| The U.S. Military’s Campaign Against Media Freedom by CHELSEA MANNING | |
 | 15 Jun 2014 |
The Fog of War Machine | |
FORT LEAVENWORTH, Kan. — WHEN I chose to disclose classified information in 2010, I did so out of a love for my country and a sense of duty to others. I’m now serving a sentence of 35 years in prison for these unauthorized disclosures. I understand that my actions violated the law. However, the concerns that motivated me have not been resolved. As Iraq erupts in civil war and America again contemplates intervention, that unfinished business should give new urgency to the question of how the United States military controlled the media coverage of its long involvement there and in Afghanistan. I believe that the current limits on press freedom and excessive government secrecy make it impossible for Americans to grasp fully what is happening in the wars we finance. If you were following the news during the March 2010 elections in Iraq, you might remember that the American press was flooded with stories declaring the elections a success, complete with upbeat anecdotes and photographs of Iraqi women proudly displaying their ink-stained fingers. The subtext was that United States military operations had succeeded in creating a stable and democratic Iraq. Those of us stationed there were acutely aware of a more complicated reality. Military and diplomatic reports coming across my desk detailed a brutal crackdown against political dissidents by the Iraqi Ministry of Interior and federal police, on behalf of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki. Detainees were often tortured, or even killed. Early that year, I received orders to investigate 15 individuals whom the federal police had arrested on suspicion of printing “anti-Iraqi literature.” I learned that these individuals had absolutely no ties to terrorism; they were publishing a scholarly critique of Mr. Maliki’s administration. I forwarded this finding to the officer in command in eastern Baghdad. He responded that he didn’t need this information; instead, I should assist the federal police in locating more “anti-Iraqi” print shops. I was shocked by our military’s complicity in the corruption of that election. Yet these deeply troubling details flew under the American media’s radar. It was not the first (or the last) time I felt compelled to question the way we conducted our mission in Iraq. We intelligence analysts, and the officers to whom we reported, had access to a comprehensive overview of the war that few others had. How could top-level decision makers say that the American public, or even Congress, supported the conflict when they didn’t have half the story? Among the many daily reports I received via email while working in Iraq in 2009 and 2010 was an internal public affairs briefing that listed recently published news articles about the American mission in Iraq. One of my regular tasks was to provide, for the public affairs summary read by the command in eastern Baghdad, a single-sentence description of each issue covered, complementing our analysis with local intelligence. The more I made these daily comparisons between the news back in the States and the military and diplomatic reports available to me as an analyst, the more aware I became of the disparity. In contrast to the solid, nuanced briefings we created on the ground, the news available to the public was flooded with foggy speculation and simplifications. Continue reading the main story Continue reading the main story Continue reading the main story One clue to this disjunction lay in the public affairs reports. Near the top of each briefing was the number of embedded journalists attached to American military units in a combat zone. Throughout my deployment, I never saw that tally go above 12. In other words, in all of Iraq, which contained 31 million people and 117,000 United States troops, no more than a dozen American journalists were covering military operations. The process of limiting press access to a conflict begins when a reporter applies for embed status. All reporters are carefully vetted by military public affairs officials. This system is far from unbiased. Unsurprisingly, reporters who have established relationships with the military are more likely to be granted access. Less well known is that journalists whom military contractors rate as likely to produce “favorable” coverage, based on their past reporting, also get preference. This outsourced “favorability” rating assigned to each applicant is used to screen out those judged likely to produce critical coverage. Reporters who succeeded in obtaining embed status in Iraq were then required to sign a media “ground rules” agreement. Army public affairs officials said this was to protect operational security, but it also allowed them to terminate a reporter’s embed without appeal. There have been numerous cases of reporters’ having their access terminated following controversial reporting. In 2010, the late Rolling Stone reporter Michael Hastings had his access pulled after reporting criticism of the Obama administration by Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal and his staff in Afghanistan. A Pentagon spokesman said, “Embeds are a privilege, not a right.” If a reporter’s embed status is terminated, typically she or he is blacklisted. This program of limiting press access was challenged in court in 2013 by a freelance reporter, Wayne Anderson, who claimed to have followed his agreement but to have been terminated after publishing adverse reports about the conflict in Afghanistan. The ruling on his case upheld the military’s position that there was no constitutionally protected right to be an embedded journalist. The embedded reporter program, which continues in Afghanistan and wherever the United States sends troops, is deeply informed by the military’s experience of how media coverage shifted public opinion during the Vietnam War. The gatekeepers in public affairs have too much power: Reporters naturally fear having their access terminated, so they tend to avoid controversial reporting that could raise red flags. The existing program forces journalists to compete against one another for “special access” to vital matters of foreign and domestic policy. Too often, this creates reporting that flatters senior decision makers. A result is that the American public’s access to the facts is gutted, which leaves them with no way to evaluate the conduct of American officials. Journalists have an important role to play in calling for reforms to the embedding system. The favorability of a journalist’s previous reporting should not be a factor. Transparency, guaranteed by a body not under the control of public affairs officials, should govern the credentialing process. An independent board made up of military staff members, veterans, Pentagon civilians and journalists could balance the public’s need for information with the military’s need for operational security. Reporters should have timely access to information. The military could do far more to enable the rapid declassification of information that does not jeopardize military missions. The military’s Significant Activity Reports, for example, provide quick overviews of events like attacks and casualties. Often classified by default, these could help journalists report the facts accurately. Opinion polls indicate that Americans’ confidence in their elected representatives is at a record low. Improving media access to this crucial aspect of our national life — where America has committed the men and women of its armed services — would be a powerful step toward re-establishing trust between voters and officials. Chelsea Manning is a former United States Army intelligence analyst. | |
| See also: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/15/opinion/sunday/chelsea-manning-the-us-militarys-campaign-against-media-freedom.html | |
Monday, June 16, 2014
 |
Worker-driven Social Responsibility (WSR):
A new idea for a new century...
If you are even a casual reader of this site you
know this: The Fair Food Program has effected unprecedented change in Florida’s
fields since it was implemented across 90% of the state’s tomato industry in
2011. It has eliminated or greatly reduced longstanding abuses from sexual
harassment to modern-day slavery, added over $14 million in Fair Food Premiums
to farm payrolls, and earned the praise of human rights experts from the White
House to the United Nations. It has been called “one of the great human rights
success stories of our day” in the Washington Post and “the best workplace
monitoring program… in the US” on the front page of the New York Times.
But even some of our most loyal readers might not
know the “secret” behind the Fair Food Program’s success, even though the answer
is deceptively simple: The Fair Food Program is a workers’ rights program that
is designed, monitored, and enforced by the workers whose rights it is
intended to protect. In the Fair Food Program, workers are not just at the
table, they are at the head of the table. And because workers are the only
actors in the supply chain with a vital and abiding interest in seeing that
their rights are effectively monitored and enforced, they have, in the case of
the Fair Food Program, constructed a system that actually works.
In short, the Fair Food Program is a truly new and
distinct form of human rights program that can be called Worker-driven Social
Responsibility (WSR). And thanks to the workers’ leading role in designing the
program, its structure and function stand in stark contrast to the traditional
corporate-led approach to social responsibility, known by its acronym CSR, as do
its results.
What follows is a quick look at the differences
between WSR and CSR along several key dimensions of social responsibility. The
conclusion of that comparison is inescapable: If a human rights program is to be
effective, the humans whose rights are in question must be key players in — the
subjects, not the objects of — the design and implementation of the program.
It starts with how the problem is defined:
Public relations crisis (CSR) vs. Human rights crisis (WSR)…
We have established that the fundamental difference
between Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and Worker-driven Social
Responsibility (WSR) — the difference from which all other distinctions
logically flow — lies in the question of who is at the helm. Does the
corporation whose supply chain is riddled with human rights violations drive the
program, or do the workers whose basic human rights are being violated on a
daily basis?...
Don't miss the rest of today's reflection on Worker-led Social
Responsibility at the CIW website!
|
 |
Don't bomb IraqPresident Obama will decide how to respond to the crisis in Iraq over the next few days.Tell Congress to speak out against bombing Iraq.  |
John McCain is shaking his fist angrily and calling for military action. Lindsey Graham is invoking terrorist attacks and describing American air power as “the only option.” The president is huddled with his advisers considering military options for Iraq. Did we just travel in a time machine to 2003?
Sadly, we are having yet another debate about using
the blunt and ineffective instrument of military force to deal with a complex
crisis in Iraq. President Obama just announced that he’ll decide on
military action “in the days ahead” and the US is reportedly moving an
aircraft carrier to the area.
President Obama recently laid out his foreign policy
vision in a speech at West Point, saying “Just because we have the best hammer
does not mean that every problem is a nail.” So why isn't he looking for other
tools in his toolbox?
We’ve seen this play out before. The gains made by
ISIS militants and their allies and the Maliki government's sectarian politics
require a smart strategy. Dropping bombs on a volatile situation is likely to
escalate the conflict, not resolve it, and innocent civilians will lose their
lives in the process.
We stopped the bombing of Syria because we
responded quickly and loudly, and Congress raised a
ruckus. Tell them to do
it again.
In some ways this feels like déjà vu all over again.
But a lot has changed in the past decade. The American people have learned a
lesson about the reckless use of military force. Let’s make sure our
leaders don’t forget it.
 |
For peace,
Shelagh ForemanProgram Director |
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UFPJ Action Alert: 3 Things You Can Do to Oppose US Military Intervention in Iraq!
 |
|
1) Tell Your Member of Congress:
Oppose US
Military Intervention in Iraq or Syria
Oppose the $ 571 Billion Defense Appropriations Bill Congressional Switchboard: (202) 224-3121
2) Call the White House. Let President Obama know you
oppose military intervention of any kind in Iraq or Syria and urge him to seek a
diplomatic solution.
White House
Switchboard: (202) 456-1111
3) Join a United for Peace and
Justice Briefing on Iraq/ Syria Crisis
Phyllis Bennis, Institute for Policy Studies and
Nicholas J. Sandy Davies, author Blood on Our Hands will discuss the
crisis in Iraq and Syria and the threat of US military intervention. How can the
antiwar movement respond?
Wednesday,
June 18, 9 pm EDT/6 pm PDT
As the situation in Iraq
deteriorates, the “Never Learn” caucus is demanding US military intervention in
the form of ground troops, air strikes, Special Operations and weapons
deliveries. The unfolding tragedy in Iraq is a direct
consequence of the illegal American invasion and occupation of that country.
The least helpful idea is for the United States to involve itself militarily
in Iraq or Syria. US military intervention, whether directly or by
providing arms, will increase the suffering of people in those countries and
enhance the risk of a wider regional conflict.
This coming week the House of Representatives is
set to pass a $571 billion Defense Appropriations bill. So long as our
oversized military eclipses our domestic needs and the United States spends more
money on warfare than the next eight countries combined, military action will
continue to be the default response to international crisis. Too many
members of Congress claim to oppose war and then quietly pass outlandish
military budgets. The proposed FY 2015 Defense Appropriations
bill far exceeds what is needed militarily to protect our country.
Please Call your Reps today and tell
them:
Some useful articles:
http://davidcortright.net/2014/06/12/diplomacy-not-more-arms-needed-in-iraq-and-syria/
http://tomhayden.com/home/stay-out-of-sectarian-civil-wars.html http://ericmargolis.com/2014/06/the-allmighty-mess-in-iraq/
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World Can't
Wait Conversation
As The 100th Anniversary Of The Beginning of World War I (Remember The War To End All Wars) Approaches ... Some Remembrances-Rosa Luxemburg, The Rose Of The Revolution -Concerning Morocco-(1911)
The events leading up to World War I from the massive
military armament of almost all the capitalist and imperialist parties in
Europe and elsewhere in order to stake their claims to their unimpeded share of
the world’s resources to the supposedly eternal pledges by the Social-Democrats
and other militant leftist formations representing the historic interest of the
international working-class to stop those parties in their tracks at the
approach of war were decisive for 20th century history. The ability
to inflict industrial-sized slaughter and mayhem on a massive scale first
portended toward the end of the American Civil War once the Northern industrial
might tipped the scales their way almost could not be avoided in the early 20th
century once the armaments race got serious, and the technology seemed to grow
exponentially with each new turn in the war machine.
The land war, the war carried out by the “grunts,” by the “cannon
fodder” of many nations was only the tip of the iceberg and probably except for
the increased cannon-power and rapidity of the machine-guns would be carried
out by the norms of the last war. However the race for naval supremacy, or the
race to take a big kink out of British supremacy, went on unimpeded as Germany
tried to break-out into the Atlantic world and even Japan, Jesus, Japan tried
to gain a big hold in the Asia seas. The deeply disturbing submarine warfare
wreaking havoc on commerce on the seas, the use of armed aircraft and other
such technological innovations of war only added to the frenzy. We can hundred
years ahead, look back and see where talk of “stabs in the back” by the losers
and ultimately an armistice rather than decisive victory on the blood-drenched
fields of Europe would lead to more blood-letting but it was not clear, or
nobody was talking about it much, or, better, doing much about calling a halt
before they began among all those “civilized” nations who went into the abyss
in July of 1914. Sadly the list of those who would not do anything, anything
concrete, besides paper manifestos issued at international conferences, included
the great bulk of the official European labor movement which in theory was
committed to stopping the madness. A few voices were raised and one hundred
years later those voices have a place of honor in this space.
Over the next period as we lead up to the 100th
anniversary of the start of World War I and beyond I will under this headline
post various documents, manifestos and cultural expressions from that time in
order to give a sense of what the lead up to that war looked like, the struggle
against its outbreak before, the forlorn struggle during and the massive
struggles in order to create a newer world out of the shambles of the
battlefields.
********
Teddy Martin had come from a long line of workers, some of
his forbears had been among the first domestic weavers in Spitalfield, had been
the first machine-tenders in Manchester and had been workers like him and his
father in the London shipbuilding trade. He knew deep in his blood there was an
“us” and “them” in the world without his party, the Labor Party, having to tell
him word one on the subject. He had even read Karl Marx in his early teens when
he was trying to figure out why his family was stuck in the faraway outer
tenements with their squalor and their human closeness (he never could get over
being in close quarters ever since then). So yes he was ready to listen to what
some left members of the party had to say if the war clouds on the horizon
turned any darker. But, and hear him true, his was like his forbears and his
father before him as loyal a man as to be found in the country. Loyal to his
king (queen too if it came to that) and his country. So he would have to think,
think carefully, about what to do if those nasty Huns and their craven allies
making loud noises of late threatened his way of life. Most of his mates to the
extent that they had any opinion were beginning to be swept up in the idea that
a little war might not be such a bad thing to settle some long smoldering
disputes. Still he, Teddy Martin, was not a man to be rushed and so he would
think, think hard, about what to do if there was a mass mobilization.
No question, thought Teddy Martin, his majesty’s government
had gotten itself into a hard situation ever since that mangy Archduke somebody
had got himself shot by a guy, a damn anarchist working with who knows who,
maybe freemasons, over in Sarajevo, over in someplace he was not quite sure he
knew where it was if somebody had asked him to point it out in a map. That
seemingly silly little act (except of course to the Archduke and his wife also
killed) apparently has exposed Britain, damn the whole British Empire that they
claim the sun never sets on, to some pretty serious entanglements because if
France were to go to war with Austria or someplace like that then the king is
duty bound to come to France’s rescue. And Teddy Martin as thinking man, as a
working man, as a member in good standing of the Labor Party ever since its
inception was still not sure what he would do. Not sure that he would follow
the war cries being shouted out by the likes of Arthur Henderson from his own
party. All he knew was that the usual talk of football or the prizefights that
filled the air at his pub, The Cock and Bull, was being supplanted by war talk,
by talk of taking a nip out of the Germans and those who spoke in that way were
gaining a hearing. All Teddy knew was that it was getting harder and harder for
him to openly express thoughts that he needed to think about the issues more.
That was not a good sign, not a good omen.
********
The German Social-Democratic Party had given Fritz Klein
everything. Had taken him from a small furniture-making factory(less than one
hundred employees constituting in those days small) where he led the fight for
unionization (against all odds for that woefully unorganized industry and
against the then still standing laws against unionization pressed by the state
as well as well as the outlaw status of the S-D Party in those pre-legal days)
and brought him along into the burgeoning party bureaucracy (boasting of this
number of party publications, that number of members, and the pinnacle the
votes attained for the growing number of party parliamentarians in the
Reichstag). Made him a local then regional shop steward agent. Later found him
a spot in the party publications department and from there to alternate member
of the party’s national committee. As he grew older, got married, had two
lovely children the party had severely sapped the youthful idealism out of him.
Still he was stirred whenever Karl Liebknecht, old Wilhelm’s son, the father whom
he knew from the old days, delivered one of his intellectual and rational
attacks against the war aims of the Kaiser and his cabal. Still too though he
worried, worried to perdition, that the British and, especially the French were
deliberately stepping on German toes. Although tired, endlessly tired, he hoped
that he would be able to stick to the Second International’s pledge made at
Basle in 1912 to do everything to stop war in case it came, as was now likely.
He just didn’t know how he would react, didn’t know at all.
Fritz was furious, furious at two things. First that those
damn whatever they were anarchists, nationalists, or whatever had assassinated
the Archduke Ferdinand. Had threatened the peace of Europe, his peace, with
their screwy theory of picking off various state officials thinking that would,
unlike victory in the mass class struggles, change the world. Christ, they
could have at least read Marx or somebody. Make no mistake Fritz had no truck
with monarchy, certainly not the moribund Austro-Hungarian monarchy, despised
the Kaiser himself right here in the German homeland (although on the quiet
since the Kaiser was not above using his courts for the simple pleasure of
skewering a man for lese majeste and had
done so to political opponents and the idle wild-talkers alike). Still his
blood boiled that some desperados would pick at a fellow Germanic target. Fritz
was not at all sure that maybe the French, or the English, the bloody English
were behind the activities. Hugo Heine thought so, his immediate regional
director, so there could be some truth to the assertion.
Secondly, that same Hugo Heine had begun, at the behest of
the national committee of the party, to clamp down on those who were trying to
make the party live up to its promises and try to make a stand against any
German, any Kaiser moves toward war over the incident at Sarajevo. The way
Heine put it was that if war was to come and he hoped that it would not the
Social-Democracy must not be thrown into the underground again like in the old
days under Bismarck. Hugo had spent two years in the Kaiser’s jail back then
for simply trying to organize his shop and get them to vote for the party then
outlawed. The radical stuffing had come out of Hugo though and all he wanted
was not to go back to jail now for any reason. Fritz cursed those damn
anarchists again, cursed them more bitterly since they were surely going to
disturb his peace.
********
Jacques Rous (and yes he traced his family roots back to the
revolution, back to the “red” priest who he was named after who had led some of
the plebeian struggles back then that were defeated by those damn moderate
cutthroats Robespierre and Saint Just) had long been a leader the anarchist
delegation in his Parisian district, had been in a few fights in his time with
the damn city bourgeoisie, and had a long, very long memory of what the Germans
had, and had not done, in Paris in ’71,in the time of the bloodedly suppressed
Commune. Also Jacques had long memories of his long past forbears who had come
from Alsace-Lorraine now in German hands. And it galled him, galled him that
there were war clouds gathering daily over his head, over his district and over
his beloved Paris.
But that was not what
was troubling Jacques Rous in the spring of 1914. He knew, knew deep in his
bones like a lot of his fellow anarchists, like a lot of the guys in the small
pottery factory he had worked in for the past several years after being laid
off from the big textile factory across the river that if war came they would
know what to do. Quatrain from the CGT (the large trade union organization to
which he and others in the factory belonged to) had clued them in, had told
them enough to know some surprises were headed the government’s way if they
decided to use the youth of the neighborhoods as cannon fodder. What bothered
Jacques was not his conduct but that of his son, Jacques too named in honor of
that same ancient red priest who was the lifeblood of the family. Young Jacques
something of a dandy like many youth in those days, something of a lady’s man
(he had reportedly a married mistress and somebody else on the side), had told
one and all (although not his father directly) who would listen one night that
he planned to enlist in the Grenadiers just as soon as it looked like trouble
was coming. Old Jacques wondered if other fathers were standing in fear of such
rash actions by their sons just then.
Old Jacques could see the writing on the wall, remembered what
it was like when the German threatened to
come back in ’70 and then came the last time. Came and left the Parisian poor
to eat rats or worse when they besieged the city, old Thiers fled to Versailles,
and Paris starved half-aided by those Germans and he expected the same if not
worse this time because that country was now unified, was now filled with strange
powerful Krupp cannon and in a mood to use it now that one of the members of
their alliance had had one of its own killed in Sarajevo and all Europe was
waiting for the other shoe to drop. He believed that the anarchists of Paris to
a man would resist the call to arms issued by the government. Quatrain, the great
leader ever since Commune days, almost guaranteed a general strike if they
tried to mobilize the Parisian youth for the slaughter. Yeah Quatrain would
stand tall. Jacques though had personal worries somebody had seen his son, also
Jacques, heading with some of his “gilded” friends toward the 12th Grenadier
recruiting office in the Hotel de Ville ready to fight for bloody bourgeois France,
for the memory of Napoleon, for the glory of battle. And he old Jacques knowing
from some skimpily- held barricades back in ’71 just how “glorious” war was fretted
in the night against his blood.
*******
George Jenkins dreamed the dream of many young men out in
the heartland, out in the wheat fields of Kansas a dream that America, his
America would keep the hell out of what looked like war clouds coming from
Europe in the spring of 1914 (although dreams and dreamers were located not
just on the farms since George was not a Kansas farm boy but a rising young
clerk in Doc Dell’s Drugstore located in the college town of Lawrence). George
was keenly interested in such matters and would, while on break or when things
were slow, glance through the day later copy of the New York Times or Washington
Post that Doc provided for his more worldly customers via the passing
trains. What really kept George informed though was William White’s home grown Emporia Gazette which kept a close eye
on the situation in Europe for the folks.
And with all of that information here is what George
Jenkins, American citizen, concluded: America had its own problems best tended
to by keeping out of foreign entanglements except when America’s direct
interests were threatened. So George naturally cast skeptical eyes on
Washington, on President Wilson, despite his protestations that European
affairs were not our business. George had small town ideas about people minding
their own business. See also George had voted for Eugene V. Debs himself, the
Socialist party candidate for President, and while he was somewhat skeptical
about some of the Socialist Party leaders back East he truly believed that
Brother Debs would help keep us out of war.
********
Ivan Smirnov was no kid, had been around the block a few
times in this war business. Had been in the Russian fleet that got its ass
kicked by the Japanese in 1904 (he never called them “Nips” like lots of his
crewmates did not after that beating they took that did not have to happen if
the damn Czar’s naval officers had been anything but lackeys and anything but
overconfident that they could beat the Johnny-come-lately Japanese in the naval
war game). More importantly he had been in the Baltic fleet when the revolution
of 1905 came thundering over their heads and each man, each sailor, each
officer had to choice sides. He had gone with rebels and while he did not face
the fate of his comrades on the Potemkin
his naval career was over.
Just as well Ivan had thought many times since he was then able
to come ashore and get work on the docks through some connections, and think.
And what he was thinking in the spring of 1914 with some ominous war clouds in
the air that that unfinished task from 1905 was going to come to a head. Ivan
knew enough about the state of the navy, and more importantly, the army to know
that without some quick decisive military action the monarchy was finished and
good riddance. The hard part, the extremely hard part, was to get those future
peasant conscripts who would provide cannon fodder for the Czar’s ill-thought
out land adventures to listen up for a minute rather than go unknowingly
head-long into the Czar’s arm (the father’s arms for many of them). So there
was plenty of work to do. Ivan just that moment was glad that he was not a
kid.
*********Rosa Luxemburg-Concerning Morocco-(1911)
First Published: Leipziger Volkszeitung, July 24th, 1911.
Source: Rosa Luxemburg: Selected Political Writings, edited and introduced by Robert Looker.
Translated: (from the German) W.D. Graf.
Transcription/Markup: Ted Crawford/Brian Baggins with special thanks to Robert Looker for help with permissions.
Copyright: Random House, 1972, ISBN/ISSN: 0224005960. Printed with the permission of Random House. Luxemburg Internet Archive (marxists.org) 2004.
Source: Rosa Luxemburg: Selected Political Writings, edited and introduced by Robert Looker.
Translated: (from the German) W.D. Graf.
Transcription/Markup: Ted Crawford/Brian Baggins with special thanks to Robert Looker for help with permissions.
Copyright: Random House, 1972, ISBN/ISSN: 0224005960. Printed with the permission of Random House. Luxemburg Internet Archive (marxists.org) 2004.
Because of the Morocco Affair, as is well known, it has occurred to a number of our French comrades that an international socialist demonstration against the militaristic colonial adventure is called for. This would be arranged by the organ competent for such matters, the International Socialist Bureau. To begin with, a meeting was planned between the socialist representatives of the two countries directly involved, France and Spain. On behalf of the Spanish comrades, Pablo Iglesias proclaimed his agreement with the proposal made by Vaillant and the French comrades. When Germany dispatched the Panther to Agadir, it became evident that German militarism was also intervening in the Moroccan adventure, thus heightening international tension and increasing the possibility of a war. Thereupon the participation of German Social Democracy and possibly of the English representatives in the planned meeting appeared necessary. In reply to an inquiry made by the Secretariat in Brussels, Keir Hardie and Quelch consented on behalf of the English workers, and for their part also declared the meeting to be necessary. Only the German Party Executive failed to support the initiative. The answer was communicated only by one member of the Party Executive – as his private opinion, it is true – but the other members apparently agreed with it, since no further announcement ensued. The German member of the International Bureau also declared the conference to be inadvisable for the time being, and for this reason the planned meeting did not take place.
Opinions may differ on the necessity or usefulness of calling a conference of the International Socialist Bureau on the question of the Morocco Affair. In any case this meeting was not planned for the immediate future: only preparations were to be made so that it could be held if the need arose. It was on this basis that the socialist representatives of France, Spain and England accepted the proposal. However, the German party’s decision not to hold the conference ‘for the time being’ must be seen as a rejection of the whole idea – which is why the Secretariat in Brussels proposed to shelve the Morocco Question until the next annual meeting of the Bureau. That this attitude on the part of the German party could not have had an encouraging and stimulating effect on the socialist protest movements in other countries seems to us to be obvious. This makes it all the more interesting to know the reasons that have led to this attitude of our party. It sounds almost unbelievable, but these reasons are again considerations of the impending Reichstag elections. The view that was expressed by the member of the Party Executive – and which, after his announcement, has already been expounded in a public meeting in Berlin – reads as follows:
I see in the whole affair something with which the rulers of our state are attempting to divert general attention away from internal conditions, and to make propaganda for the Reichstag elections. With its domestic policy, our government has created a situation which would not even arouse a dog’s sympathy. It is thus relying on its favourite method, one which was used by Bismarck in 1887 with Boulanger and by Bülow in 1906 with the Hottentots. Now I believe Messrs Bethmann-Hollweg and Kiderlen-Wächter capable of any stupidity, even of one which could lead to serious European conflicts. In the case of Morocco, however, I believed that these gentlemen did not have a free hand, since conflicting capitalist interests come into question in that country; of which, the ‘French’ group in Germany is the strongest.
For years this war for the mines has been with us. As is well known, a certain Herr Mannesmann has given money to the Sultan of Morocco, for which he has received a document; this he and his friends and the small group of ranters who call themselves Pan-Germans claim is a document giving the brothers Mannesmann a monopoly over the Moroccan mines. Of course the contents of this document conflict with the Treaty of Algeciras. Mannesmann and his friends claim that this makes no difference, since the treaty cannot affect prior treaties.
Despite the great row that Mannesmann and his friends made in the press, the former Secretary of State for External Affairs, von Schön, could not be induced to say an obliging word concerning the Mannesmann Treaty although he did not wish to oppose Mannesmann publicly. But when he was pressed to take a stand, it turned out to be unfavourable towards Herr Mannesmann. The reason for this decision is due less to Mannesmann’s uncertain legal position than to a conflicting capitalist interest. Mannesmann is in competition with an ostensibly French mining syndicate. This syndicate is based in Paris and one of its partners is Schneider of Creusot. But besides Schneider, other giants of the German Steel-Works Association, such as Krupp and Thyssen, are represented in it. They say: if iron ore exists in Morocco in the great quantities that Mannesmann claims, then we can fetch it ourselves and need not be exploited by Mannesmann. These gentlemen would prefer to carry out the exploitation themselves rather than become victims of that exploitation. This consideration carried far more weight than all the legal and constitutional grounds. In so far as Messrs Mannesmann are still drilling for iron ore at all, they have recently transferred their activities to Agadir. From there the complaint was heard that the technicians were being prevented from doing their work. Then Bethmann-Hollweg and Kiderlen-Wächter made a concession to the cries of Mannesmann and his comrades. I do not believe, however, that they will allow themselves to be pressed further, since then they would be damaging the interests of the great powers of the Steel-Works Association. In brief: I believe the leaders of our foreign policy capable of any stupidity, but I do not believe that they will go any further because then they might injure the interests of the most powerful capitalists, and they, whose understanding is more penetrating, would call a halt in good time.
If we were to commit ourselves firmly too soon and to stress the Moroccan Question at the expense of all questions of domestic policy in such a way that an effective electoral slogan could be used against us, then the consequences cannot be anticipated. For in their hatred and fear of socialism, Krupp and Thyssen yield nothing to Bethmann-Hollweg. It is in our vital interests not to allow the discussion of domestic events such as tax policy, agrarian privileges and security regulations to be suppressed. Yet this is what could happen if we talk about the Moroccan Question in every village and thus encourage a backlash. If in this affair Messrs Bethmann and comrades get the defeat they deserve – which in view of their notorious incompetence is quite possible – then we would have one more argument to use against them in the election.
We must confess that the conclusions which have been drawn from the Moroccan Affair and described with such expert knowledge encourage us very little. The high-minded policy upon which they are based is: let us leave it to the grandees of the Steel-Works Association to put a stop to the German action in Morocco in good time while we trouble ourselves as little as possible with the whole matter, for we have other things to occupy us, namely, coping with the Reichstag elections. In any case, it surely occurred to no one to demand of the German Social-Democratic Party that we should ‘stress the Moroccan Question at the expense of all questions of domestic policy’. The very last persons who might be suspected of this are Vaillant and the French comrades, for they themselves are a living example of how one can stress foreign policy while not neglecting domestic affairs. This they demonstrated by discussing in the most lively manner their problems of domestic politics, especially the social security bill, without detriment to their energetic agitation against the Moroccan adventure. And similarly, the forceful protest action of Iglesias and his comrades did very little to harm the party’s other political struggles in Spain, particularly the splendidly executed economic mass action in Saragossa.
Moreover, it is most likely that our opponents, given the urgency of their need, are attempting to concoct an electoral slogan against Social Democracy out of all the hullabaloo over Morocco in order to produce a kind of patriotic election carnival. However, precisely if one accepts this and even believes that this ridiculous and frivolous adventure could result in ‘a powerful slogan’ against us, then it would seem completely illogical to avoid discussing this question in the course of our campaign. If we are to expect that the Reaction will use Morocco as a decoy to its own advantage, then the only way of making this slogan ineffective and of thwarting this attempt at manipulation is for us to enlighten the masses as soon and as completely as possible as to the deplorable background to the affair and the sordid capitalist interests involved in it. If there is a way in which our own debates on, and agitation against, this new attack by capitalist reaction could bring about our defeat, we are not aware of it. There is evidently such a limited trust in the strength of our view, in the productive power of our agitation, that one searches in vain for its causes. In 1870, in the face of the unleashed furies of jingoism, Bebel and Liebknecht did not hesitate to proclaim loudly our devotion to peace and fraternity. If they did not do this ‘in every village’, it was probably only because we were able to make headway in very few villages. And compared with the ‘patriotic war against the Sworn Enemy’, how insignificant is the insipid farce of the Mannesmann firm and its offspring in the present Foreign Office!If the point of view that we have been discussing is guilty of too little faith in the victorious strength of our slogans, it seems to us that, on the other hand, it strongly overestimates the power of vested capitalist interests in guaranteeing peace. It may well be that the foreign policy of Bethmann and Kiderlen feels itself confident only of holding the balance between the two cliques of mining exploiters; but the game that is played on the volcanic terrain of international conflicts is, even for minds greater than these capitalist clerks, a game of blindman’s-bluff. Mannesmann and Thyssen alone do not determine the further course of the adventure which, like all global blunders, can easily escape from the grasp of those who arranged it and grow from a frivolous game with matches into a global conflagration. And of course the critical forms of the situation can be transferred, by means of granting concessions’ of some kind, to South Africa or another part of the world, which then creates quite new conflicts. This is why, in our view, the duty of Social Democracy is not to reassure public opinion, but to do the very reverse, to rouse it and warn it against the dangers lying dormant in it such adventures in international politics today. It is not enough for us to rely on the pacific intentions of some capitalist clique as a factor in achieving peace; we can only count on the resistance of the enlightened masses. By obeying the order to keep our peace, incidentally, we would be seen to be falling in with the wishes of the rulers of the Moroccan policy. The general Silence in the Forest [reference to a famous poem by Goethe] that the two high priests of colonial policy, Cambon and Kiderlen, have insisted on in order to carry on their hocus-pocus without interruption behind the backs of the people’s representatives and the public, is one more sign that the tactics of the workers’ parties require the very opposite: a loud appeal to the public opinion to which the rulers intend to present a fait accompli. In this sense the demand first put forward by Vorwärts that, for example, the Reichstag be convened, was surely dictated by the right instinct. Unfortunately, our central organ – if we are not mistaken – no longer appears to support this demand.
Finally the position of the Party Executive exhibits a general conception of the electoral struggle that does not appear entirely satisfactory to us. They say that we should restrict our agitation exclusively to matters of domestic policy, to questions or taxation and social legislation. But financial policy, the rule of the Junkers and the stagnation. of social reform are organically bound up with militarism, naval policy, colonial policy, and with personal rule and its foreign policy. Any artificial separation of these spheres can only present an incomplete and one-sided picture of the state of our public affairs. Above all we should propagate socialist enlightenment in the Reichstag elections, but this we cannot do if we restrict our criticism to Germany’s domestic circumstances, if we fail to depict the great international relationships, the growing dominance of capitalism. in all parts of the world, the obvious anarchy in every corner of the globe, and the major role played by colonial and global policy in this process. We must conduct our electoral agitation not as an abridged political primer reduced to a few simple points now ‘in vogue’, but as the socialist world view in all its comprehensiveness, richness and diversity.
We have heard so much about the ‘splendid situation’ in which we are approaching the Reichstag elections, and at the same time we have been warned repeatedly against spoiling this ‘situation’ by some imprudent action; previously this was the struggle for universal suffrage in Prussia, and now it is the agitation against the hubbub surrounding Morocco. We think that the ‘splendid situation’ is not a chance external constellation that one can spoil by a rash act. Rather it is the product of the entire historical development of the past few decades within and without Germany. The best way of throwing away the advantage of this ‘situation’ would be to begin to consider all party life and all tasks of the class struggle simply from the perspective of the ballot-box.
No U.S. Troops-No Drones- No Covert Agents- No Materials To Iraq-We Have Been Down This Quagmire Road Before...
On Point-NPR
Iraq Unravels In Violent Civil Strife
June 16, 2014 at 10:00 AM
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Iraq Unravels In Violent Civil Strife
Iraq, coming apart at the seams. And the whole map of the Middle East may be in play. We’ll take a cold, hard look.
Days into the onslaught of black-clad fighters in Iraq, the news is still stunning. The map of Iraq – where the US invaded, spent billions, trillions, lost 4000 lives – redrawn in less than a week. City after city lost to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, a group more than dreaming now of an Islamic “caliphate” stretching from Aleppo to Iran, beyond. A fantasy before the US invasion. Now a region of turmoil you can draw on the map. This hour On Point: Iraq, coming apart right now at the seams. America’s options. The facts on the ground.
Paul Pillar, professor at Georgetown University’s Security Studies Program. Form national intelligence officer for the Near East and South Asia.
Seth Jones, acting director of the RAND Corporation’s International Security and Defense Policy Center. (@SethGJones)
Borzou Daragahi, Middle East and North Africa correspondent for the Financial Times. (@borzou)
Reuters: Iraq’s top Shi’ite cleric issues call to fight jihadist rebels – “Iraq’s most senior Shi’ite Muslim cleric urged followers to take up arms against a full-blown Sunni militant insurgency to topple Shi’ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, escalating a conflict that threatens civil war and a possible break-up of the country.”
The Daily Beast: ISIS’s Secret Allies — “All eyes have been on ISIS as the jihadist group, in a matter of days, cut Iraq in half and declared its own state in the cities it captured. With fewer than 10,000 fighters ISIS forced the retreat of the better-armed Iraqi army forces many times its size. Their incredible success on the battlefield has fed into a growing lore about the group: the small band of fanatics that can take down a country. The truth is more basic and it’s something ISIS doesn’t want to admit—they weren’t acting alone.”
This image posted on a militant website on Saturday, June 14, 2014, which has been verified and is consistent with other AP reporting, appears to show militants from the al-Qaida-inspired Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) leading away captured Iraqi soldiers dressed in plain clothes after taking over a base in Tikrit, Iraq. (AP)
– Tom Ashbrook
Guests
Ned Parker, Baghdad bureau chief for Reuters. (@nedmparker1)Paul Pillar, professor at Georgetown University’s Security Studies Program. Form national intelligence officer for the Near East and South Asia.
Seth Jones, acting director of the RAND Corporation’s International Security and Defense Policy Center. (@SethGJones)
Borzou Daragahi, Middle East and North Africa correspondent for the Financial Times. (@borzou)
From Tom’s Reading List
The Wall Street Journal: Iraq Scrambles to Defend Baghdad — “Iraq’s government girded to protect the capital from advancing insurgents, as Iranian security officials said their forces had joined the battle on Baghdad’s side and the U.S. weighed military assistance, including airstrikes. Iraq edged closer to all-out sectarian conflict as Kurdish forces took control of a provincial capital in the oil-rich north on Thursday and Sunni militants threatened to march on two cities revered by Shiite Muslims and the capital.”Reuters: Iraq’s top Shi’ite cleric issues call to fight jihadist rebels – “Iraq’s most senior Shi’ite Muslim cleric urged followers to take up arms against a full-blown Sunni militant insurgency to topple Shi’ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, escalating a conflict that threatens civil war and a possible break-up of the country.”
The Daily Beast: ISIS’s Secret Allies — “All eyes have been on ISIS as the jihadist group, in a matter of days, cut Iraq in half and declared its own state in the cities it captured. With fewer than 10,000 fighters ISIS forced the retreat of the better-armed Iraqi army forces many times its size. Their incredible success on the battlefield has fed into a growing lore about the group: the small band of fanatics that can take down a country. The truth is more basic and it’s something ISIS doesn’t want to admit—they weren’t acting alone.”
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