2010 Haiti Earthquake - The Haiti Haters and US Mercenaries

The Haiti Haters

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“The HISTORY of an oppressed people is hidden in the lies and the agreed myth of its conquerors.” - Meridel Le Sueur, American writer, 1900-1996

"The chief business of America is business" - President Calvin Coolidge, 1925

"The glory of the United States is business" - Wendell L. Willkie, 1936

THE HAITI HATERS

by AMY WILENTZ, 

January 21, 2010

The Haitian tragedy has opened up a whole new industry for what I call the genteel racist point of view. A week into the crisis I heard an otherwise intelligent report on NPR in which the correspondent opened her piece from Port-au-Prince by declaring that it "is not falling into a...pit of violence," thereby giving us an idea of what she had been anticipating, almost breathlessly. We heard this kind of thing frequently in the days after the earthquake, with scores of fresh reporters receiving their Haitian baptism amid the rubble. There are many problems in Haiti, but most of the negative pronouncements that have been circulating do not touch on them. The commentary has been psychopolitical rather than analytical.

At least reporters, while their views may be wrongheaded, are giving us new information from the ground. Far more insidious are the armchair commentators who know nothing about Haiti--many never having set toe there--but enjoy rebuking suffering Haitians from the comfort of their white bastions in the United States and Europe. I've never seen victims so roundly blamed for their fate. David Brooks' recent column in the New York Times--one of the paper's most e-mailed articles the week it was published--blamed Haiti's culture for the quake's violence.

"It is time," Brooks writes sententiously, "to put the thorny issue of culture at the center of efforts to tackle global poverty. Why is Haiti so poor? Well, it has a history of oppression, slavery and colonialism. But so does Barbados, and Barbados is doing pretty well."

By all means, let's turn to actual history, which Brooks has mangled. As has been mentioned repeatedly, the Haitian slaves rose up in 1791 and began what was to become the only successful slave revolution in modern history. That war ended, after much loss of life on both sides, with the establishment of the world's first black republic, in 1804--just twenty-eight years after the American Declaration of Independence. The Haitians' models were the American and French revolutions, and they based their ideas on the Declaration of the Rights of Man. But their revolution seems to have been a little premature for the tastes of the world in which they had to operate. Haiti was almost immediately saddled with a gargantuan and punitive reparations payment to France in exchange for recognition and the ability to engage in unhampered international trade. The wealthy, slaveholding United States did not recognize Haiti until 1862, after the Southern states seceded. Haiti has been a pariah nation for its entire history.

Barbados, on the other hand: the Barbadians made their bold stand for independence from Britain in... 1966. The British had already given up slavery more than a century earlier. It was an unbloody, negotiated independence, and Barbados is still a part of the British Commonwealth. In fact, its membership began on the date of independence, as did Jamaica's, in 1962, when it shrugged off the very loose shackles of the remnant of British colonialism. The British were less brutal masters than the French, and in the eighteenth century it was probably wiser to remain a colony under them than, as the Haitians did, gain your freedom at the expense of your economic welfare.

Brooks goes on to discuss the Haitian family, seemingly basing his argument on a book by Lawrence Harrison, a conservative cultural critic who also knows nothing about Haiti. "Child-rearing practices" in Haiti, Brooks writes, "often involve neglect in the early years and harsh retribution when kids hit 9 or 10." I don't know where this assertion comes from, but it reminds me of nothing so much as Daniel Patrick Moynihan's controversial and misguided report on the black family in the 1960s. I've never seen either of these child-rearing practices in my two decades of living in and covering Haiti. In fact, I see more parents carrying small children around in Haiti's markets than I do at the farmers' markets in Los Angeles. You can't write these kinds of things about people whose culture and nation you respect. Nor would an editor permit you to say such things blithely about people who are considered our equals or are able to respond in equally august publications. Right now, the Haitians cannot--they're too busy getting water for their neglected children.

Let's move briefly to Anne Applebaum's similar column, which appeared in the Washington Post. Anne's a little depressed. She opens her piece (as she so often does) by telling us about herself; her reactions are important to her: "For the past several days, I have found myself unable to look at the photographs from Haiti. I have also found that when I start an article datelined Port-au-Prince, I have to force myself to read to the end." Although she doesn't like to read about it, she knows what's at the heart of her reluctance: "I have no illusions about anyone's ability to help, for this...is a man-made disaster first and foremost, and so it will remain." She goes on to fault the weakness of Haiti's public institutions for the physical collapse of buildings, including the Presidential Palace (constructed by the Marines during the 1915-34 US occupation of Haiti) and many other public edifices built by perfectly well-educated architects using the best practices of their day. It's a stunningly heartless argument.

Applebaum tells us that she was not this hopeless after the Indian Ocean tsunami or Hurricane Katrina, and that it was easy to coordinate basic assistance in those cases. Of course, this is patently not true, as anyone who has read about or experienced those situations knows. Applebaum goes on to say that there were no scenes in Aceh, Indonesia, of "what everyone always calls 'biblical' tragedy." The reason some people call the Haitian quake biblical is that they believe, whether consciously or not, that it is a sort of divine retribution for the temerity of the Haitian Revolution, and for the idea that black people could take charge of their own lives. As Pat Robertson put it, the Haitians made a deal with the Devil to throw off French rule. That's how he sees it, and by extension, though in much more genteel terms, that's how many other commentators see it. One cannot help but wonder, then, what the Lord was avenging when he brought down an earthquake on San Francisco in 1989, or on Los Angeles in 1994. Gay rights? Bad movies?

But let's look at things clearly, without prejudice. Haiti was in bad shape before the earthquake. Though outside forces like debt, economic sanctions, US interference and a big but diffuse and uncoordinated development community have grievously harmed the country, Haitians too are responsible for their problems. The government is weak and--although much improved in recent years--still corrupt here and there, and still plagued by internecine fighting over the tiny bits of funding that are available in a country with microscopic national coffers. Taxes are not properly collected, and well-connected families and officials fight to the death over things like where emergency response teams or bridges should be located (my province or yours?). Appropriations battles are even harder fought in the Haitian legislature than in the US Congress, and over much smaller streams of money. And powerful drug traffickers have taken refuge in this governmentally lax situation, as they have in Mexico and Colombia.

The country is also too centralized. Everything depends on the government in Port-au-Prince. All the money flows out of that great city to the provinces, when it flows at all. But with people fleeing the destroyed capital, now's a good time to consider federalizing Haiti. The countryside needs funding sources other than the usually paralyzed national legislature. Strong and honest provincial councils that can levy taxes and craft local solutions to local problems would vastly improve the quality of life, and fewer Haitians would feel compelled to move to Port-au-Prince to seek their fortune--and build slums that pancake in earthquakes.

We need constructive answers to these big questions now. Good ideas are coming in from people like Paul Farmer, who's run Haiti's Partners in Health for years and who is now Bill Clinton's deputy at the United Nations. They're coming in from Haitian survivors in all rubble-strewn walks of life. New paradigms are also being offered by hardheaded analysts like Jocelyn McCalla, a Haitian who consults on government, immigration and business affairs, and from economists who have turned their view toward global poverty eradication. Not all their ideas are useful or plausible, and everything will be difficult to implement in the months immediately following such a catastrophe. But people like this are trying to find a way toward rebuilding Haiti, and building it better.

You have a choice in a situation like the one we're confronting. You can sit back in your chair and fondle your nihilism, or you can try to be original and work toward something creative. People like Brooks, Applebaum and Robertson are tapping into something very dark and atavistic indeed. Those who read them or hear them are bound to ask themselves, "What is it about Haiti?" Some will shrug and, like Applebaum, turn away. In a moment of such death and destruction, that's not the reaction one should hope to elicit.

Amy Wilentz

Amy Wilentz is a Nation contributing editor and the author of the award-winning The Rainy Season: Haiti Since Duvalier (Simon & Schuster, 1989). Her novel Martyrs' Crossing (Simon & Schuster, 2001) won an American Academy of Arts and Letters Prize. Her most recent book is I Feel Earthquakes More Often Than They Happen: Coming to California in the Age of Schwarzenegger (Simon & Schuster, 2006). She teaches journalism at the University of California, Irvine

Source: 

This article appeared in the February 8, 2010 edition of The Nation.

US Mercenaries Set Sights on Haiti

by JEREMY SCAHILL, January 19, 2010

We saw this type of Iraq-style disaster profiteering in New Orleans, and you can expect to see a lot more of this in Haiti over the coming days, weeks and months. Private security companies are seeing big dollar signs in Haiti thanks in no small part to the media hype about "looters." After Katrina, the number of private security companies registered (and unregistered) multiplied overnight. Banks, wealthy individuals, the US government all hired private security. I even encountered Israeli mercenaries operating an armed checkpoint outside of an elite gated community in New Orleans. They worked for a company called Instinctive Shooting International. (That is not a joke).

Now, it is kicking into full gear in Haiti.

The Orwellian-named mercenary trade group International Peace Operations Association didn't waste much time in offering the "services" of its member companies to swoop down on Haiti for some old-fashioned "humanitarian assistance" in the form of disaster profiteering. Within hours of the massive earthquake in Haiti, the IPOA created a special webpage for prospective clients, saying: "In the wake of the tragic events in Haiti, a number of IPOA's member companies are available and prepared to provide a wide variety of critical relief services to the earthquake's victims."

While some of the companies specialize in rapid housing construction, emergency relief shelters and transportation, others are private security companies that operate in Iraq and Afghanistan, such as Triple Canopy, the company that took over Blackwater's massive State Department contract in Iraq. For years, Blackwater played a major role in IPOA until it left the group following the 2007 Nisour Square massacre.

In 2005, while still a leading member of IPOA, Blackwater's owner Erik Prince deployed his forces in New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Far from some sort of generous gift to the suffering people of the US gulf, Blackwater raked in some $70 million in Homeland Security contracts that began with a massive no-bid contract to provide protective services for FEMA. Blackwater billed US taxpayers $950 per man per day.

The current US program under which armed security companies work for the State Department in Iraq--the Worldwide Personal Protection Program--has its roots in Haiti during the Clinton administration. In 1994, private US forces, such as DynCorp, became a staple of US operations in the country following the overthrow of Jean-Bertrand Aristide by CIA-backed death squads. When President Bush invaded Iraq, his administration radically expanded that program and turned it into the privatized paramilitary force it is today. At the time of his overthrow in 2004, Aristide was being protected by a San Francisco-based private security firm, the Steele Foundation.

Beyond the establishment mercenary industry's activities in Haiti, look for more stories like this one:

On January 15, a Florida-based company called All Pro Legal Investigations registered the URL Haiti-Security.com. It is basically a copy of the company's existing US website but is now targeted for business in Haiti, claiming the "purpose of this site is to assure construction and reconstruction companies considering a Haiti project that professional security is available."

"All Protection and Security has made a commitment to the Haitian community and will provide professional security against any threat to prosperity in Haiti," the site proclaims. "Job sites and supply convoys will be protected against looters and vandals. Workers will be protected against gang violence and intimidation. The people of Haiti will recover, with the help of the good people from the world over."

The company boasts that it has run "Thousands of successful missions in Iraq and Afghanistan." As for its personnel, "Each and every member of our team is a former Law Enforcement Officer or former Military service member," the site claims. "If Operator experience, training and qualifications matter, choose All Protection and Security for your high-threat Haiti security needs."

Among the services offered are: "High Threat terminations," dealing with "worker unrest," armed guards and "Armed Cargo Escorts." Oh, and apparently they are currently hiring.

What is unfolding in Haiti seems to be part of what Naomi Klein has labeled the "Shock Doctrine." Indeed, on the Heritage Foundation blog, opportunity was being found in the crisis with a post titled: "Amidst the Suffering, Crisis in Haiti Offers Opportunities to the U.S." "In addition to providing immediate humanitarian assistance, the U.S. response to the tragic earthquake in Haiti earthquake offers opportunities to re-shape Haiti's long-dysfunctional government and economy as well as to improve the public image of the United States in the region," wrote Heritage fellow Jim Roberts in a post that was subsequently altered to tone down the shock-doctrine language. The title was later changed to: "Things to Remember While Helping Haiti" and the wording changed to "In addition to providing immediate humanitarian assistance, the U.S. response to the tragic earthquake in Haiti should address long-held concerns over the fragile political environment that exists in the region."

Jeremy Scahill

Jeremy Scahill, a Puffin Foundation Writing Fellow at The Nation Institute, is the author of the bestselling Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army, published by Nation Books. He is an award-winning investigative journalist and correspondent for the national radio and TV program Democracy Now!.

Source; http://www.thenation.com/doc/20100201/scahill

U.S. Armed Intervention in the Philippines and the People's Struggle for National Freedom

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U.S. Armed Intervention in the Philippines and the People's Struggle for National Freedom

By Rep. Satur C. Ocampo

I cannot recall the names of the two Filipino soldiers who, on the warm moonlit night of February 4, 1899, were shot dead by American sentries, nor, indeed, if their names were ever recorded. But whoever they were they are remembered as the first casualties of U.S. armed intervention in our nation's affairs. That encounter served as U.S. imperialism's pretext to begin the conquest of the Philippines and heralded the Filipino-American War - a heroic struggle by the Filipino people against the United States whose revolutionary legacy extends to this day.

By now I am sure we are all aware why the Philippines figures so prominently in the United States’ hegemonic ambitions. As it was a century ago, we are strategically important as a staging post in the region from which the United States can protect and advance its imperial interests. But also, as it was a century ago and indeed in all the time since, the Filipino people do not meekly submit to U.S. imperialism's designs.

The Filipino nation was born in the battlefield, through over 200 uprisings during three centuries of Spanish colonialism and then with the 1896 Philippine revolution under the leadership of the Katipunan. These culminated in our distinguishing ourselves as the first nation in Asia to wage and win the old democratic revolution against a colonial power. When we fought U.S. aggression beginning in 1899 we fought it as a sovereign nation. When we fight U.S. imperialism today we do so as a sovereign people.

Filipino-American War
The sounds and images of the Filipino-American War reverberate to this day. In all the important things, U.S. imperialism's deep grip on Philippine society was established through its war of conquest and in the course of the colonial and then the neocolonial puppet regimes in its wake.

The extent and brutality of the U.S.' war of aggression against the Philippines are lost or obscured in history written from the U.S. viewpoint.

The defiant resistance of the fledgling Filipino republic against the then still maturing but already mighty imperialist behemoth is undeniable. The Spanish-American War lasted less than four months in its entirety with insignificant losses for the U.S.: less than 800 dead from direct fighting, mainly in Cuba. Yet the Filipino-American War dragged on for virtually 17 years in Luzon and the Visayas, up to 1916, and at least 14 years in Mindanao, up to 1913. When the U.S. formally declared colonial rule in 1902, only three years into the fighting, there were already 4,234 American dead and 2,779 wounded.

The U.S. had unleashed its vast war machine. Some 60% of the U.S.' 216,029 Army regulars and volunteers in 1898 were deployed in 639 outposts across the archipelago. Indeed, the 50,000 Army regulars of 1898 were doubled - some estimates say even quadrupled - because of the Filipino-American War. Prosecuting the war cost the U.S. anywhere from U.S.$400 million to over U.S.$600 million, staggering amounts for the time.

Clearly then it was by no means the small "Tagalog rebellion" as it was called by then U.S. President McKinley. Nor was it fought just by what U.S. General Otis called "a rag tag army". U.S. history has recorded the Filipino-American War as an "insurgency" or an "insurrection" by insurgents, outlaws, brigands and bandits. It was far more than that.

The Filipino fighting forces came from the working classes, mainly the peasantry - hacienda tenants, dispossessed farmers, small farmers and agricultural laborers - and some urban working people. They fought with whatever weapons were at hand. Maybe one in four had rifles captured from the Spanish and the rest were armed with bolos and other crude weapons. This against the U.S. troops' modern rifles, revolvers, artillery, rapid-fire guns, flamethrowers, explosives and their navy's big guns. But the guerrilla war we fought drew its strength from much more: the people.

Even General MacArthur couldn't but concede:
"The success of this unique system of war depends upon almost complete unity of action of the entire native population. That such unity is a fact is too obvious to admit of discussion; how it is brought about and maintained is not so plain... but fear as the only motive is hardly sufficient to account for the united and apparently spontaneous action of several millions of people."

And it was the people who paid the price for their fierce patriotism and determined struggle for independence. Filipino soldiers and civilians alike were wantonly killed. We were beaten, dismembered, burned alive and subjected to the infamous "rope torture" and "water cure". Our villages, crops and property were indiscriminately burned and destroyed. Public assassinations, beatings, intimidation, rape and other wanton violence and terror tactics were in daily use.

As early as May 1901, U.S. General Bell estimated that there were already 600,000 Filipino casualties in Luzon alone of which perhaps only between 15,000-20,000 were soldiers. This was only after two years of fighting and before the systematic "pacification campaigns" in Luzon and the Visayas.

Entire populations were herded into so-called "zones of protection" and so many tens of thousands died from hunger, exposure and disease. Perhaps 100,000 Muslims were also killed in their resistance from 1903 to 1913 in Mindanao. It is certain that U.S. imperialism killed between 10-15% of our population then of some 8 million, or from 800,000 to over a million deaths. By any account that is a staggering amount.

Colonialism and neocolonialism
We rake up these brutal events not out of any historical curiosity but because they are of the greatest relevance today. As so well put by one of our country's nationalist historians, the present is a continuation of the past.

The Filipino-American War and the succeeding decades of colonial rule aimed to destroy any vestiges of the sovereign Filipino nation and erect in its stead a vassal state, be it in colonial or neocolonial form. Brute military force, as we have seen, was used to deadly effect. But the colonial period also saw U.S. imperialism using the rest of the powers of the state against the Filipino people.

Repressive laws like the Sedition Law (1901), Brigandage Act (1902), Reconcentration Act (1903) and Flag Law (1907) were put in place to sanction the use of force against all nationalist Filipinos. The U.S. also started organizing and training surrogate armed forces to help suppress resistance to American rule. The Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) and Philippine National Police (PNP) we know of today trace their anti-people lineage to the U.S.-created Philippine Scouts and the National Police Force of 1901.

There is an important point worth stressing. The people's armed revolutionary and anti-colonial resistance continued well after U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt declared the so-called "Philippine insurrection" over on July 4, 1902 and long after the ilustrado elite had reverted to attending to their political and economic affairs.

Armed fighting continued in Pampanga, Laguna, Nueva Ecija, Pangasinan, Zambales, Rizal, Cavite, Batangas, Tayabas, Isabela, Albay, Samar, Leyte, Negros, Cebu and elsewhere under the leadership of Sakay, Montalan, Felizardo, San Miguel, Guillermo, Ola, Toledo, Manalan, Tomines and many others until 1916. Defiant Mindanao Moro resistance continued still in Cotabato, Sulu and Lanao until 1913 in the face of equally ferocious massacres by U.S. troops. As late as 1935, some 60,000 Sakdalistas rose up in arms in 18 municipalities of Southern Tagalog and proclaimed independence shouting "Long live the Republic of the Philippines!"

Despite the death penalty or long prison terms under the Sedition Law for anyone calling for independence, open legal struggles against U.S. imperialism and its colonial rule continued to flourish. The pro-independence Partido Nacionalista was organized in 1902 and Congreso Obrero de Filipinas (COF) in 1913. The Union Obrera Democratica de Filipinas (UODF) led the commemoration of the first labor day in 1903 with some 100,000 workers shouting "Down with U.S. imperialism!" Filipino journalists and writers opposed colonial rule through nationalist plays like "Tanikalang Ginto" and newspapers like El Renacimiento and Muling Pagsilang. And doubtless to the great dismay of the U.S. colonial government, the Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas (PKP) was launched on November 7, 1930.

Flag independence was granted the Philippines on July 4, 1946. By that time, however, decades of colonial rule had succeeded in politically, economically, ideologically and culturally fettering the Filipino nation to U.S. imperialism. The very puppet governments and the big business and landlord interests beholden to U.S. imperialism carefully put in place then - as its proxy rulers - are the very caretakers of the system today.

Continuing U.S. armed interventionSustained U.S. intervention in the Philippines' affairs in the past half century is no less armed just because American fingers haven't been pulling triggers of guns aimed at Filipinos. The most glaring example of this in the post-colonial period are of course the U.S. military bases guaranteed under the RP-U.S. Military Bases Agreement (MBA) of 1947 and the Mutual Defense Treaty (MDT) of 1951.

Is there any doubt that the U.S. military presence is, in the final analysis, what lay behind such outrageously anti-people laws as the U.S.-RP Treaty of General Relations Property Act (1946), the Bell Trade Act (1946), the Parity Amendment (1947) and the Luarel-Langley Agreement (1954)? These blatantly affirmed the country's neocolonial character, especially by upholding and deepening the interests of U.S. monopolies over our economy - by granting Americans equal economic rights as Filipinos, by skewing trade and investment relations in their favor, and so on.

And is there any doubt that, in the decades that followed until today, brute U.S. military might is in the final analysis what underpins IMF-WB stabilization and structural adjustment programs, World Trade Organization (WTO) "commitments", and imperialist globalization in all its forms? We are not naïve.
That U.S. forces haven't been openly mobilized against Filipinos - because it is certain that they have - is testament more to the complete servility of the U.S. imperialism's puppet Philippine governments and especially its armed forces than to any real independence.

We note how the AFP, the U.S.' proxy armed force in the country, has historically been active not against any external aggressor but mainly against Filipinos - in the peasant uprisings of the 1930s, against the Hukbong Bayan Laban sa Hapon (Hukbalahap) and Hukbong Mapagpalaya ng Bayan (HMB) in the 1940s and 1950s, against the New People's Army (NPA) since the 1960s, and against the Moro people since the 1970s.

But even then it's important to highlight our complete solidarity with national freedom movements around the world. Since 1946, the U.S. has conducted hundreds of military operations in over 70 countries, not even considering yet countless covert operations. It actively had a hand in attempts to overthrow some 40 foreign governments and in efforts to crush 30 freedom and liberation movements.

We know that the U.S. used their military bases here in the Philippines as major staging areas in at least the Korean War and the Vietnam War. They have also been key transit points during military operations in the Middle East such as against Iraq. Most recently of course was the use of Philippine facilities by the U.S. in its war against the Afghan people. Our struggle against U.S. imperialism dovetails with the sovereign rights of other peoples to be free from outside intervention.

In any case it's clear that the U.S. exercises the overtly military option even in the Philippines when, as, and how it sees fit. We recall the December 1989 "persuasion flights" by U.S. Air Force jets from Clark Air Base that helped the Aquino regime put down a rightist coup. And of course the current military operations under the guise of Balikatan "training exercises".

But the Filipino people's struggle for national freedom has continued, in the open mass movement and in the armed struggle. Against the backdrop of 1950s U.S.-orchestrated anti-Communist hysteria, militant Left organizations spurred a resurgent nationalism and directly opposed U.S. imperialism from the late 1950s and in the 1960s. Sparked by the youth and students, the workers and peasants movements revived nationwide and flourished.

The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) was re-established on December 26, 1968 and the NPA organized on March 29 the following year. National democratic (ND) mass organizations took root among the people and the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) was formed in 1971 aiming to build a sovereign, democratic, progressive, just and peaceful society.
Despite the imposition of martial law and harsh repression by the U.S.-backed Marcos dictatorship, millions of people were swept into the struggle for national freedom and democracy. The people's movement continued to draw broad swathes of the country's patriotic and progressive into its fold, coalescing into the Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (BAYAN) formed in 1986, and was instrumental in toppling the regime in 1986.

The ND forces spearheaded the anti-bases movement with the militant Abakada (Anti-Baseng Kilusan) and Anti-Treaty Movement (ATM) at its core, also driving other broad anti-bases initiatives forward. It was a truly nationalist force that couldn't be resisted. When the MBA lapsed in 1991, the Senate rejected its extension by voting against the new proposed RP-U.S. Bases Treaty and caused the removal of U.S. troops and facilities - a truly historic step towards genuine freedom for our people.

The return of U.S. troops
But U.S. imperialism apparently can't long stand being deprived of Philippine facilities so crucial to its geopolitical interests.

When the U.S. came to our shores a century ago, it was continuing a wave of territorial expansion conducted throughout the 19th century - from its east coast across the mainland continent to the west coast and various Pacific islands, then into Central America, then across the Pacific to the Philippines. We were desired not only for our rich forests and vast minerals but also as a staging post from which to expand into the markets of China and the rest of Asia - in short, extending the U.S.' imperial reach into this part of the world. Senator Beveridge said to the U.S. Senate in 1900: "...the archipelago is a base for commerce of the East. It is a base for military and naval operations against the only powers with whom conflict is possible."

Things have changed little even after the Cold War. The U.S.' 1995 East Asian Strategy Report of the Department of Defense:
"reaffirms our commitment to maintain a stable forward presence in the region, at the existing level of 100,000 troops, for the foreseeable future... for maintaining forward deployment of U.S. forces and access and basing rights for U.S. and allied forces... If the American presence in Asia were removed... our ability to affect the course of events would be constrained, our markets and interests would be jeopardized."

U.S. imperialism first tried to extract an Acquisition and Cross-Servicing Agreement (ACSA) which would have allowed U.S. forces to refuel, repair and store war materiel in the country. Vigorous protests and mass demonstrations put this down. This was repackaged in 1997 as the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) and, again, was met with great opposition and put down.

Yet, quietly, RP-U.S. military exercises were still held in the country even after total U.S. withdrawal in 1992. These exercises allow the U.S. to gain familiarity with other countries' forces and potential battlefield terrain, as well as cement political and military ties of dependence.

The U.S. was finally able to force a Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA) through in 1999 despite the protestations of our Junk VFA Movement. Approved by the Senate as a treaty - and by the U.S. as a mere executive agreement - the VFA effectively makes the country one gigantic U.S. military facility at its convenience. Full access to Philippine territory is granted by giving U.S. military and civilian forces, including their personnel, warships, and warplanes, extraordinary rights and privileges.

The VFA is fully a piece of the U.S.' global military spread spanning over 800 military installations (including 60 major facilities) in over 140 countries, significant troop deployments in 25 countries, and at least 36 security arrangements. It's part of a string of dozens of security treaties, arrangements, ACSAs and SOFAs in Asia stretching from North Asia through Southeast Asia to Australia and the South Pacific - including Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Hongkong, Burma, Thailand, Singapore, Indonesia, Brunei, the Philippines, Australia, New Zealand, the Marshall Islands and so on.

The U.S. lost no time in taking advantage of this and conducted Balikatan 2000 in January 2000 in Nueva Ecija, Tarlac, Pampanga, Zambales, Bataan, Cavite and Palawan - i.e. in exercise venues exceeding the scope of any before it.
We have always argued that these agreements make a mockery of Philippine sovereignty and lay the basis for a return of U.S. troops to the country and direct armed intervention. Well a scant decade after the ejection of the military bases, the foot soldiers and grunts of U.S. imperialism are well and truly back - this time for their "war on terrorism".

The "war on terrorism"
Terrorism is an indefensible scourge and should be condemned. Yet what is even more condemnable is how U.S. imperialism, which has had little qualms in targeting civilians in defense of its hegemony, is invoking that legitimate cause for its own self-interested ends. All the end of the Cold War has meant for the U.S. is a golden opportunity to expand its economic, political and military hegemony ever wider across the world.

Consider what the important U.S. Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) 2001 says. It begins from the premise that America's overseas presence posture, concentrated in Western Europe and Northeast Asia, "is inadequate for the new strategic environment, in which U.S. (economic and security) interests are global and potential threats in other areas of the world are emerging."

It thus calls for an even more aggressive U.S. global security posture reoriented to:
"a) develop a basing system that provides greater flexibility for U.S. forces in critical areas of the world, placing emphasis on additional bases and stations beyond Western Europe and Northeast Asia;

b) provide temporary access to facilities in foreign countries that enable U.S. forces to conduct training and exercises in the absence of permanent ranges and bases;

c) redistribute forces and equipment based on regional deterrence requirements;

d) provide sufficient mobility, including airlift, sealift, pre-positioning, basing infrastructure, alternative points of debarkation, and new logistical concepts of operations, to conduct expeditionary operations in distant theaters against adversaries armed with weapons of mass destruction and other means to deny access to U.S. forces."

Largely written before the 9/11 terrorist attacks though released a few weeks after, implementation of the recommendations of the QDR 2001 gained momentum with the creation of the "war on terrorism" as a propaganda pillar.

The Philippines was quickly declared as the "second front" after Afghanistan with the return of U.S. troops sycophantically embraced by the Arroyo regime. As ever, the country is critical to the U.S. strategy of fortifying its presence in Southeast Asia, a presence somewhat weakened after the ouster of the bases.

The region is rich in natural resources like oil, gas and minerals. With over 500 million people, it's a vast market for U.S. goods and services and a significant destination for U.S. investments. Its east-west sea lanes connect the Indian and Pacific Oceans and its north-south routes link Australasia with Northeast Asia. These are vital not only to international commerce but also to any movement of U.S. forces from the western Pacific to the Indian Ocean or the Persian Gulf.

Mainland Asia is also home to three nuclear powers: China, India and Pakistan.
Tenuous links of the CIA-created bandit Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) with the Al Qaeda were played up to bolster the U.S. campaign for deeper military ties with the Philippines and a stronger military presence. Spuriously invoking the VFA, Balikatan 02-01 was a qualitative leap for RP-U.S. relations with open joint RP-U.S. field military operations conducted for the first time. Mindanao is clearly of special significance with U.S. Combat Engineers ("Seabees") working on a network of roads and airfields that come on top of earlier U.S.AID-funded development of military-ready "civilian" airports and seaports.

More to come
The VFA - a toned-down ACSA - is apparently still not enough for the U.S.' tastes. In her trip to the U.S. last November, President Arroyo took up a Mutual Logistics Support Agreement (MLSA) which is presently being negotiated secretly by the two governments. The preamble of the working draft says the MLSA aims to "further the interoperability, readiness and effectiveness" of the RP-U.S. military forces "through increased logistics cooperation."

The basic aim though is simply to allow the U.S. to set up logistics support network in the country - covering supplies, billeting, transportation, communication and medical materiel -by storing or procuring them locally. Though involving seemingly innocuous items they clearly have a darkly military purpose.

The joint combat operations against the trifling ASG are also obviously meant to lay the ground for similar operations against the NPA, Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and the Misuari faction of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF). The Arroyo regime has been conspicuous in floating and pushing the idea of allowing the U.S. troops to go well beyond Basilan.

In her State of the Nation Address (SONA) last week the president even boasted of "[enhancing] our strategic relationship with the U.S. through continuing training exercises." Clearly the deployment of U.S. forces against the ASG was meant to start a chain of events for rationalizing further U.S. military intervention and aggression, which can only wreak havoc on the Filipino people and our struggle for national freedom. Bayan Muna joins U.S. Troops Out Now in confronting U.S. imperialism's machinations.

Our history is replete with experiences that show U.S. imperialism is a deceitful and brutal enemy of the people. The widespread poverty, social inequity and deep exploitation we suffer today is in large measure due to its domination of Philippine society. Yet our history also shows that the hard and valiant struggle and, indeed, the sacrifices and martyrdom of so many are not in vain.

We are unrelenting in our struggle and convinced that each battle we fight, no matter the outcome, is a step in the right direction. A step towards national freedom and liberation.

Speech prepared for the International Solidarity Mission Against U.S. Armed Intervention in the Philippines, July 28, 2002
Source: http://www.bayanmuna.net/Speech/12th_Cong/06-ISM.htm

THE POWER OF NATIONALISM AND AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY

"To oppose the policies of a government does not mean you are against the country or the people that the government supposedly represents. Such opposition should be called what it really is: democracy, or democratic dissent, or having a critical perspective about what your leaders are doing. Either we have the right to democratic dissent and criticism of these policies or we all lie down and let the leader, the Fuhrer, do what is best, while we follow uncritically, and obey whatever he commands. That's just what the Germans did with Hitler, and look where it got them." - Michael Parenti NOTES:
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WHAT WE FILIPINOS SHOULD KNOW:

Some of us may know a friend or relative who has earned a study grant as a "Fulbright scholar," and thus familiar with the name.

Senator Fulbright wrote books such as the "Arrogance of Power" (1966), "The Pentagon Propaganda Machine" (1970), "The Crippled Giant: American Foreign Policy and its Domestic Consequences" (1972), "The Price of the Empire" (1989), etc.

Fulbright was the longest serving and most powerful chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He was also the most prominent, and the most effective, of the first American critics of the Vietnam War.

Fulbright's criticism was particularly galling and damning to Lyndon Johnson because Fulbright was a principled internationalist who could not be dismissed as an ideologue. Fulbright used hearings by the Foreign Relations Committee as a forum in which to advance his powerful critique of the war.

Below is what he said about nationalism during the Vietnam War. It sounds familiar even today. Deja vu! Now with the quagmire brought about by the Iraqi Invasion, with the new excuse/spin of "fighting terrorism" and "spreading democracy", etc. as modeled from the U.S. intervention/occupation of our homeland. The new spin is now used since the old rationale of "containing or fighting communism" is now moot -given that communism is practically the God that failed.

America, due to its self-righteous ignorance/arrogance, desire and action to bully the world, and insatiable greed (the logic of capitalism), creates its own monsters, a self-fulfilling prophecy.

America's leaders never learn to respect other peoples' society and sovereignty. Despite being the wealthiest and militarily, the strongest country since the start of the 20th century; their war-mongering results only in their young soldiers fighting for nebulous rationalizations and thus dying needlessly. 

- Bert

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THE POWER OF NATIONALISM AND AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY

- James W. Fulbright (D), Senate Years of Service: 1945-1974

Looking beyond a possible settlement of the Vietnamese War, it may be that the major lesson of trhis tragic conflict will be a new appreciation of the power of nationalism in Southeast Asia and, indeed, in all of the world's emerging nations.

Generally, American foreign policy in Asia, in Africa and in latin America has been successful and constructive as far as American aims have coincided with the national aims of the people concerned.

The tragedy of Vietnam is that for many reasons, including the intransigence of a colonial power and the initial failure of the United States to appreciate the consequences of of that intransigence, the nationalist movement became associated with and largely subordinated to the Communist movement.

In the postwar era it has been demonstrated repeatedly that nationalism is a stronger force than communism and that the association of the two, which has created so many diffilcuties for the United States, in neither inevitable nor neutral.

In the past, it has come about when, for one reason or another, the West has set itself in opposition to the natural aspirations of the emerging peoples. It is to be hoped that in the future the United States will leave no country in doubt as to its friendship and support for legitimate national aspirations.

If we do this, we will find ourselves in another conflict like the one in Vietnam.

Source: "The Vietnam Reader - Articles and Documents on American Foreign Policy and the Vietnam Crisis, M. G. Raskin and Bernard B, Fall
"From 1945 to 2003, the United States attempted to overthrow more than 40 foreign governments, and to crush more than 30 populist-nationalist movements fighting against intolerable regimes. In the process, the US bombed some 25 countries, caused the end of life for several million people, and condemned many millions more to a life of agony and despair." - William Blum

"I spent thirty-three years in the Marines, most of my time being a hlgh class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer for capitalism." - General Smedley Butler, former US Marine Corps Commandant,1935

"Why of course the people don't want war... That is understood. But after all it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship ...Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger."- Hermann Goering, Hitler's righthand man (1893-1946)

"[American leaders] are perhaps not so much immoral as they are amoral. It's not that they take pleasure in causing so much death and suffering. It's that they just don't care ... the same that could be said about a sociopath. As long as the death and suffering advance the agenda of the empire, as long as the right people and the right corporations gain wealth and power and privilege and prestige, as long as the death and suffering aren't happening to them or people close to them ... then they just don't care about it happening to other people, including the American soldiers whom they throw into wars and who come home - the ones who make it back alive - with Agent Orange or Gulf War Syndrome eating away at their bodies. American leaders would not be in the positions they hold if they were bothered by such things." - William Blum

"To oppose the policies of a government does not mean you are against the country or the people that the government supposedly represents. Such opposition should be called what it really is: democracy, or democratic dissent, or having a critical perspective about what your leaders are doing. Either we have the right to democratic dissent and criticism of these policies or we all lie down and let the leader, the Fuhrer, do what is best, while we follow uncritically, and obey whatever he commands. That's just what the Germans did with Hitler, and look where it got them." - Michael Parenti

"The selfish spirit of commerce knows no country, and feels no passion or principle but that of gain" - Thomas Jefferson, 1809

"If it is commercialism to want the possession of a strategic point [Philippines] giving the American people an opportunity to maintain a foothold in the markets of that great Eastern country [China], for God's sake let us have commercialism." --Senator Mark Hanna (1837-1904)

“Any country whose people conduct themselves well can count upon our hearty friendship. If a nation..keeps order and pays its obligations, it need fear no interference from the United States…The adherence of the Unted States to the Monroe Doctrine may force the United States..to the exercise of an international police power.” – American President Theodore Roosevelt (opening of 58th Congress, 1903-1905)