plane crash. Soviets war-ned not to get involved in revolution.
LIBYA
1981
Naval jets Two Libyan jets shot down in maneuvers.
EL SALVADOR
1981-92
Command operation, troops Advisors, overflights aid anti-rebel war, soldiers briefly involved in hostage clash.
NICARAGUA
1981-90
Command operation, naval CIA directs exile (Contra) invasions, plants harbor mines against revolution.
LEBANON
1982-84
Naval, bombing, troops Marines expel PLO and back Phalangists, Navy bombs and shells Muslim and Syrian positions.
HONDURAS
1983-89
Troops / Maneuvers help build bases near borders.
GRENADA
1983-84
Troops, bombing Invasion four years after revolution.
IRAN
1984
Jets / Two Iranian jets shot down over Persian Gulf.
LIBYA
1986
Bombing, naval Air strikes to topple nationalist gov't.
BOLIVIA
1986
Troops Army assists raids on cocaine region.
IRAN
1987-88
Naval, bombing US intervenes on side of Iraq in war.
LIBYA
1989
Naval jets Two Libyan jets shot down.
VIRGIN ISLANDS
1989
Troops
St. Croix Black unrest after storm.
PHILIPPINES
1989
Jets / Air cover provided for government against coup.
PANAMA
1989-90
Troops, bombing
Nationalist government ousted by 27,000 soldiers, leaders arrested, 2000+ killed.
LIBERIA
1990
Troops
Foreigners evacuated during civil war.
SAUDI ARABIA
1990-91
Troops, jets Iraq countered after invading Kuwait; 540,000 troops also stationed in Oman, Qatar, Bahrain, UAE, Israel.
IRAQ
1990-?
Bombing, troops, naval Blockade of Iraqi and Jordanian ports, air strikes; 200,000+ killed in invasion of Iraq and Kuwait; no-fly zone over Kurdish north, Shiite south, large-scale destruction of Iraqi military.
KUWAIT
1991
Naval, bombing, troops Kuwait royal family returned to throne.
LOS ANGELES
1992
Troops
Army, Marines deployed against anti-police uprising.
SOMALIA
1992-94
Troops, naval, bombing U.S.-led United Nations occupation during civil war; raids against one Mogadishu faction.
YUGOSLAVIA
1992-94
Naval Nato blockade of Serbia and Montenegro.
BOSNIA
1993-95
Jets, bombing No-fly zone patrolled in civil war; downed jets, bombed Serbs.
HAITI
1994-96
Troops, naval
Blockade against military government; troops restore President Aristide to office three years after coup.
CROATIA
1995
Bombing
Krajina Serb airfields attacked before Croatian offensive.
ZAIRE (CONGO)
1996-97
Troops
Marines at Rwandan Hutu refuge camps, in area where Congo revolution begins.
LIBERIA
1997
Troops
Soldiers under fire during evacuation of foreigners.
ALBANIA
1997
Troops
Soldiers under fire during evacuation of foreigners.
SUDAN
1998
Missiles
Attack on pharmaceutical plant alleged to be "terrorist" nerve gas plant.
AFGHANISTAN
1998
Missiles
Attack on former CIA training camps used by Islamic fundamentalist groups alleged to have attacked embassies.
IRAQ
1998-?
Bombing, Missiles
Four days of intensive air strikes after weapons inspectors allege Iraqi obstructions.
YUGOSLAVIA
1999-?
Bombing, Missiles
Heavy NATO air strikes after Serbia declines to withdraw from Kosovo.
YEMEN
2000
Naval
Suicide bomb attack on USS Cole.
MACEDONIA
2001
Troops
NATO troops shift and partially disarm Albanian rebels.
UNITED STATES
2001
Jets, naval
Response to hijacking attacks.
AFGHANISTAN
2001
Massive U.S. mobilization to attack Taliban, Bin Laden. War could expand to Iraq, Sudan, and beyond.
(The first bombing began on October 7, 2001. Several Afghan cities come under aerial attack. The story continues).
Printer friendly version
Send page by E-Mail
U.S. staff stage-managed food scramble-Zimbabwe
Posted: Thursday, November 21, 2002
Abstract from: www.alertnet.org
HARARE, Nov 19 (Reuters) - Two Americans detained by pro-government militants in Zimbabwe last week were part of a group that stage-managed and filmed a scramble for food among farm workers, the official Herald newspaper reported on Tuesday.
The incident stemmed from "intrusive and interventionist behaviour by some U.S. embassy personnel," Information and Publicity Minister Jonathan Moyo told the newspaper.
Moyo said: "There are no displaced farm workers in Zimbabwe and the embassy knows that. As to claims that there is lawlessness, purely on the basis of this incident, that is over the top and quite preposterous."
The Herald said the embassy group was detained after allegedly throwing food from a moving vehicle to farm workers, who were then filmed as they jostled for the handouts.
A loaded camera and two computer discs were reportedly confiscated from the group, the newspaper added.
Earlier this month, Zimbabwe accused the United States of trying to use widespread food shortages as a pretext to interfere in its internal affairs.
More at www.alertnet.org
Printer friendly version
Send page by E-Mail
Stage-managing food scramble
Posted: Wednesday, November 20, 2002
Wednesday November 20, 2002
Herald Reporters
TWO Americans and two Zimbabweans were last Friday briefly detained by war veterans at Inversnaid Farm in Melfort after they allegedly threw food from a moving vehicle to farm workers whom they then filmed as they jostled for the food.
The four - Mr Andrew John Simpson, Mr Audu Besmer, Mr Costain Chibanda and Mr Elias Shamu - are alleged to have done this on three separate occasions.
A loaded camera and two computer discs were reportedly confiscated from the group.
They are said to have visited Benridge Farm in Matepatepa and Bineer Farm in Glendale on November 14 to arrange for interviews and for the filming of what they described as "displaced farm workers", eye witnesses said.
More at www.herald.co.zw
Check the US-UK version of this story below and see if it gives any reason for the incident or if their reports are destined to give the impression that an attack was carried out by a bunch of mindless pro-Mugabe savages. The people were right to stop them from stage-managing a food scramble to use in their propaganda campaign.
US embassy worker beaten in Zimbabwe
Andrew Meldrum in Harare
Wednesday November 20, 2002
The Guardian UK
The diplomatic dispute between the United States and Zimbabwe has deepened after an employee of the American embassy in Harare was beaten by war veterans loyal to President Robert Mugabe.
The Zimbabwean employee was on an aid mission with a group which included another embassy employee who was an American citizen, and a United Nations official.
The team was studying how to help the former farm workers displaced by Mr Mugabe's land seizures who were "subsisting on a diet of berries and termites", according to a statement from the US government.
The embassy said that the UN official, the American, the Zimbabwean employee and another Zimbabwean citizen travelling with them were forcibly held and interrogated. The Zimbabweans were also beaten, it added.
More at www.guardian.co.uk
Printer friendly version
Send page by E-Mail
More people will admit land reform is justified
Posted: Tuesday, November 19, 2002
Herald Reporter
IF Britain had accepted much earlier its responsibility in creating Zimbabwe’s land problem, the situation would not have deteriorated to what it is now, says the Minister of State for Information and Publicity, Professor Jonathan Moyo.
British foreign minister, Mr Jack Straw last week publicly acknowledged the role of his country’s imperialist expansionist policies in the problems besetting Zimbabwe, after pummelling the country for embarking on land reforms to correct historical injustices for over two years.
Prof Moyo said yesterday more people were going to admit that the country was justified in acquiring land for the landless majority in its quest to correct historical imbalances.
"Chickens are coming home to roost," he said during a lecture at the Zimbabwe Staff College. "Jack Straw now agrees. If he had agreed much earlier we should not have had this problem."
Mr Straw is reported to have ruffled feathers in British politics by blaming the current crises in Iraq and Zimbabwe on the legacy of British imperialism.
"A lot of problems that we are having to deal with now — I have to deal with now — are a consequence of our colonial past," he was quoted as saying in an interview published in the New Statesman magazine last Friday.
The British government has reneged on its colonial obligation to fund Zimbabwe’s land reform despite having agreed to do so at the 1979 Lancaster House talks.
"We are going to have more people admitting that we are right," Prof Moyo said. "Land is now in the hands of Zimbabweans. We are not going to give back an inch of that land."
"We don’t want to have this problem in future. In Zimbabwe there can be no better way of turning things around than to till the land," he said during a lecture attended by 100 army Junior Staff Course and Joint Command Staff Course students.
In his lecture, Prof Moyo outlined the role of his ministry, recent media development trends and challenges facing the information sector in the wake of fierce global capitalism and an onslaught on Zimbabwe’s sovereignty.
"It is important to know what the Government policy is. It is our duty to articulate Government policy, to explain Government policy and to appreciate what it is doing," he said.
He said the electorate expects the Government to implement what Zanu-PF as a party promised in its election manifesto.
"Government policy and its decisions are rooted in the vision and the thinking of our party," he said.
Prof Moyo narrated how the Zimbabwe Mass Media Trust was formed to rid the country’s national media from foreign domination.
With Nigerian funding, he said, the Trust was able to buy out shares of the South African Argus Press, which used to own titles under the Zimpapers Group.
"There was no way we could allow our national media to be controlled by apartheid media institution," he said.
He said he was surprised that critics called titles under Zimpapers "Government-owned or Government-controlled."
"They make their own editorial decisions," he said. If they are going to criticise the Government, they should criticise what they know. We see them not as Government media but as national media."
Prof Moyo criticised privately owned media for being used by Western countries to ridicule the Government and everything that was Zimbabwean.
"They are opposed to the history of the nation, they are opposed to the values of the nation … they are anti-nation.
"It is our desire to work with everyone. We have a media that is principally anti-nation, anti-nationalist, anti-pan-Africanist and against the land reform programme," he said.
The media, he said, had become an area of major contest, with some powerful countries using the privately owned media to demonise and topple the democratically elected Government.
He said the Daily News was being used by Western countries to attack the Government, the country’s values and traditions and the standing of the country’s national heroes who suffered to liberate Zimbabwe.
"This has put us in conflict with certain interests. It survives on sponsored criticism. It is a paper, which became the voice of farmers. It distorted the whole land issue saying the land issue was disorderly and that it was not done according to the rule of law.
"The rule of law is a product of the people in that country … law made by Zimbabweans and for Zimbabweans. This has become an issue in national politics."
He said the Daily News was obsessed with criticising the Government but turned a blind eye to any wrongdoing or shortcomings of the British government and the white world.
"They never ever, ever, find any wrong with the British, never find any wrong with the white world who criticise the Zimbabwean leadership," Prof Moyo said.
"We don’t think this is a reasonable thing."
The paper, he said, showed no regard of the colonial injustices perpetrated by white settlers when they dispossessed black Zimbabweans from their land a century ago, that lives were lost for the country to be independent and the fact that Britain has reneged on its colonial obligation to fund agrarian reforms.
"This is the point we have been making," he said. "Jack Straw now agrees."
Unlike in other countries, he said, his department defended national interest and articulated Government policy at the same time given the on-slaught on the country.
"We defend national interest, defend the Zimbabwean-ness through the promotion of Zimbabwean values, identity and our right to the nation. It’s none but ourselves."
Zimbabwe, he said, valued its participation and association with the Africa Union, Non-Aligned Movement, United Nations and Sadc.
"The Commonwealth is a club that has not rid itself from the colonial hangover," he said.
He said Zimbabwe had become a target of the British who were using BBC to set up a pirate radio station to churn out hate which sought to bring regime change.
SW Africa Radio, he said, was formed by the British and got funding from the US Transition Initiative, which got its money from USAID.
"We are the first country to be the victim. When you seek regime change, you are not seeking the change of the leader … you are seeking for a change of the process … regime change seeks to move us away from the foundation of the revolutionary struggle."
This, he said, was a threat to democracy as defined by the US and its allies.
He said the US government had openly accepted that it is working with some local journalists and media houses to effect "regime change".
"They use that phrase where they want to put a puppet. They will be interested in replacing values of the country. Regime change is a code word for a coup," he said.
Zimbabwe, he said, had proudly been able to hold elections when they were due and had one of the most vibrant democracies in the world.
"They are saying we will use information. It has become a most powerful tool since the collapse of the Cold War. You cannot defend your country without control of the information. AIPPA has brought some discipline in this country.
"It has comparable pieces of legislation, which are there in US."
Prof Moyo said there were some unpatriotic Zimbabweans who went to Britain and the US to urge these countries to invade or blockade the country.
"The Zimbabwe Democracy Act as drafted by Zimbabweans and perfected by the baas … the Uncle Toms ," he said.
He hailed the December 1987 Unity Accord signed by Zanu-PF and PF-Zapu describing it as firmly rooted in the revolutionary struggle.
"False pressures of a government of national unity has been created. We have a strong unity. There can be no unity between a nationalist and a reactionary, no unity between a nationalist and a puppet.
"They want to replace this through the back door. When it comes to national affairs, we deal with them ourselves," he said.
Global capitalism, he said, had led to the collapse of some economies of countries like Argentina and Brazil.
"Why should we all implement Tony Blair’s policy, George Bush’s policy? They should accept that within the international community there are differences.
"We don’t aspire to be like them...an American dream is not a Zimbabwean dream. The Zimbabwean dream is to own land unlike the American dream, which may be to own a hamburger," Prof Moyo said.
Printer friendly version
Send page by E-Mail
Israel and White Supremacy
Posted: Thursday, November 14, 2002
by Aaron Michael Love
In 1945 Jan Smuts, then prime minister of South Africa appealed to the UN for an article on human rights to be included in the United Nations Charter. This incident, cited in W.E.B Du Bois's remarkable book The World and Africa, is a powerful reminder of the contradiction in the European conception of freedom. Freedom only applies absolutely to the white man, temporarily excluding the complications of class and of course, gender. Du Bois argued that the Atlantic slave trade produced this schism materially and culturally, although its origins no doubt go much farther back in European history. He concludes, "nothing so vividly illustrates the twisted contradiction of thought in the minds of white men."
Much ink has been spilled bemoaning the Zionist lobby in the United States. The success of this lobby in the Washington and media establishment, in terms of its limited objectives, is no doubt spectacular. However, it is a strange success, which has made strange bedfellows when considering the history of anti-Jewish racism in the U.S. After all, how could such a lobby hold sway over the Christian Right, Waspish conservative think tanks and a Congress filled with southern gentlemen?
The answer is the Zionist organizations do not hold sway over anyone and to imply otherwise, as some do, has the unintended consequence of flirting on the margins of a major Fascist conceit. Instead, the answer can be found in the history of white supremacy and imperialism within the United States and Europe themselves. In other words, Zionist Apartheid is seen as an old fashioned war on people of color and, as such is perfectly attune to the historical psyche of white America. Rather than trying to "liberate" American foreign policy from Zionist influence, I think it would be much more fruitful to ask why Americans, particularly the political, business class, and certain sectors of the white middle class, love Israel so much.
In an indispensable article, "Antisemitism: Real and Imagined", Tim Wise writes, "Zionism is a form of white supremacy". There are few places where Zionism is placed firmly within the operation of whiteness, though it has been indirectly touched on many times before, most notably in discussions of the relationship between Ashkenazi and Sephardim and Mizrahim Jews in Israel. Indeed, as one Israeli Black Panther put it in 1972, "We must reach a situation in which we shall fight together with the Arabs against the establishment. We are the only ones who can constitute a bridge of peace with the Arabs in the context of a struggle against the establishment." Zionism, like white supremacy, albeit in different keys, is a war against savage Arabs and only a less savage Arab and African Jew.
My experience as a divestment and solidarity organizer over the last couple of years has brought me first hand knowledge of the Zionist paradox in the Jewish community. More than once, young Jews approached us, confessing they struggle to maintain a Jewish identity outside of whiteness, revealing young minds trying to grasp with the irony of an alliance between Jews and White Supremacy. Micah Bazant has spoken of "the Jewish establishment" giving "tremendous lip-service to the concern of Jewish assimilation" but instead contributes "to assimilation of the worst kind." He explains, "they claim to value real Jewish traditions of social justice and tikkun olam, but in fact they have sold out and assimilated to U.S. values of capitalism, racism and imperialism."
Zionism developed in a time of reinvigorated white supremacy in the latter part of the nineteenth century when European states were busily dividing up the land of Africa and Asia. In the confrontation with the indigenous people of Palestine, its ideology belongs within the history of European racial theories and, like the Afrikaner ideology of Jan Smuts, has little problem with seeing itself in the forefront of democracy and civilization in the Middle East while at the same time implementing and justifying the complete and utter subjugation of one its most prominent people.
However, to understand Israel/Palestine as defined systematically by racial oppression has yet to be elaborated on its own. This is odd, given that the racial oppression of the Palestinian people is at the heart of the matter; all other things--land laws, religion, pass laws, racially designated roads and neighborhoods, etc.--are symptoms. This should not come as any surprise: the racial definition of the Zionist project existed from the very beginning. Theodor Herzel in his 1896 pamphlet "The Jewish State" wrote it would "form a part of a wall of defense for Europe in Asia, an outpost of civilization against barbarism." This is the same Herzel who stated that Zionist colonization would be "representatives of Western civilization," bringing "cleanliness, order and the well-established customs of the Occident to this plague-ridden, blighted corner of the Orient." Recall Chomsky memorably quoting Chaim Weizmann, first president of Israel, as saying of Palestine, "there are several hundred thousand negroes there but that this matter has no significance."
How little has changed. With the African liberation movements abroad and the civil rights struggle at home, the white supremacist war on African people has entered a new stage, but the war on the Arab has found its triumphant moment. In that story we hear about the Arab resistance to modernity in the infamous "Arab street", mitigated, of course, by friendly but nervous ruling classes. In the stirring street, like in the Intifada, we are told you find the irrational and the superstitious, not a working toward self-determination and freedom. And who holds the key to holding back this self-evident preternatural violence of the Palestinian and the Arab? Whether it is Bernard Lewis, the New York Times, the Heritage Foundation, Al Gore, the ADL or American Jewish Council Ads on Fox News, the answer is the Zionist State. Counterpoised to the Arab and the Palestinian in particular there is democracy, technology, Judeo-Christian values, the opera and shopping malls. Apartheid Palestine/Israel is necessary exactly because the Palestinian rejects all of these things. They hate "us". Unfortunately, the more honest imperialists say, this is a world of civilization and barbarism: Israel the white European nation in a sea of dark savagery.
That Israel should be in the vanguard of whiteness is actually a credit to the more than five decade old Palestinian struggle. The Palestinian struggle is on the fault-line of freedom and oppression and, as such, is in the forefront of the struggle against white supremacy and imperialism in the world today. Is it any wonder that the white supremacist imperialists holler the most when Palestine/Israel is brought up? It is exactly here that their "twisted contradiction" is most likely to be exposed. Apartheid Israel/Palestine is just another solution to the "problem of the color line." It is a solution that did not begin in 1948 but some 400 years ago and is still with us very much today.
Indeed, we have the rulers of the "western" world as proof. The idea of a Zionist lobby duping State Department officials, ignorant Congress people, the EU or UN bureaucrats, ignores the role of white supremacy. This complicates the popular Leftist view that America and Europe's largely unconditional support of the Zionist state is like a functional balance sheet: tallying the price between keeping a bully on the Middle East block, "a strategic asset", and bad relations with the wider Arab public. We should recall what Du Bois was trying to tell the Left in his day: race and class are not separable categories in modern world history.
But the implications go beyond the exigencies of Leftist anti-imperialism to the heart of the Palestinian struggle and solidarity itself. Typically, Palestine/Israel is argued in terms of an abstract discourse of "human rights", "UN resolutions", and "international law". This is problematic on several grounds. First, on a psychological level, the basic effrontery of Apartheid to human dignity is lost. On a more practical level, most Americans do not connect immediately to the Palestinian struggle because the direct connections to their historical experience are not revealed or emphasized. Further, rights, laws and resolutions bring a kind of equivalence to the Palestinian and Jewish experience in Israel/Palestine. The Zionist state can cite almost as many rights, laws and resolutions as their opponents. Even worse the application of these things, like the UN itself, is dominated by the United States. What is missing is a sense of right and wrong, of abnormality, and a lack of understanding the deep connections of the Palestinian struggle with the operation of the American historical psyche.
The importance of understanding white supremacy could also be important for the Palestinian struggle in Palestine/Israel. Israel Shahak wrote in his brilliant article:
"Analysis of Israeli policies: the priority of the ideological factor," that eventually, "the Palestinians are bound to perceive themselves first and foremost as victims of Israeli legal discrimination, applied against them by virtue of their being non-Jews. When this occurs, Israel's domestic and international position can be expected to become highly unstable."
Oppression-political, economic, legal, cultural-on the basis of race is what most intimately connects all Palestinians, at a most basic level, living throughout Palestine/Israel. If Shahak's observation is politically formulated and used in a struggle to trump the Zionist, white supremacist vision and enforcement of separation and expropriation, meanwhile coupled with an effective solidarity campaign to politically and economically isolate Israel, the Zionist state will eventually "become highly unstable" indeed.
I do not think this can be overstated at this time. Like the U.S. commitment to Israel, the Zionist commitment to the West Bank and Gaza exists over and above balance sheet considerations. Returning to Shahak's article, a particular passage is worth quoting in full:
"In other words, empirical evidence (valid as anything in politics can be valid) shows that Israeli policies are primarily ideologically motivated and that the ideology by which they are motivated is totalitarian in nature. This ideology can be easily known since it is enshrined in the writings of the founders of Labor Zionism, and it can be easily inferred from Israeli laws, regulations and pursued policies. Those who, like Arafat, his henchmen and most Palestinian intellectuals, have through all these years failed to make an intellectual effort to seriously study this ideology, have only themselves to blame for being stunned by all the developments of the 20 months after Oslo."
As I have tried to briefly lay out, the Zionist Apartheid project finds its force and appeal through its own conception of whiteness, not because Zionist organizations find better ways to get the ear of the white man. It is fully assimilated into this framework and all of its self-justification refers back to the matrix of white supremacy and empire. One cannot battle Zionism without battling white supremacy and the U.S. establishment--they are intimately linked. Seeking the ear of the establishment without speaking the truth about their racism underestimates their psychological and historical relationship with Apartheid. This means a solidarity built on an alliance with those who have been in the forefront of fighting white supremacy.
The brilliance of Du Bois's book is to show exactly how the "West" can be for human rights and for an unrelenting war on Arabs and, in particular, Palestinians. It explains how Jan Smuts in Du Bois's day or Shimon Peres in ours can lecture us on "human rights" and get away with it. Perhaps, most importantly, white supremacy reframes the Palestinian struggle in a historical continuum that better explains the reflexive support among a broad swathe of the American and European public for the Zionist adventure. It equally reframes it within a tradition that has deep reserves for overcoming the contradictions of race, freedom and oppression in European and American history with universal ideas of equality, democracy and fraternity, previously only thought available to the white man.
Printer friendly version
Send page by E-Mail
Zimbabwe, BBC and illegitimate White Control
Posted: Tuesday, November 12, 2002
From: AmonHotep: Dialogue
ABSTRACT: BBC Zimbabwe 'diverts food aid'
"Mr Mugabe denies that the food crisis is a result of his land reform programme and blames it on a drought, which has affected much of the region.
But white farmers who are prevented from working their land say that their dams are full of water.
Just a few hundred white farmers remain on their land, out of some 4,000 two years ago.
Our correspondent says that the land has gone to Zanu-PF officials, who often have no farming background, instead of the landless black people who were supposed to benefit.
In Maputo, Zimbabwean Foreign Minister Stan Mudenge repeated his government's argument that former colonial power Britain should compensate the white farmers who have lost their land.
As a result of British colonial rule, whites owned much of Zimbabwe's best farmland.
Britain has refused to pay unless there is transparency in the redistribution of land."
___________________________________________
The BBC is currently funded through the UK Licence Fee payment to the tune of £2.4bn. The Licence fee from which BBC is paid is an annual fee that allows people to own and use a television in the UK. If you have any equipment capable of receiving a television signal and receive any programmes, including satellite, you must have a licence. [More from BBC]
Abstract: 'BBC gets anything it wants,' claims Murdoch
by Dan Milmo, guardian.co.uk
Friday November 8, 2002
Rupert Murdoch today launched a scathing attack on the government, accusing it of being too cosy with the BBC and of fostering anti-competitive behaviour on the part of the corporation.
He said the BBC, funded by an annual licence fee payment of £2.4bn, had been protected by successive Conservative and Labour governments. [full article]
__________________________________________
ABSTRACT: Carrington backs Zimbabwe farmers
By Andrew Unsworth: London. Sunday Oct 20 2002
www.sundaytimes.co.za
"Lord Carrington, who chaired the Lancaster House conference that led to the end of white minority rule in Zimbabwe, has joined in the growing controversy over Prime Minister Tony Blair's government's reluctance to support white farmers who have been evicted from land in Zimbabwe.
In a question tabled in the House of Lords this week, Carrington asked whether the British government was prepared to use money earmarked for land reform more than 20 years ago to help farmers now left destitute.
Speaking to the Sunday Times, he said that funds were available for land redistribution in 1979.
"What we intended to do at the Lancaster House negotiations and subsequently was to help Zimbabwean farmers on a willing buyer-willing seller basis, and to help the Zimbabwean government . . . to make more farms available to black farmers," he said this week. "It all fell down because the Zimbabwean government gave farms to their own cronies and the British government of the day decided the money could not be used on that basis."
He said the government's response to this had been to "waffle" . No specific sum was pledged originally, but £44-million (about R750-million) had been given to Zimbabwe up to 2000. [full article]
___________________________________________
South Africa fears terror threat of white extremists
Tuesday, 12 November 2002
From Michael Dynes in Johannesburg
More than 80 extreme right-wing groups are thought to be operating in South Africa. They represent a mixture of military underground cells, such as Boeremag, and an assortment of religious doomsday cults, such as Israel Vision and Daughter of Zion. Farmers, blue-collar workers, professionals, academics and retired military and police officers fill their ranks and they have cultivated the conviction that they are being "oppressed" by South Africa's black majority rule. [full article here or here]
Ayinde's comment
Western Media houses (BBC) are rather slow to highlight the terrorist threats from White extremist groups in South Africa. These Groups represent the general thinking of most Whites who still suffer from superiority complexes and feel they have a divine right to rule all people.
This attitude is at the root of all other forms of Terrorism.
__________________________________________
Aisha's comment
Britain wanted to continue their dictatorship. They wanted to dictate to the Zimbabwe Government who should own the land so that they (Britain) could still maintain control.
The colour of the farmers would have changed but the 'ownership' would have remained the same. White farmers would have been replaced with Black farmers who were willing to be puppets of the British government.
___________________________________________
Ayinde's comments...
BBC is not impartial in this whole affair.
Other US and UK media houses are being guided by some legitimate concerns muddled with their own prejudices. Their coverage generally lacks the historical perspective coupled with the agreements signed when Zimbabwe won its independence. There are many things wrong with the Resettlement Programme but I would only focus on aspects that pertain to the dishonest media reports.
No one can be against the Zimbabwe government's agents for this headline in their newspapers, "BBC gets more money to step up anti-Zim crusade".
During BBC's latest propaganda report on Television they were referring to the Resettlement Programme as "THE WHITE MAN'S LAND BEING RESETTLED".
Two questions!
1) After how many years does stolen property become the property of the thief?
2) Do inheritors of stolen property become the legitimate owners of the property by virtue of the inheritance?
Land was at the core of Zimbabwe's liberation struggle
British and American negotiators granted independence with the imposition of certain conditions destined to keep the colonial masters in control. One provision stipulated that for a period of 10 years, land ownership in Zimbabwe could only be transferred on a "willing seller, willing buyer" basis. This amounted to further rewarding people who had already profited from ill-gotten gains.
This also retarded the transformation process by ten years during which the British and American negotiators hoped they would have been able to 'install' a government favorable to their indirect control.
In 1992 the Land Acquisition Act was passed notwithstanding the pressures from Britain and the US.
Zimbabwe's government felt it could no longer continue haggling over land reform, and nearing the end of the 1990's, they started moving away from the Economic Structural Adjustment Program (ESAP), which was not adequately addressing the issues of land reform. In October 2001 Mugabe abandoned the ESAP.
The claim that Mugabe did nothing for 20 years is usually made without reference to the Independence agreement that placed restraints on what Mugabe and his government could have done for the first 10 years. It also neglects the years of trying to get the European powers to honor their agreement.
Meanwhile the Western media kept harping about the harm the economy of Zimbabwe would endure because of the land reform. They continually mention that the Zimbabweans who are getting the confiscated agricultural lands do not know about commercial farming. BBC reported that these African farmers do not have seeds and fertilizers.
If these Africans cannot acquire fertilizers and seeds it is only because of trade restrictions or sellers being discouraged from supplying them.
If in their opinion these Africans cannot grow their own food, then they should explain how humans survived in Africa for thousands of years before Europeans. This fraudulent racist position also highlights the fact that for all the years they occupied the land they were not interested in teaching those Africans whom they profited from. They were quite contented to keep them as cheap farm labour.
European superiority complexes are responsible for these statements and conscious people should treat with them accordingly. Apparently they have no problem delivering food aid which keeps the population enslaved, but allowing people to help themselves is a problem.
The unspoken suggestion is that only Whites can successfully run businesses.
MUGABE IS RIGHT!!!
Transparency for Britain means handing the land over to 'mentally enslaved Africans' who would easily 'give' the land to colonial Whites.
The land MUST go to those Africans who support his Land Reform Programme to ensure the land is not given or resold cheaply to the former White occupiers.
BRITAIN IS RUDE!!!
Britain has to pay and must do so through the legitimate government in Zimbabwe. Britain must stop trying to undermine the democratic process in that country for the benefit of a few Whites.
Where on earth could people guilty of a crime retain the right to determine when and to whom they must pay compensation?
BRITAIN wants to remain in control of African lands and her former colonies through remote control. (Through supporting 'mentally enslaved Africans' who pursue British interest first.)
Who gets land or reclaimed farms is a matter for the internal politics of Zimbabwe and is not up to the dictates of Britain. They had already decided to pay and should have continued through the legitimate government in Zimbabwe.
The Christianized, colonized Blacks they keep featuring on BBC (e.g. Zimbabwe Catholic bishop) is destined to give the impression that most Africans are against the return of their lands. In small print below his picture they put, "Archbishop Ncube is a long-time Mugabe critic". Of course he is; he is 'Christianized', colonized and walks around with his White 'Virgin' Mary and White Jesus as was seen in the background when he was leveling his criticisms of Mugabe on BBC's 24hr News Television feature.
Food Aid is being used as a tool to interfere in the political process in Zimbabwe. Many of these agencies get their funding from Europe and America and they are carrying out the dirty works of those who fund them.
Food Aid is also being used to introduce genetically modified seeds into Africa thus corrupting their own food supply. This will make these people dependant on US corporations for seeds. This is one of the ways the West intends to control all people through controlling seeds and by extension food supplies.
___________________________________________
Zimbabwe, Mugabe and White farmers
Dr. Chika A. Onyeani, Aug. 22, 02, The African Sun Times
"It seems the height of hypocrisy that the world should be focused on the plight and non-payment of compensation to white farmers, without as much as a mention of the savagery with which the Black African owners were massacred and their lands seized without compensation. The word Bulawayo, the second largest city in Zimbabwe, is an Ndebele word for "slaughter," and it refers to the savagery of the British settlers, including the infamous Cecil Rhodes who had crushed the attempt by the indigenes to fight back, leading King Lobengula to swallow poison rather than be captured. Or should we forget the savagery of the bestial Sir Frederick Carrington, who had publicly advocated that the entire Ndebele race should be forcefully removed or be exterminated.
Or that of profligate Ian Smith, who seized the government in 1965 and unilaterally declared the then Southern Rhodesia independent, when he refused to apologize for the atrocities he committed while he held office. In fact, he even boasted that he had no regrets about the estimated 30,000 Zimbabweans killed during his rule. Said Smith, "the more we killed, the happier we were." [full article]
¤ British Terrorist Assualt on Zimbabwe
¤ Land Issue - Fact Sheet
¤ Zimbabwe Under Siege
¤ 2000 Parliamentary elections: Electorate want change
¤ Mugabe: Zimbabwe will not be a colony again
¤ Stop imperialist intervention in Zimbabwe
___________________________________________
Message Board Comments
From: THANDO S
19 October 2002, at 12:18 p.m.
I am writing in relation to your article on Zimbabwe coverage by the British media. As a black Zimbabwean I have found your article to be incorrect to say the least.
Unfair economic practises have indeed contributed to Africa's woes as has the drought. However in Zimbabwe the violence and intimidation which has been used to seize the farms has greatly increased the enormity of the disaster. People who do not support Mugabe whether they belong to the opposition or not have been victimised and the law disregarded in a so called 'democratic and free' country.
'Returning the land to its rightful owners',as the Zimbabwean government puts it is just a way of getting people like you to support them.As a matter of fact seized farms are being given to Mugabe's friends on a permanent bases. The farm labourers are being driven off the land and whether they originated from Mozambique or Malawi they are Zimbabwean and their treatment is unconstitutional. At least the white farmers not only paid them, but provided healthcare, education and housing which by Zimbabwean standards is a 'luxury'. The point of colonial policy is laughable because Zimbabweans fought and died for a free and equal society not just for blacks but for whites as well and whites such as Sir Garfield Todd the former Rhodesian Prime Minister who was imprisoned by the Smith regime in the '70's for supporting the black cause, were also involved in the struggle for independence.
After independence Zimbabwe has been destroyed by its leadership which does not want to step down but would rather kill its own people to preserve its power.
Inasmuch as the British media is biased to an extent in its coverage of Zimbabwe, you should research your facts before supporting Mugabe's draconian tactics.
####
Ayinde's Response...
20 October 2002, at 1:19 a.m.
Anyone can claim to be White or Black on the Internet. Claiming to be Black does not validate your comments. One would think if you had a view that was legitimate then it would not have been necessary to state if you were White or Black as the truth can stand without the colour weight.
Let us hope Mugabe remains smart enough to continue returning the lands to those people who support and lobbied for its return.
Giving farms to his opponents is equal to handing it back to the White farmers. (Mental enslavement)
Yes, it took 20 years and there is much that is wrong with Mugabe and the process, but the UK also took 20 years too long while offering tokenism. The White farmers should have acted without it reaching this stage.
Seeing that you do not support the process then you would have much to condemn and the condemnations are in all other media sources. Repeating them here is to continue the imbalance in the general news coverage.
Although you condemn the coverage you did not present one quote that was inaccurate but instead you choose to repeat the popular ignorant diatribe.
I wonder how many people would take the time to register or write a letter with much of the self-hating comments I see on the Internet.
Victims against a global corporate structure
By Ghifari al Mukhtar
Terms rather than words
I have always encountered problems with my slave tongue which is the English language, the simplistic yet perplex mode of communication latter on as I matured in the world that surrounded me more so became extremely unfathomable throughout the ever declining American revolution or the English evolution, that gave rise to the United States of America Australia to a lesser extent New Zealand and the more Cosmo politic Euro-American Israeli State somewhere in the middle East.
Terms rather than words they are; can only be determined base on the person time and circumstances of use, which is the American-way.
For example we hear of Israeli incursions but Iraqi invasion; targeted (retaliatory) killings against Palestinian children and their parents in response to Palestinian "terrorist" fighting off an invader uniform sometimes not (Settlers); Constructive engagement towards western satellite states as in the case of Apartheid but cluster bombs coupled with a can of GM expired food disguised as it were from Santa Clause 'who the hell is he is any fools 'GUEST' of non-Aryan humanities, collateral damage instead of innocent defenseless people, again-collateral damage as oppose to deliberate and calculated disregard.
Why continue on this ever expanding yet continual deceptive creative language as though the communicative extracts is what I am after rather than its users.
We see and we hear-that politics are bad even though rotten men find the use of politics meaningless and naive do-gooders endeavor to make the instrument useful.
Like politics English have always been used to perfection when coming to telling lies, its omissions as well as its pronouncements as suggestions equals advice for the purposes of deception.
Englishmen (Americans they are) are the masters of it all even the crude Israelis depend on the Americans for this lauded cultural asset.
Native Americans warned humanity; that the white man spoke with four (folk) tongue; ‘no racism intended’.
Today we hear of the other meaning for the word invasion/colonization (INTRUSIVE INTERVENTION).
As if the underlying factor for invasions were usually preceded by way of sanctions then who must invade the United States and the allies of sanctions that resulted in mass murder on the peoples of Iraq and Palestine to name the current victims to say the least, a policy nurtured and engineered by a group of unmatched criminals who's deeds against every form of human decency against their fellow man on any scale globally or infinite throughout human existence will always be remembered even as "Zimbabwe" Africans world over flirt with branded names like Pepsi & Coco cola, GM foods, Addidas, Roebuck and Nike assisted amnesia.
They'd like us not to remember yet be fearful of, so they can keep their charge is just a tacit reminder how twisted are the meanings and use of the criminally "skilled" English usage.
The limitations prove exhausting though on the issue of the International Court of Justice only because the ICJ is a EU child and when the language (immunity) is converted to the varied EU member states languages it just didn't compute then came the evolutionary Word processor i.e. compromise, by way of coercions, arm twisting, economic whitemail and the "santa" Clauses called diplomacy.
History have proved that the last 80 years the deliberate protracted wars imposed on Africa, the subverted economic AID packages the willful spreading of the HIV virus via inoculation the orchestrated droughts throughout many states on the continent the subsequent christianisation, the blackened mainstream "media" bias the WTO WHO the IMF WB HRW are all but policies and entities that out-served the colonialist adventure hence the intrusive intervention threat from the last generation of the final Aryan empire comes at this time.
One needs not look further as the economy is rapidly slipping from the grip of their monopoly.
But invading Africa is surely the groundless pivot where the resurrection of Rhodes will find no ground secure, beneath or above them. Perception though not shared is that while all things must return to its point and place of origin Africa shall be the place where Europe and all her descendants shall be retributed. African soil as such may only occur during their disastrous return to re-colonize the continent, as it's not in her "US" nature to genuinely seek forgiveness while at strength.
Share your views
Printer friendly version
Send page by E-Mail
Share your views on the Online Forums
View last 5 days / Advance search
