War Without Purpose
Posted on Jul 20, 2009
By Chris Hedges
Al-Qaida could not care less what we do in Afghanistan. We can bomb Afghan villages, hunt the Taliban in Helmand province, build a 100,000-strong client Afghan army, stand by passively as Afghan warlords execute hundreds, maybe thousands, of Taliban prisoners, build huge, elaborate military bases and send drones to drop bombs on Pakistan. It will make no difference. The war will not halt the attacks of Islamic radicals. Terrorist and insurgent groups are not conventional forces. They do not play by the rules of warfare our commanders have drilled into them in war colleges and service academies. And these underground groups are protean, changing shape and color as they drift from one failed state to the next, plan a terrorist attack and then fade back into the shadows. We are fighting with the wrong tools. We are fighting the wrong people. We are on the wrong side of history. And we will be defeated in Afghanistan as we will be in Iraq.
The cost of the Afghanistan war is rising. Tens of thousands of Afghan civilians have been killed or wounded. July has been the deadliest month in the war for NATO combatants, with at least 50 troops, including 26 Americans, killed. Roadside bomb attacks on coalition forces are swelling the number of wounded and killed. In June, the tally of incidents involving roadside bombs, also called improvised explosive devices (IEDs), hit 736, a record for the fourth straight month; the number had risen from 361 in March to 407 in April and to 465 in May. The decision by President Barack Obama to send 21,000 additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan has increased our presence to 57,000 American troops. The total is expected to rise to at least 68,000 by the end of 2009. It will only mean more death, expanded fighting and greater futility.
We have stumbled into a confusing mix of armed groups that include criminal gangs, drug traffickers, Pashtun and Tajik militias, kidnapping rings, death squads and mercenaries. We are embroiled in a civil war. The Pashtuns, who make up most of the Taliban and are the traditional rulers of Afghanistan, are battling the Tajiks and Uzbeks, who make up the Northern Alliance, which, with foreign help, won the civil war in 2001. The old Northern Alliance now dominates the corrupt and incompetent government. It is deeply hated. And it will fall with us.
We are losing the war in Afghanistan. When we invaded the country eight years ago the Taliban controlled about 75 percent of Afghanistan. Today its reach has crept back to about half the country. The Taliban runs the poppy trade, which brings in an annual income of about $300 million a year. It brazenly carries out attacks in Kabul, the capital, and foreigners, fearing kidnapping, rarely walk the streets of most Afghan cities. It is life-threatening to go into the countryside, where 80 percent of all Afghanis live, unless escorted by NATO troops. And intrepid reporters can interview Taliban officials in downtown coffee shops in Kabul. Osama bin Laden has, to the amusement of much of the rest of the world, become the Where’s Waldo of the Middle East. Take away the bullets and the bombs and you have a Gilbert and Sullivan farce.
No one seems to be able to articulate why we are in Afghanistan. Is it to hunt down bin Laden and al-Qaida? Is it to consolidate progress? Have we declared war on the Taliban? Are we building democracy? Are we fighting terrorists there so we do not have to fight them here? Are we “liberating” the women of Afghanistan? The absurdity of the questions, used as thought-terminating clichés, exposes the absurdity of the war. The confusion of purpose mirrors the confusion on the ground. We don’t know what we are doing.
Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the new commander of U.S. and NATO-led troops in Afghanistan, announced recently that coalition forces must make a “cultural shift” in Afghanistan. He said they should move away from their normal combat orientation and toward protecting civilians. He understands that airstrikes, which have killed hundreds of civilians, are a potent recruiting tool for the Taliban. The goal is lofty but the reality of war defies its implementation. NATO forces will always call in close air support when they are under attack. This is what troops under fire do. They do not have the luxury of canvassing the local population first. They ask questions later. The May 4 aerial attack on Farah province, which killed dozens of civilians, violated standing orders about airstrikes. So did the air assault in Kandahar province last week in which four civilians were killed and 13 were wounded. The NATO strike targeted a village in the Shawalikot district. Wounded villagers at a hospital in the provincial capital told AP that attack helicopters started bombarding their homes at about 10:30 p.m. Wednesday. One man said his 3-year-old granddaughter was killed. Combat creates its own rules, and civilians are almost always the losers.
The offensive by NATO forces in Helmand province will follow the usual scenario laid out by military commanders, who know much about weapons systems and conventional armies and little about the nuances of irregular warfare. The Taliban will withdraw, probably to sanctuaries in Pakistan. We will declare the operation a success. Our force presence will be reduced. And the Taliban will creep back into the zones we will have “cleansed.” The roadside bombs will continue to exact their deadly toll. Soldiers and Marines, frustrated at trying to fight an elusive and often invisible enemy, will lash out with greater fury at phantoms and continue to increase the numbers of civilian dead. It is a game as old as insurgency itself, and yet each generation of warriors thinks it has finally found the magic key to victory.
We have ensured that Iraq and Afghanistan are failed states. Next on our list appears to be Pakistan. Pakistan, like Iraq and Afghanistan, is also a bizarre construct of Western powers that drew arbitrary and artificial borders, ones the clans and ethnic groups divided by these lines ignore. As Pakistan has unraveled, its army has sought legitimacy in militant Islam. It was the Pakistani military that created the Taliban. The Pakistanis determined how the billions in U.S. aid to the resistance during the war against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan was allocated. And nearly all of it went to the most extremist wings of the Afghan resistance movement. The Taliban, in Pakistan’s eyes, is not only an effective weapon to defeat foreign invaders, whether Russian or American, but is a bulwark against India. Muslim radicals in Kabul are never going to build an alliance with India against Pakistan. And India, not Afghanistan, is Pakistan’s primary concern. Pakistan, no matter how many billions we give to it, will always nurture and protect the Taliban, which it knows is going to inherit Afghanistan. And the government’s well-publicized battle with the Taliban in the Swat Valley of Pakistan, rather than a new beginning, is part of a choreographed charade that does nothing to break the unholy alliance.
The only way to defeat terrorist groups is to isolate them within their own societies. This requires wooing the population away from radicals. It is a political, economic and cultural war. The terrible algebra of military occupation and violence is always counterproductive to this kind of battle. It always creates more insurgents than it kills. It always legitimizes terrorism. And while we squander resources and lives, the real enemy, al-Qaida, has moved on to build networks in Indonesia, Pakistan, Somalia, Sudan and Morocco and depressed Muslim communities such as those in France’s Lyon and London’s Brixton area. There is no shortage of backwaters and broken patches of the Earth where al-Qaida can hide and operate. It does not need Afghanistan, and neither do we.
Monday, July 20, 2009
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Chris Hedges - Truthdig.com (June 8, 2009)
Hold Your Applause
Posted on Jun 8, 2009
By Chris Hedges
Did they play Barack Obama’s speech to the Muslim world in the prison corridors of Abu Ghraib, Bagram air base, Guantanamo or the dozens of secret sites where we hold thousands of Muslims around the world? Did it echo off the walls of the crowded morgues filled with the mutilated bodies of the Muslim dead in Baghdad or Kabul? Was it broadcast from the tops of minarets in the villages and towns decimated by U.S. iron fragmentation bombs? Was it heard in the squalid refugee camps of Gaza, where 1.5 million Palestinians live in the world’s largest ghetto?
What do words of peace and cooperation mean from us when we torture—yes, we still torture—only Muslims? What do these words mean when we sanction Israel’s brutal air assaults on Lebanon and Gaza, assaults that demolished thousands of homes and left hundreds dead and injured? How does it look for Obama to call for democracy and human rights from Egypt, where we lavishly fund and support the despotic regime of Hosni Mubarak, one of the longest-reigning dictators in the Middle East?
We may thrill to Obama’s rhetoric, but very few of the 1.3 billion Muslims in the world are as deluded. They grasp that nothing so far has changed for Muslims in the Middle East under the Obama administration. The wars of occupation go on or have been expanded. Israel continues to flout international law, gobbling up more Palestinian land and carrying out egregious war crimes in Gaza. Calcified, repressive regimes in countries such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia are feted in Washington as allies.
The speech at Cairo University, which usually has trucks filled with riot police outside the university gates and a heavy security presence on campus to control the student body, is an example of the facade. Student political groups, as everyone who joined in the standing ovation for the president knew, are prohibited. Faculty deans are chosen by the administration, rather than elected by professors, “as a way to combat Islamist influence on campus,” according to the U.S. State Department’s latest human rights report. And, as The Washington Post pointed out, students who use the Internet “as an outlet for their political or social views are on notice: One Cairo University student blogger was jailed for two months last summer for ‘public agitation,’ and another was kicked out of university housing for criticizing the government.”
The expanding imperial projects and tightening screws of repression lurch forward under Obama. We are not trying to end terror or promote democracy. We are ensuring that our corporate state has a steady supply of the cheap oil to which it is addicted. And the scarcer oil becomes, the more aggressive we become. This is the game playing out in the Muslim world.
The Bush White House openly tortured. The Obama White House tortures and pretends not to. Obama may have banned waterboarding, but as Luke Mitchell points out in next month’s issue of Harper’s magazine, torture, including isolation, sleep and sensory deprivation and force-feeding, continues to be used to break detainees. The president has promised to close Guantanamo, where only 1 percent of the prisoners held offshore by the United States are kept. And the Obama administration has sought to obscure the fate and condition of thousands of Muslims held in black holes around the globe. As Mitchell notes, the Obama White House “has sought to prevent detainees at Bagram prison in Afghanistan from gaining access to courts where they may reveal the circumstances of their imprisonment. It has sought to continue the practice of rendering prisoners to unknown and unknowable locations outside the United States, and sought to keep secret many (though not all) of the records regarding our treatment of those detainees.”
Muslim rage is stoked because we station tens of thousands of American troops on Muslim soil, occupy two Muslim nations, make possible the illegal Israeli occupation of Palestine, support repressive Arab regimes and torture thousands of Muslims in offshore penal colonies where prisoners are stripped of their rights. We now have 22 times as many military personnel in the Muslim world as were deployed during the crusades in the 12th century. The rage comes because we have constructed massive military bases, some the size of small cities, in Iraq, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Kuwait, and established basing rights in the Gulf states of Bahrain, Qatar, Oman and the United Arab Emirates. The rage comes because we have expanded our military empire into neighboring Uzbekistan, Pakistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. It comes because we station troops and special forces in Egypt, Algeria and Yemen. And this vast network of bases and military outposts looks suspiciously permanent.
The Muslim world fears, correctly, that we intend to dominate Middle East oil supplies and any Caspian Sea oil infrastructure. And it is interested not in our protestations of good will but in the elemental right of justice and freedom from foreign occupation. We would react, should the situation be reversed, no differently.
The brutal reality of expanding foreign occupation and harsher and harsher forms of control are the tinder of Islamic fundamentalism, insurgences and terrorism. We can blame the violence on a clash of civilizations. We can naively tell ourselves we are envied for our freedoms. We can point to the Koran. But these are fantasies that divert us from facing the central dispute between us and the Muslim world, from facing our own responsibility for the virus of chaos and violence spreading throughout the Middle East. We can have peace when we shut down our bases, stay the hand of the Israelis to create a Palestinian state, and go home, or we can have long, costly and ultimately futile regional war. We cannot have both.
Obama, whose embrace of American imperialism is as naive and destructive as that of George W. Bush, is the newest brand used to peddle the poison of permanent war. We may not see it. But those who bury the dead do.
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
Monday, June 1, 2009
Frank Kaplan - Slate.com (May 29, 2009)
War Stores
There Are Already 355 Terrorists in American Prisons
The preposterous arguments against allowing Gitmo detainees into the U.S.
By Fred Kaplan
Posted Friday, May 29, 2009, at 5:33 PM ET
President Obama's remark that some Guantanamo detainees might be transferred to American prisons has prompted an extraordinary, and intellectually feeble, storm of protest. Former Vice President Dick Cheney kicked off the campaign when he said, during his May 21 speech at the American Enterprise Institute, that "to bring the worst terrorists inside the United States would be a cause for great danger and regret in the years to come." Sitting lawmakers—especially those from states such as Kansas and Colorado where federal prisons are based—raised the same specter and shouted the ancient cry of principled rebellion: "Not In My Back Yard!"
It makes one wonder: Do any of these legislators know who's in their backyards already, with no apparent detriment to their constituents' daily lives, much less the nation's security?
According to data provided by Traci L. Billingsley, spokeswoman for the U.S. Bureau of Prisons, federal facilities on American soil currently house 216 international terrorists and 139 domestic terrorists. Some of these miscreants have been locked up here since the early 1990s. None of them has escaped. At the most secure prisons, nobody has ever escaped, period.
Keep reading:
http://www.slate.com/id/2219268/
There Are Already 355 Terrorists in American Prisons
The preposterous arguments against allowing Gitmo detainees into the U.S.
By Fred Kaplan
Posted Friday, May 29, 2009, at 5:33 PM ET
President Obama's remark that some Guantanamo detainees might be transferred to American prisons has prompted an extraordinary, and intellectually feeble, storm of protest. Former Vice President Dick Cheney kicked off the campaign when he said, during his May 21 speech at the American Enterprise Institute, that "to bring the worst terrorists inside the United States would be a cause for great danger and regret in the years to come." Sitting lawmakers—especially those from states such as Kansas and Colorado where federal prisons are based—raised the same specter and shouted the ancient cry of principled rebellion: "Not In My Back Yard!"
It makes one wonder: Do any of these legislators know who's in their backyards already, with no apparent detriment to their constituents' daily lives, much less the nation's security?
According to data provided by Traci L. Billingsley, spokeswoman for the U.S. Bureau of Prisons, federal facilities on American soil currently house 216 international terrorists and 139 domestic terrorists. Some of these miscreants have been locked up here since the early 1990s. None of them has escaped. At the most secure prisons, nobody has ever escaped, period.
Keep reading:
http://www.slate.com/id/2219268/
Scott Horton - Harpers.org (May 28, 2009)
Six Questions for Rashid Khalidi, Author of Sowing Crisis
Columbia University historian Rashid Khalidi has been a forceful critic of the Bush Administration’s heavy-handed conduct in the Middle East, often drawing on modern historical parallels to argue that the approaches taken are short-sighted. In his latest book, Sowing Crisis: The Cold War and American Dominance in the Middle East, he recaps the Cold War era in Middle Eastern history, showing how the United States dominated the region throughout the period but was able to achieve remarkably little nonetheless. I put six questions to Prof. Khalidi about his new book.
Rest of the article here:
http://www.harpers.org/archive/2009/05/hbc-90005060
Columbia University historian Rashid Khalidi has been a forceful critic of the Bush Administration’s heavy-handed conduct in the Middle East, often drawing on modern historical parallels to argue that the approaches taken are short-sighted. In his latest book, Sowing Crisis: The Cold War and American Dominance in the Middle East, he recaps the Cold War era in Middle Eastern history, showing how the United States dominated the region throughout the period but was able to achieve remarkably little nonetheless. I put six questions to Prof. Khalidi about his new book.
Rest of the article here:
http://www.harpers.org/archive/2009/05/hbc-90005060
BLDGBLOG.blogspot.com (May 27, 2009)
Interview with photographer Richard Mosse who has a new photo series entitled Breach.
http://bldgblog.blogspot.com/2009/05/saddams-palaces-interview-with-richard.html
Interesting quote from the interview:
The most interesting thing about the whole endeavor for me was the very fact that the U.S. had chosen to occupy Saddam's palaces in the first place. If you're trying to convince a population that you have liberated them from a terrible dictator, why would you then sit in his throne? A savvier place to station the garrison would have been a place free from associations with Saddam, and the terror and injustices that the occupying forces were convinced they'd done away with. Instead, they made the mistake of repeating history. This is why I've titled this body of work Breach. "Breach" is a military maneuver in which the walls of a fortification (or palace) are broken through. But breach also carries the sense of replacement—as in, stepping into the breach. The U.S. stepped into the breach that it had created, replacing the very thing that it sought to destroy.
AndrewSullivan.com (June 1, 2009)
Sotomayor's Defense Of A White Bigot
A reader writes:
It took about, oh, under one minute to do a Google search and come up with Judge Sotomayor's dissent in Pappas v. Giuliani, 290 F.3d 143.
The plaintiff, Pappas, was fired by the NYPD when it was discovered that Pappas had regularly (but anonymously and on his own private time) distributed racist and anti-semitic pamphlets of the David Duke variety. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals voted to affirm the NYPD's actions but Justice Sotomayor dissented on the grounds that Pappas's first amendment rights were not vitiated merely because he had unpopular views.
There are two critical points to take from this. The first, and most important point to consider, is that here we have a judge, accused of entho-centric racism, dissenting on behalf of a white male police officer accused of distributing racist pamphlets. This is outside the Limbaugh/Rove/Hannity nattering nabob narrative and so has to be ignored by much of the MSM.
The second point is the fact that despite the fact that his material is so readily available at the click of a Google button, so many people rely on ideologues to filter the information they take in and who treat that information as fact (which it is not) rather than advocacy (which it is). It is a sad pathetic sign of the times.
A reader writes:
It took about, oh, under one minute to do a Google search and come up with Judge Sotomayor's dissent in Pappas v. Giuliani, 290 F.3d 143.
The plaintiff, Pappas, was fired by the NYPD when it was discovered that Pappas had regularly (but anonymously and on his own private time) distributed racist and anti-semitic pamphlets of the David Duke variety. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals voted to affirm the NYPD's actions but Justice Sotomayor dissented on the grounds that Pappas's first amendment rights were not vitiated merely because he had unpopular views.
There are two critical points to take from this. The first, and most important point to consider, is that here we have a judge, accused of entho-centric racism, dissenting on behalf of a white male police officer accused of distributing racist pamphlets. This is outside the Limbaugh/Rove/Hannity nattering nabob narrative and so has to be ignored by much of the MSM.
The second point is the fact that despite the fact that his material is so readily available at the click of a Google button, so many people rely on ideologues to filter the information they take in and who treat that information as fact (which it is not) rather than advocacy (which it is). It is a sad pathetic sign of the times.
AndrewSullivan.com (June 1, 2009)
"What I do support is what has been termed the responsible closure of Gitmo. Gitmo has caused us problems, there's no question about it. I oversee a region in which the existence of Gitmo has been used by the enemy against us. We have not been without missteps or mistakes in our activity since 9/11 and again Gitmo is a lingering reminder for the use of some in that regard... I don't think we should be afraid of our values we're fighting for, what we stand for. And so indeed we need to embrace them and we need to operationalize them in how we carry out what it is we're doing on the battlefield and everywhere else...
So one has to have some faith, I think, in the legal system. One has to have a degree of confidence that individuals that have conducted such extremist activity would indeed be found guilty in our courts of law. When we have taken steps that have violated the Geneva Conventions, we rightly have been criticized, so as we move forward I think it's important to again live our values, to live the agreements that we have made in the international justice arena and to practice those," - general David Petraeus, conceding that the US violated the Geneva Conventions under president Bush, and pledging to remain within the laws of war in the future, as the best way to win the war on terror.
So one has to have some faith, I think, in the legal system. One has to have a degree of confidence that individuals that have conducted such extremist activity would indeed be found guilty in our courts of law. When we have taken steps that have violated the Geneva Conventions, we rightly have been criticized, so as we move forward I think it's important to again live our values, to live the agreements that we have made in the international justice arena and to practice those," - general David Petraeus, conceding that the US violated the Geneva Conventions under president Bush, and pledging to remain within the laws of war in the future, as the best way to win the war on terror.
AndrewSullivan.com (June 1, 2009)
Why It's Religious Terrorism
McClatchy's story helps explain the fuller context:
In the rear window of the 1993 blue Ford Taurus that he was driving was a red rose, a symbol often used by abortion opponents. On the rear of his car was a Christian fish symbol with the word "Jesus" inside... Dinwiddie said she met Roeder while picketing outside the Kansas City Planned Parenthood clinic in 1996. Roeder walked into the clinic and asked to see the doctor, Robert Crist, she said. "Robert Crist came out and he stared at him for approximately 45 seconds," she said. "Then he (Roeder) said, 'I've seen you now.' Then he turned his back and walked away, and they were scared to death. On the way out, he gave me a great big hug and he said, 'I've seen you in the newspaper. I just love what you're doing.'"
And this:
In April 1996, Roeder was arrested in Topeka after Shawnee County sheriff's deputies stopped him for not having a proper license plate. In his car, officers said they found ammunition, a blasting cap, a fuse cord, a one-pound can of gunpowder and two 9-volt batteries, with one connected to a switch that could have been used to trigger a bomb. Jim Jimerson, supervisor of the Kansas City ATF's bomb and arson unit, worked on the case. "There wasn't enough there to blow up a building,'' Jimerson said at the time, ``but it could make several powerful pipe bombs...There was definitely enough there to kill somebody.''
The fusion of religion with politics is a dangerous, dangerous thing.
McClatchy's story helps explain the fuller context:
In the rear window of the 1993 blue Ford Taurus that he was driving was a red rose, a symbol often used by abortion opponents. On the rear of his car was a Christian fish symbol with the word "Jesus" inside... Dinwiddie said she met Roeder while picketing outside the Kansas City Planned Parenthood clinic in 1996. Roeder walked into the clinic and asked to see the doctor, Robert Crist, she said. "Robert Crist came out and he stared at him for approximately 45 seconds," she said. "Then he (Roeder) said, 'I've seen you now.' Then he turned his back and walked away, and they were scared to death. On the way out, he gave me a great big hug and he said, 'I've seen you in the newspaper. I just love what you're doing.'"
And this:
In April 1996, Roeder was arrested in Topeka after Shawnee County sheriff's deputies stopped him for not having a proper license plate. In his car, officers said they found ammunition, a blasting cap, a fuse cord, a one-pound can of gunpowder and two 9-volt batteries, with one connected to a switch that could have been used to trigger a bomb. Jim Jimerson, supervisor of the Kansas City ATF's bomb and arson unit, worked on the case. "There wasn't enough there to blow up a building,'' Jimerson said at the time, ``but it could make several powerful pipe bombs...There was definitely enough there to kill somebody.''
The fusion of religion with politics is a dangerous, dangerous thing.
AndrewSullivan.com - Quote of the Day (June 1, 2009)
"If anyone has an urge to kill someone at an abortion clinic, they should shoot me. ... It's madness. It discredits the right-to-life movement. Murder is murder. It's madness. You cannot prevent killing by killing." - John Cardinal O'Connor.
Chris Hedges - Truthdig.com (June 1, 2009)
War Is Sin
Posted on Jun 1, 2009
By Chris Hedges
The crisis faced by combat veterans returning from war is not simply a profound struggle with trauma and alienation. It is often, for those who can slice through the suffering to self-awareness, an existential crisis. War exposes the lies we tell ourselves about ourselves. It rips open the hypocrisy of our religions and secular institutions. Those who return from war have learned something which is often incomprehensible to those who have stayed home. We are not a virtuous nation. God and fate have not blessed us above others. Victory is not assured. War is neither glorious nor noble. And we carry within us the capacity for evil we ascribe to those we fight.
Those who return to speak this truth, such as members of Iraq Veterans Against the War, are our contemporary prophets. But like all prophets they are condemned and ignored for their courage. They struggle, in a culture awash in lies, to tell what few have the fortitude to digest. They know that what we are taught in school, in worship, by the press, through the entertainment industry and at home, that the melding of the state’s rhetoric with the rhetoric of religion, is empty and false.
The words these prophets speak are painful. We, as a nation, prefer to listen to those who speak from the patriotic script. We prefer to hear ourselves exalted. If veterans speak of terrible wounds visible and invisible, of lies told to make them kill, of evil committed in our name, we fill our ears with wax. Not our boys, we say, not them, bred in our homes, endowed with goodness and decency. For if it is easy for them to murder, what about us? And so it is simpler and more comfortable not to hear. We do not listen to the angry words that cascade forth from their lips, wishing only that they would calm down, be reasonable, get some help, and go away. We, the deformed, brand our prophets as madmen. We cast them into the desert. And this is why so many veterans are estranged and enraged. This is why so many succumb to suicide or addictions.
War comes wrapped in patriotic slogans, calls for sacrifice, honor and heroism and promises of glory. It comes wrapped in the claims of divine providence. It is what a grateful nation asks of its children. It is what is right and just. It is waged to make the nation and the world a better place, to cleanse evil. War is touted as the ultimate test of manhood, where the young can find out what they are made of. War, from a distance, seems noble. It gives us comrades and power and a chance to play a small bit in the great drama of history. It promises to give us an identity as a warrior, a patriot, as long as we go along with the myth, the one the war-makers need to wage wars and the defense contractors need to increase their profits.
But up close war is a soulless void. War is about barbarity, perversion and pain, an unchecked orgy of death. Human decency and tenderness are crushed. Those who make war work overtime to reduce love to smut, and all human beings become objects, pawns to use or kill. The noise, the stench, the fear, the scenes of eviscerated bodies and bloated corpses, the cries of the wounded, all combine to spin those in combat into another universe. In this moral void, naively blessed by secular and religious institutions at home, the hypocrisy of our social conventions, our strict adherence to moral precepts, come unglued. War, for all its horror, has the power to strip away the trivial and the banal, the empty chatter and foolish obsessions that fill our days. It lets us see, although the cost is tremendous.
The Rev. William P. Mahedy, who was a Catholic chaplain in Vietnam, tells of a soldier, a former altar boy, in his book “Out of the Night: The Spiritual Journey of Vietnam Vets,” who says to him: “Hey, Chaplain ... how come it’s a sin to hop into bed with a mama-san but it’s okay to blow away gooks out in the bush?”
“Consider the question that he and I were forced to confront on that day in a jungle clearing,” Mahedy writes. “How is it that a Christian can, with a clear conscience, spend a year in a war zone killing people and yet place his soul in jeopardy by spending a few minutes with a prostitute? If the New Testament prohibitions of sexual misconduct are to be stringently interpreted, why, then, are Jesus’ injunctions against violence not binding in the same way? In other words, what does the commandment ‘Thou shalt not kill’ really mean?”
Military chaplains, a majority of whom are evangelical Christians, defend the life of the unborn, tout America as a Christian nation and eagerly bless the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as holy crusades. The hollowness of their morality, the staggering disconnect between the values they claim to promote, is ripped open in war.
There is a difference between killing someone who is trying to kill you and taking the life of someone who does not have the power to harm you. The first is killing. The second is murder. But in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, where the enemy is elusive and rarely seen, murder occurs far more often than killing. Families are massacred in airstrikes. Children are gunned down in blistering suppressing fire laid down in neighborhoods after an improvised explosive device goes off near a convoy. Artillery shells obliterate homes. And no one stops to look. The dead and maimed are left behind.
The utter failure of nearly all our religious institutions—whose texts are unequivocal about murder—to address the essence of war has rendered them useless. These institutions have little or nothing to say in wartime because the god they worship is a false god, one that promises victory to those who obey the law and believe in the manifest destiny of the nation.
We all have the capacity to commit evil. It takes little to unleash it. For those of us who have been to war this is the awful knowledge that is hardest to digest, the knowledge that the line between the victims and the victimizers is razor-thin, that human beings find a perverse delight in destruction and death, and that few can resist the pull. At best, most of us become silent accomplices.
Wars may have to be fought to ensure survival, but they are always tragic. They always bring to the surface the worst elements of any society, those who have a penchant for violence and a lust for absolute power. They turn the moral order upside down. It was the criminal class that first organized the defense of Sarajevo. When these goons were not manning roadblocks to hold off the besieging Bosnian Serb army they were looting, raping and killing the Serb residents in the city. And those politicians who speak of war as an instrument of power, those who wage war but do not know its reality, those powerful statesmen—the Henry Kissingers, Robert McNamaras, Donald Rumsfelds, the Dick Cheneys—those who treat war as part of the great game of nations, are as amoral as the religious stooges who assist them. And when the wars are over what they have to say to us in their thick memoirs about war is also hollow, vacant and useless.
“In theological terms, war is sin,” writes Mahedy. “This has nothing to do with whether a particular war is justified or whether isolated incidents in a soldier’s war were right or wrong. The point is that war as a human enterprise is a matter of sin. It is a form of hatred for one’s fellow human beings. It produces alienation from others and nihilism, and it ultimately represents a turning away from God.”
The young soldiers and Marines do not plan or organize the war. They do not seek to justify it or explain its causes. They are taught to believe. The symbols of the nation and religion are interwoven. The will of God becomes the will of the nation. This trust is forever shattered for many in war. Soldiers in combat see the myth used to send them to war implode. They see that war is not clean or neat or noble, but venal and frightening. They see into war’s essence, which is death.
War is always about betrayal. It is about betrayal of the young by the old, of cynics by idealists, and of soldiers and Marines by politicians. Society’s institutions, including our religious institutions, which mold us into compliant citizens, are unmasked. This betrayal is so deep that many never find their way back to faith in the nation or in any god. They nurse a self-destructive anger and resentment, understandable and justified, but also crippling. Ask a combat veteran struggling to piece his or her life together about God and watch the raw vitriol and pain pour out. They have seen into the corrupt heart of America, into the emptiness of its most sacred institutions, into our staggering hypocrisy, and those of us who refuse to heed their words become complicit in the evil they denounce.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Spectator UK (May 22, 2009)
Diet Guantanmo! -Alex Massie
Watch this one run and run. First up is Florida Democrat Alcee Hastings:
"If we have transparency and accountability, than you can leave Gitmo just like it is," he said. "The physical plant of Guantanamo is built to hold people. And therefore I argue and will pursue the administration to give a look at legislation that I am developing that will give transparency and accountability and may satisfy our allies as well," Hastings said, noting that he would enable groups like Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the Red Cross to have better access to monitor the facility.
Hastings has yet to seriously discuss the proposal with the White House but asserts that it could be a viable solution given that the new Gitmo comes with a guarantee of no torture.
Hastings, a former U.S. District Court judge, cited a problematic prison he once ordered closed, renovated and eventually reopened.
"I went in-same facility-we just changed what was going on inside and therefore the perception changed," he said, when asked about President Obama's assertion Guantanamo poses a international perception problem for the nation.
Given that Obama has vowed that no torture will take place at the facility, Hastings said Obama will be able to declare that "the new Guantanamo is open."
Batting second, National Review's Andy McCarthy:
I continue to be baffled by this: If President Obama truly is the transformative, transcendent figure all the hype tells us he is, why can't he "cleanse" Gitmo of its purported terror-driving taint by his personal certification that it's now a top-notch detention center — "rule of law" compliant, consistent with "our values," and otherwise worthy of The One's very own seal of approval? Why is that straightforward, cost-free alternative not an option? After all, he's maintaining Bush policies like rendition, state-secrets, and military commmissions. We are now told we can trust that these former atrocities have been purged of their Bushie taint because Obama has personally scrutinized them and decided to keep them after an oh-so-thoughtful nip here and tuck there. Why does that rationale not work for Gitmo?
Look, as I said last week, this business about Gitmo being a blight on our reputation in the world and a driver of terror recruitment is the most uninformed gust of high-minded, reality-defying blather ever blown across a debate. But even if we concede this dreck for argument's sake, shouldn't the problem be an easy one for a messiah of Obama's stature? Obviously, nothing will satisfy the ACLU until the combatants are roaming America's streets while Pelosi waterboards Cheney, but if Obama says Gitmo is now fine, shouldn't that be enough for the Europeans?
This isn't going to work. How hard is it to understand that Guantanamo has become a poisonous symbol? Sure, there were plenty of evil-doers and terrorists before Guantanamo ever opened its doors and there will still be plenty once it's shut. But that's no reason to give people an additional reason for despising the United States when, you know, you don't have to accomodate and deepen their prejudices in this fashion. Equally, european public opinion is one thing, but it's not as important as views elsewhere in the world. Do these people really think that you can have Diet Gitmo and persuade the rest of the world that it isn't actually just the same old stuff in new packaging? Therere are good reasons explaining why Abu Ghraib, or in another place, the Maze prison in Belfast, were demolished.
This doesn't seem a difficult point to grasp. But, I dunno, maybe it is.
UPDATE: Batting third, is dear old Victor Davis Hanson:
We have seen that we can rename terrorists and the very war on terror in hopes of changing reality. Tribunals, renditions, intercepts, Iraq, wiretaps, etc. — they all continue, but with a kinder, gentler Obama facade. I think Guantánamo will follow the same Orwellian script. Readers can probably imagine the new euphemisms that prove Obama closed the facility as promised even as it will remain open under some such inspired nomenclature that suggests that it is neither a prison nor in Cuba — The Center for Man-Caused Disasters? The Victim Center of Overseas Contingency Operations? The Caribbean Institution for Conflict Resolution?
Aye,right enough, Guantanamo's a laugh a minute.
Watch this one run and run. First up is Florida Democrat Alcee Hastings:
"If we have transparency and accountability, than you can leave Gitmo just like it is," he said. "The physical plant of Guantanamo is built to hold people. And therefore I argue and will pursue the administration to give a look at legislation that I am developing that will give transparency and accountability and may satisfy our allies as well," Hastings said, noting that he would enable groups like Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the Red Cross to have better access to monitor the facility.
Hastings has yet to seriously discuss the proposal with the White House but asserts that it could be a viable solution given that the new Gitmo comes with a guarantee of no torture.
Hastings, a former U.S. District Court judge, cited a problematic prison he once ordered closed, renovated and eventually reopened.
"I went in-same facility-we just changed what was going on inside and therefore the perception changed," he said, when asked about President Obama's assertion Guantanamo poses a international perception problem for the nation.
Given that Obama has vowed that no torture will take place at the facility, Hastings said Obama will be able to declare that "the new Guantanamo is open."
Batting second, National Review's Andy McCarthy:
I continue to be baffled by this: If President Obama truly is the transformative, transcendent figure all the hype tells us he is, why can't he "cleanse" Gitmo of its purported terror-driving taint by his personal certification that it's now a top-notch detention center — "rule of law" compliant, consistent with "our values," and otherwise worthy of The One's very own seal of approval? Why is that straightforward, cost-free alternative not an option? After all, he's maintaining Bush policies like rendition, state-secrets, and military commmissions. We are now told we can trust that these former atrocities have been purged of their Bushie taint because Obama has personally scrutinized them and decided to keep them after an oh-so-thoughtful nip here and tuck there. Why does that rationale not work for Gitmo?
Look, as I said last week, this business about Gitmo being a blight on our reputation in the world and a driver of terror recruitment is the most uninformed gust of high-minded, reality-defying blather ever blown across a debate. But even if we concede this dreck for argument's sake, shouldn't the problem be an easy one for a messiah of Obama's stature? Obviously, nothing will satisfy the ACLU until the combatants are roaming America's streets while Pelosi waterboards Cheney, but if Obama says Gitmo is now fine, shouldn't that be enough for the Europeans?
This isn't going to work. How hard is it to understand that Guantanamo has become a poisonous symbol? Sure, there were plenty of evil-doers and terrorists before Guantanamo ever opened its doors and there will still be plenty once it's shut. But that's no reason to give people an additional reason for despising the United States when, you know, you don't have to accomodate and deepen their prejudices in this fashion. Equally, european public opinion is one thing, but it's not as important as views elsewhere in the world. Do these people really think that you can have Diet Gitmo and persuade the rest of the world that it isn't actually just the same old stuff in new packaging? Therere are good reasons explaining why Abu Ghraib, or in another place, the Maze prison in Belfast, were demolished.
This doesn't seem a difficult point to grasp. But, I dunno, maybe it is.
UPDATE: Batting third, is dear old Victor Davis Hanson:
We have seen that we can rename terrorists and the very war on terror in hopes of changing reality. Tribunals, renditions, intercepts, Iraq, wiretaps, etc. — they all continue, but with a kinder, gentler Obama facade. I think Guantánamo will follow the same Orwellian script. Readers can probably imagine the new euphemisms that prove Obama closed the facility as promised even as it will remain open under some such inspired nomenclature that suggests that it is neither a prison nor in Cuba — The Center for Man-Caused Disasters? The Victim Center of Overseas Contingency Operations? The Caribbean Institution for Conflict Resolution?
Aye,right enough, Guantanamo's a laugh a minute.
Salon.com (May 28, 2009)
In the shadow of Cheney
Obama could spring America from the dank culture of fear spread by Cheney and Bush. So what's holding him back?
By Gary Kamiya
Full article here:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/kamiya/2009/05/28/culture_of_fear/
Obama could spring America from the dank culture of fear spread by Cheney and Bush. So what's holding him back?
By Gary Kamiya
Full article here:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/kamiya/2009/05/28/culture_of_fear/
HuffingtonPost.com (May 27, 2009)
The Rush and Cheney Show Accelerates Military Desertion of the GOP
Jon Soltz
Co-Founder of VoteVets.org, served as a Captain in Operation Iraqi Freedom
Posted: May 27, 2009 12:49 PM
For decades, the conventional wisdom was that the Republican Party was the party of the military. And while no party has or ever will monopolize military support, certainly Republicans had a good amount of support from some big names - from Eisenhower to Powell.
In recent years, however, as Republicans have abandoned ideals that make our military strong - no nation building using our Armed Forces, looking for strong alliances to join us in action, operating on a moral high ground when we do use force, and commitment to a strong enough and large enough force - we've seen big names head towards supporting Democrats - from General Wesley Clark and Major General Paul Eaton to General John Shalikashvili, General Joseph Hoar, and General Hugh Shelton. Oh, and Colin Powell.
That shift towards Democrats, and especially President Obama and Hillary Clinton during the primary, is about to be fast tracked, as Rush Limbaugh and Dick Cheney take control of Republican messaging, ideals, practices, and policies.
Ideals that include torturing detainees, hoping for a "24-like" moment that neatly helps dismantle terrorist networks, instead of giving them their best recruiting tool. It goes against everything we learn in the Army Field Manual (which forbids torture), and what we know works on the ground. For example, when we urgently needed information about insurgents in Iraq, we didn't bring in a local leader and torture him, no matter what. Doing so would have only inflamed things and made it impossible for us to effectively operate in an area again.
Practices based on use of force first, like Newt Gingrich's odd contention that if he was President, he'd go into North Korea and bomb away to destroy their missiles, unphased by what that would actually mean.
And, policies like favoring big contracts for high-end weapons systems and air power, over a military with a strong ground component - championed by Donald Rumsfeld. Policy still backed by those who would put more money into experimental weapons systems over growing the size of our enlisted forces, which would only hamstring our ability to effectively operate.
For all I disagree on with Senator John McCain, he may have been the Republicans best hope at stemming the trend, by at least voicing opposition to torture, and standing firm on Pentagon waste and bloated contracts, worried more about practical equipment that could help our troops in the field. Now, with Senator McCain vanquished within his own party by those who weaseled their way out of service in Vietnam, no one seems to be in the way of taking the Republican Party full-tilt to the anti-military-ideals fringe.
It's hard to remember, but when General Wesley Clark retired, and was rumored to be interested in politics leading to 2004, there was some buzz wondering if he would be a Democrat or Republican. It says a lot, because even though he supported Democrats privately while serving, there still was a sliver of space for someone like General Clark in the Republican Party, making such speculation not too outlandish.
It reminds me of recent news involving another General.
Last year, those on the right loved General David Petraeus. You couldn't debate anyone on the neocon side without them trying to hide behind the General. There were even rumors swirling that Republicans would recruit him to be their nominee in 2012. Then, supporters of Governor Palin championed her nomination in four years, but they thought General Petraeus would make a fine subordinate to the Governor in a Dream Ticket to take on President Obama.
Well, don't look now, but our friend Sam Stein at reported here:
General David Petraeus said this past weekend that President Obama's decision to close down Gitmo and end harsh interrogation techniques would benefit the United States in the broader war on terror.
General Petraeus goes on to say that he believes we need to stay within the Geneva Convention, and that closing Gitmo "sends an important message to the world, as does the commitment of the United States to observe the Geneva Convention when it comes to the treatment of detainees."
Of course, this flies in the face of the Rush Limbaugh and Dick Cheney crowd - those who believe that we're safer when we do things that serve as great recruiting tools for al Qaeda.
There's no doubt that General Petraeus would be a powerful nominee for Republicans in 2012. One has to wonder, however, if with Dick Cheney and Rush Limbaugh calling the shots, the GOP is a Dream Party for him.
Jon Soltz
Co-Founder of VoteVets.org, served as a Captain in Operation Iraqi Freedom
Posted: May 27, 2009 12:49 PM
For decades, the conventional wisdom was that the Republican Party was the party of the military. And while no party has or ever will monopolize military support, certainly Republicans had a good amount of support from some big names - from Eisenhower to Powell.
In recent years, however, as Republicans have abandoned ideals that make our military strong - no nation building using our Armed Forces, looking for strong alliances to join us in action, operating on a moral high ground when we do use force, and commitment to a strong enough and large enough force - we've seen big names head towards supporting Democrats - from General Wesley Clark and Major General Paul Eaton to General John Shalikashvili, General Joseph Hoar, and General Hugh Shelton. Oh, and Colin Powell.
That shift towards Democrats, and especially President Obama and Hillary Clinton during the primary, is about to be fast tracked, as Rush Limbaugh and Dick Cheney take control of Republican messaging, ideals, practices, and policies.
Ideals that include torturing detainees, hoping for a "24-like" moment that neatly helps dismantle terrorist networks, instead of giving them their best recruiting tool. It goes against everything we learn in the Army Field Manual (which forbids torture), and what we know works on the ground. For example, when we urgently needed information about insurgents in Iraq, we didn't bring in a local leader and torture him, no matter what. Doing so would have only inflamed things and made it impossible for us to effectively operate in an area again.
Practices based on use of force first, like Newt Gingrich's odd contention that if he was President, he'd go into North Korea and bomb away to destroy their missiles, unphased by what that would actually mean.
And, policies like favoring big contracts for high-end weapons systems and air power, over a military with a strong ground component - championed by Donald Rumsfeld. Policy still backed by those who would put more money into experimental weapons systems over growing the size of our enlisted forces, which would only hamstring our ability to effectively operate.
For all I disagree on with Senator John McCain, he may have been the Republicans best hope at stemming the trend, by at least voicing opposition to torture, and standing firm on Pentagon waste and bloated contracts, worried more about practical equipment that could help our troops in the field. Now, with Senator McCain vanquished within his own party by those who weaseled their way out of service in Vietnam, no one seems to be in the way of taking the Republican Party full-tilt to the anti-military-ideals fringe.
It's hard to remember, but when General Wesley Clark retired, and was rumored to be interested in politics leading to 2004, there was some buzz wondering if he would be a Democrat or Republican. It says a lot, because even though he supported Democrats privately while serving, there still was a sliver of space for someone like General Clark in the Republican Party, making such speculation not too outlandish.
It reminds me of recent news involving another General.
Last year, those on the right loved General David Petraeus. You couldn't debate anyone on the neocon side without them trying to hide behind the General. There were even rumors swirling that Republicans would recruit him to be their nominee in 2012. Then, supporters of Governor Palin championed her nomination in four years, but they thought General Petraeus would make a fine subordinate to the Governor in a Dream Ticket to take on President Obama.
Well, don't look now, but our friend Sam Stein at reported here:
General David Petraeus said this past weekend that President Obama's decision to close down Gitmo and end harsh interrogation techniques would benefit the United States in the broader war on terror.
General Petraeus goes on to say that he believes we need to stay within the Geneva Convention, and that closing Gitmo "sends an important message to the world, as does the commitment of the United States to observe the Geneva Convention when it comes to the treatment of detainees."
Of course, this flies in the face of the Rush Limbaugh and Dick Cheney crowd - those who believe that we're safer when we do things that serve as great recruiting tools for al Qaeda.
There's no doubt that General Petraeus would be a powerful nominee for Republicans in 2012. One has to wonder, however, if with Dick Cheney and Rush Limbaugh calling the shots, the GOP is a Dream Party for him.
McClatchy Newspapers (May 27, 2009)
Iraq redux? Obama seeks funds for Pakistan super-embassy
Saeed Shah and Warren P. Strobel | McClatchy Newspapers
last updated: May 27, 2009 07:33:18 PM
ISLAMABAD — The U.S. is embarking on a $1 billion crash program to expand its diplomatic presence in Pakistan and neighboring Afghanistan, another sign that the Obama administration is making a costly, long-term commitment to war-torn South Asia, U.S. officials said Wednesday.
The White House has asked Congress for — and seems likely to receive — $736 million to build a new U.S. embassy in Islamabad, along with permanent housing for U.S. government civilians and new office space in the Pakistani capital.
The scale of the projects rivals the giant U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, which was completed last year after construction delays at a cost of $740 million.
Senior State Department officials said the expanded diplomatic presence is needed to replace overcrowded, dilapidated and unsafe facilities and to support a "surge" of civilian officials into Afghanistan and Pakistan ordered by President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Other major projects are planned for Kabul, Afghanistan; and for the Pakistani cities of Lahore and Peshawar. In Peshawar, the U.S. government is negotiating the purchase of a five-star hotel that would house a new U.S. consulate.
Funds for the projects are included in a 2009 supplemental spending bill that the House of Representatives and the Senate have passed in slightly different forms.
Obama has repeatedly stated that stabilizing Pakistan and Afghanistan, the countries from which al Qaida and the Taliban operate, is vital to U.S. national security. He's ordered thousands of additional troops to Afghanistan and is proposing substantially increased aid to both countries.
In Pakistan, however, large parts of the population are hostile to the U.S. presence in the region — despite receiving billions of dollars in aid from Washington since 2001 — and anti-American groups and politicians are likely to seize on the expanded diplomatic presence in Islamabad as evidence of American "imperial designs."
"This is a replay of Baghdad," said Khurshid Ahmad, a member of Pakistan's upper house of parliament for Jamaat-e-Islami, one of the country's two main religious political parties. "This (Islamabad embassy) is more (space) than they should need. It's for the micro and macro management of Pakistan, and using Pakistan for pushing the American agenda in Central Asia."
In Baghdad and other dangerous locales, U.S. diplomats have sometimes found themselves cut off from the population in heavily fortified compounds surrounded by blast walls, concertina wire and armed guards.
"If you're going to have people live in a car bomb-prone place, your are driven to not have a light footprint," said Ronald Neumann, a former U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan and the president of the American Academy of Diplomacy. Neumann called the planned expansions "generally pretty justified."
In Islamabad, according to State Department budget documents, the plan calls for the rapid construction of a $111 million new office annex to accommodate 330 workers; $197 million to build 156 permanent and 80 temporary housing units; and a $405 million replacement of the main embassy building. The existing embassy, in the capital's leafy diplomatic enclave, was badly damaged in a 1979 assault by Pakistani students.
The U.S. government also plans to revamp its consular buildings in the eastern city of Lahore and in Peshawar, the regional capital of the militancy plagued North West Frontier Province. The consulate in the southern megacity of Karachi has just been relocated into a new purpose-built accommodation.
A senior State Department official confirmed that the U.S. plan for the consulate in Peshawar involves the purchase of the luxury Pearl Continental hotel. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak publicly.
The Pearl Contintental is the city's only five-star hotel, set in its own expansive grounds, with a swimming pool. It's owned by Pakistani tycoon Sadruddin Hashwani.
Peshawar is an important station for gathering intelligence on the tribal area that surrounds the city on three sides and is a base for al Qaida and the Taliban. The area also will be a focus for expanded U.S. aid programs, and the American mission in Peshawar has already expanded from three U.S. diplomats to several dozen.
In all, the administration requested $806 million for diplomatic construction and security in Pakistan.
"For the strong commitment the U.S. is making in the country of Pakistan, we need the necessary platform to fulfill our diplomatic mission," said Jonathan Blyth of the State Department's Overseas Buildings Operations bureau. "The embassy is in need of upgrading and expansion to meet our future mission requirements."
A senior Pakistani official said the expansion has been under discussion for three years. "Pakistanis understand the need for having diplomatic missions expanding and the Americans always have had an enclave in Islamabad," said the official, who requested anonymity because he wasn't authorized to discuss the matter publicly. "Will some people exploit it? They will."
In Kabul, the U.S. government is negotiating an $87 million purchase of a 30- to 40-acre parcel of land to expand the embassy. The Senate version of the appropriations bill omits all but $10 million of those funds.
Saeed Shah and Warren P. Strobel | McClatchy Newspapers
last updated: May 27, 2009 07:33:18 PM
ISLAMABAD — The U.S. is embarking on a $1 billion crash program to expand its diplomatic presence in Pakistan and neighboring Afghanistan, another sign that the Obama administration is making a costly, long-term commitment to war-torn South Asia, U.S. officials said Wednesday.
The White House has asked Congress for — and seems likely to receive — $736 million to build a new U.S. embassy in Islamabad, along with permanent housing for U.S. government civilians and new office space in the Pakistani capital.
The scale of the projects rivals the giant U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, which was completed last year after construction delays at a cost of $740 million.
Senior State Department officials said the expanded diplomatic presence is needed to replace overcrowded, dilapidated and unsafe facilities and to support a "surge" of civilian officials into Afghanistan and Pakistan ordered by President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Other major projects are planned for Kabul, Afghanistan; and for the Pakistani cities of Lahore and Peshawar. In Peshawar, the U.S. government is negotiating the purchase of a five-star hotel that would house a new U.S. consulate.
Funds for the projects are included in a 2009 supplemental spending bill that the House of Representatives and the Senate have passed in slightly different forms.
Obama has repeatedly stated that stabilizing Pakistan and Afghanistan, the countries from which al Qaida and the Taliban operate, is vital to U.S. national security. He's ordered thousands of additional troops to Afghanistan and is proposing substantially increased aid to both countries.
In Pakistan, however, large parts of the population are hostile to the U.S. presence in the region — despite receiving billions of dollars in aid from Washington since 2001 — and anti-American groups and politicians are likely to seize on the expanded diplomatic presence in Islamabad as evidence of American "imperial designs."
"This is a replay of Baghdad," said Khurshid Ahmad, a member of Pakistan's upper house of parliament for Jamaat-e-Islami, one of the country's two main religious political parties. "This (Islamabad embassy) is more (space) than they should need. It's for the micro and macro management of Pakistan, and using Pakistan for pushing the American agenda in Central Asia."
In Baghdad and other dangerous locales, U.S. diplomats have sometimes found themselves cut off from the population in heavily fortified compounds surrounded by blast walls, concertina wire and armed guards.
"If you're going to have people live in a car bomb-prone place, your are driven to not have a light footprint," said Ronald Neumann, a former U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan and the president of the American Academy of Diplomacy. Neumann called the planned expansions "generally pretty justified."
In Islamabad, according to State Department budget documents, the plan calls for the rapid construction of a $111 million new office annex to accommodate 330 workers; $197 million to build 156 permanent and 80 temporary housing units; and a $405 million replacement of the main embassy building. The existing embassy, in the capital's leafy diplomatic enclave, was badly damaged in a 1979 assault by Pakistani students.
The U.S. government also plans to revamp its consular buildings in the eastern city of Lahore and in Peshawar, the regional capital of the militancy plagued North West Frontier Province. The consulate in the southern megacity of Karachi has just been relocated into a new purpose-built accommodation.
A senior State Department official confirmed that the U.S. plan for the consulate in Peshawar involves the purchase of the luxury Pearl Continental hotel. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak publicly.
The Pearl Contintental is the city's only five-star hotel, set in its own expansive grounds, with a swimming pool. It's owned by Pakistani tycoon Sadruddin Hashwani.
Peshawar is an important station for gathering intelligence on the tribal area that surrounds the city on three sides and is a base for al Qaida and the Taliban. The area also will be a focus for expanded U.S. aid programs, and the American mission in Peshawar has already expanded from three U.S. diplomats to several dozen.
In all, the administration requested $806 million for diplomatic construction and security in Pakistan.
"For the strong commitment the U.S. is making in the country of Pakistan, we need the necessary platform to fulfill our diplomatic mission," said Jonathan Blyth of the State Department's Overseas Buildings Operations bureau. "The embassy is in need of upgrading and expansion to meet our future mission requirements."
A senior Pakistani official said the expansion has been under discussion for three years. "Pakistanis understand the need for having diplomatic missions expanding and the Americans always have had an enclave in Islamabad," said the official, who requested anonymity because he wasn't authorized to discuss the matter publicly. "Will some people exploit it? They will."
In Kabul, the U.S. government is negotiating an $87 million purchase of a 30- to 40-acre parcel of land to expand the embassy. The Senate version of the appropriations bill omits all but $10 million of those funds.
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