the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
Oct 28, 2002
Elections are coming up.
What continues to dominate the stage is Bush who, in threatening Iraq, pretends to speak for all the American people. Having ridden September 11 for all it was worth, trying to divert attention from what was happening to the lives of the working people of this country, he now uses the so-called "Iraqi threat" to do the same thing.
There is no real discussion about the problems that ravage the country today: the failing economy and the corruption of big business linked with it; the loss of jobs and the threat of more plant closings; insufficient spending on the schools, the public services and the social programs needed by the population.
But neither is there any discussion of what a new war against Iraq would really mean. Only propaganda, distortions and outright lies.
The election this November, even while putting a few new people in office, will confirm most of those who are responsible for the current situation, both Democrat and Republican.
It may be Bush who today pushes for war in Iraq–but he does so with the support of both parties. Democrats made a show of opposing the war resolution, but the Democratic Party itself made sure to give Bush all the votes he needed in order to let him proclaim that he had "strong support" from Congress for his war.
Bush and his administration may have set a new mark for corruption, but he simply is doing what the executives of most major corporations have been doing. And like Bush, they will never see prison for the billions of dollars they stole.
Bush, as president, may preside over a failing economy, but he is supported by both parties in handing over more of the nation’s wealth to the bosses.
As far as social programs–both parties engaged in the slight of hand they called "extending unemployment benefits." That is, both parties voted for an extension that is to run out in December–just after the election is over and they are safely back in office. And both parties agreed not to pass the budget until after the election–for the same reason: they will be safely back in office when they vote to pass out more money to the corporations at our expense.
Both parties have made it clear that on everything essential–and even in almost everything non-essential–they stake their claim with the bosses. Neither one has a record that in any way serves the interests of the working class. Both parties are parties of big business.
There is no reason to vote for either of these parties–including for those candidates who present themselves as (lukewarm) friends of labor.
The best way for working people to express ourselves in this election is to refuse to give either of these parties our vote.
We may not be able to vote for what we want this election. But we certainly don’t have to vote for what we don’t want. Nor do we have to let them pretend we approve of what they are doing to us by giving them our votes. A vote is not a harmless thing when we give it to someone who is harming us.
Oct 28, 2002
One of the ballot proposals in Michigan was put there by the efforts of state workers and their union, the UAW. If passed, it would amend the state constitution, giving state workers part of the rights that workers in private industry already enjoy. It would require the state to engage in collective bargaining, for the purpose of negotiating a "binding collective bargaining agreement." And it would let the union submit unresolved matters to binding arbitration.
Given what’s happened in Michigan in recent years, it’s understandable why state workers are asking for these legal rights. Several times the Civil Service Commission has overturned parts of a contract that state negotiators had agreed on. The courts upheld the contention of the CSC that it held precedent over any contract terms that might have been negotiated.
Furthermore, since state workers are denied the right to strike, it’s understandable that workers might hope at least that an arbitrator would sometimes take their side, so that they did not find themselves always at the mercy of the dictates of the state.
And of course, it’s outrageous that workers for the state are denied rights that other unionized workers have. The state obviously believes that it does not have to respect laws that apply to other entities.
But it’s necessary to remember that while some arbitrators do act in a neutral way, more often than not they don’t. And even when they do attempt to be neutral, they don’t start from the concerns and needs of the workers, but only from what has already been written in a contract.
And that contract is negotiated in a situation without workers having the right to strike.
It’s obvious that state workers ought to have the rights denied to them. But it would be a mistake to believe that this referendum–even if passed–will offer state workers the protection that they need–protection they can get only through their own militant activity.
It would also be a mistake to believe that there is nothing the workers can do, just because the law says there is nothing. After all, if workers today have rights enshrined in the law, it’s because at one time they took those rights for themselves, despite the law.
Oct 28, 2002
On November 5, ballot proposals across the country will allow voters a choice of taking poison or being hanged. That is to say, we are supposed to choose between taxing ourselves even more, or else doing without such things as parks, after-school programs, safe water systems and libraries.
In Baltimore, Maryland’s largest city, bond proposals on the ballot include over 80 million dollars for upkeep and repair of city schools, museums, libraries, and parks.
In California, Bond Proposals 46, 47, and 50 ask taxpayers for yet more taxes: number 46, for shelters for battered women, the elderly, the homeless and mentally ill; number 47, for repairing schools and relieving overcrowding; number 50, for water supply, quality, and safety, plus coastal wetlands conservation.
In Michigan, State Proposal 02-2 asks higher taxes for sewage treatment and pollution control. In Wayne and Oakland Counties Proposal K asks for 46 million dollars for support of arts and recreation programs serving over a million people.
Proposals like these, on ballot after ballot, are calculated to play on workers’ understanding of their communities’ needs. Of course we need clean water and proper sewage treatment! Of course we need to improve our schools! Of course our children need parks, libraries, and culture!
How can we not agree to pay for it?
The truth is that we have already paid many times over. But our taxes are skimmed to pay for all the stuff we can’t vote on: official salaries, junkets, staffs, programs, purchases. Our taxes pay for expenditures of billions upon billions of dollars for goods and services that we never see, but that line the pockets of politicians and their business cronies.
We are never allowed to vote on the money for their projects, because they know all too well what the answer will be! No, they rely on our willingness to provide what we and most of all our children need, and allow us to vote more taxes for those things. The politicians can then take money that they would have had to put into such projects–and use that money for extra pocket lining.
When we vote to tax ourselves, we are accepting this sort of manipulation. They have got far too much of our money already. Don’t vote to give them more.
Oct 28, 2002
Hundreds of people showed up for memorial services and rallies in East Baltimore recently, and more than 2,000 people went to a funeral home to pay their respects to Angela and Carnell Dawson and five of her children. They had been burned to death in a fire set in retaliation for the parents’ opposition to drug dealing in their neighborhood.
Angela Dawson had complained to the police repeatedly about drug dealing in her neighborhood and threats and harassment directed against her as a result of her confrontation with drug dealers. Months ago, Dawson had reported their next door neighbor to police as a drug dealer, but in a plea bargain with prosecutors he pled guilty only to illegal gun possession charges and was placed on probation.
He came back to harass the Dawsons, painting profanities on the outside of their house and slapping Mrs. Dawson when she tried to remove it. On October 2, Mrs. Dawson had been a witness against him in court concerning this incident.
The next morning, two Molotov cocktails were thrown through a window of the house and burned up the kitchen before the Dawsons succeeded in bringing the fire under control.
Fifteen days later, early in the morning, an associate of the drug dealer kicked in the door to the Dawsons’ three-story row house, pouring gasoline throughout the first floor, and then setting the house on fire, killing everyone sleeping on the floors above.
In response to loud criticism from the neighborhood, police say they offered to move the Dawsons after the first attack.
What kind of offer was that? It would have left the neighborhood more under the control of drug dealers. Maybe the police don’t care about that. But the Dawsons did. They refused, saying they wouldn’t be driven out of their neighborhood.
If the Dawsons made any mistake it was to put their faith in the cops, who at best don’t care, but too often are implicated in the drug trade.
Drugs won’t be stopped in these neighborhoods unless people who oppose them band together to oppose them, including to protect themselves.
Oct 28, 2002
Private Fuel Storage, PFS, a combination of eight utility corporations, can’t find a place to store their nuclear waste. Right now they have at least 15,000 tons (30 million pounds) of waste products from nuclear power plants which needs to be stored until the long-term storage facility is opened by the U.S. government at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. And no one knows when or if that facility will ever open.
PFS has offered their waste as an economic "opportunity" to Native American tribes. Tribes have some control of their own lands, that is, the reservations found in a number of states. PFS first offered 280 million dollars to an Apache tribe in New Mexico, but this tribe turned down the deal in 1996. Now the PFS is negotiating with the Goshute Band, a Utah tribe so small and so poor that their average income is $7,000 per person.
PFS operates nuclear power plants from California to Florida, from Minnesota to Arkansas. They have enormous expenses for storing fuel rods which remain radioactive for thousands of years. Most communities want the nuclear waste stored far away from them.
The federal government has long recognized this problem of nuclear waste; it has been working on the Yucca Mountain project for many years, trying to gather support for permanent underground storage there. In addition, a U.S. Atomic Waste Negotiator has the job of trying to bribe some community somewhere to take these radioactive fuel rods temporarily.In Utah, where the Goshute are located, tribes are not allowed casinos, even on reservations where they supposedly control the laws and the land. So the tribal leaders hope for high payments for taking this deadly waste.
The U.S. government has handled other waste problems in a similar way. All kinds of power plants have hazards associated with their waste products. But we never see power plants located in wealthy communities nor right in the heart of Washington D.C. Over and over, power plants are located among the poorest communities where, even when the neighbors object, they lack the political or financial resources to push the power plants out.
The federal government has a 400 year history of attacks on native Americans since the first European settlers came to these shores. With deadly nuclear waste to store for centuries and centuries, these attacks continue!
Oct 28, 2002
The Environmental Protection Agency recently issued a report on the state of the nation’s rivers, lakes and estuaries. Almost half are too polluted for swimming or fishing, let alone drinking. The pollution comes from sewage treatment plants, from industrial waste and from farm runoff (of chemicals and manure).
In Maryland, for example, 19 sewage plants and industries were cited between 1999 and 2001 for leaking hazardous chemicals at levels higher than those allowed. Among the violators were two of the largest industries in Maryland: Bethlehem Steel at Sparrows Point and Perdue Farms on the Eastern shore. In addition, the cities of Baltimore and Salisbury paid fines for letting sewage leak into the water system.
By the EPA’s own estimate, more than 500 billion dollars over the next 17 years is needed to repaid aging pipes and facilities and to build needed new ones.
Under pressure from state officials, Congress has proposed some tax money to assist in rebuilding water and sewage infrastructure. The Bush administration already announced its opposition even to this small amount. It said the money was needed for defense spending.
If this administration were really "defending" us, it would start by paying to clean up the water we use every day.
Oct 28, 2002
As George Bush continues to beat the war drums against Iraq, he talks about replacing Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship with a democratic regime.
The U.S. has already intervened many times in the Middle East. For example, the U.S. government brags of having "liberated" Kuwait from the grip of Iraq during the Persian Gulf War of 1991. But the U.S. simply reinstalled the same brutal rule of the same sheik and his family, who had treated the country as if it were their own private estate for decades. The U.S. did claim that it pushed the sheik to establish a new parliament. But this was something of a joke. First, few people have the right to vote for the representatives to this parliament. Second, the real power in the country remains concentrated in the hands of the sheik and his family.
The U.S. government didn’t do things much differently when it "liberated" Afghanistan last year. Sure, the U.S. got rid of the Taliban. But the new, "improved" government in Afghanistan under Hamid Karzai is made up of the same old warlords, including religious fundamentalists, who terrorized the population and ruined the country for decades. When Karzai announced the make-up of his new government several months ago, the U.S. news media made a big deal about the fact that he named a female to the government. This was supposed to symbolize a more enlightened attitude by the new rulers. But only a few months later this woman was forced to resign by her fundamentalist colleagues, who accused her of "blasphemy."No, Afghanistan is no closer, under direct U.S. tutelage, to a democracy than it was before.
Nonetheless, the U.S. government likes to pretend that its main mission is to spread "democratic ideals" all over the world. If that were true, then the wealthy regime in Saudi Arabia would be a beacon of democracy. After all, in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia is the regime that is the closest to the U.S. For over half a century, the U.S. has funneled massive military aid to the Saudi regime. The U.S. has all kinds of close business ties with Saudi Arabia. U.S. officials even qualify the Saudi regime as "moderate." But to the people of the country, the Saudi regime remains one of the most reactionary and barbaric on the face of the earth. The country is run by a handful of families. Nobody is allowed to vote, neither male nor female. There is no freedom of assembly or freedom of the press. And of course, the most oppressed part of the population, the women, are treated as virtual chattel. They are not allowed to drive, and they have to be accompanied by a male relative in public–otherwise, they risk being beaten in the street by the ever-present religious police.
None of this is a "mistake," "accident," or "oversight." The real policy of the U.S. government all over the world has been to defend the interests of U.S. corporations. And these corporations have only one over-riding goal: to increase their profits by exploiting the workers of the region, and by stripping the region of its resources. In the case of the Middle East, this means, first of all, taking out the oil, at great profit. As a result, the U.S. government directly opposes the interests of the masses of workers and poor in the Middle East.
Certainly, the current regime of Saddam Hussein in Iraq is a terrible and barbaric dictatorship. But history shows that if the U.S. eventually does go in and removes Hussein, it will not install a regime any less terrible for the population.
The only way that the people of Iraq–and the people of the rest of the region–will ever win freedom is by organizing themselves to fight, not just against the dictatorships in their own countries, but against U.S. imperialism, which provides the real force behind these dictatorships.
Oct 28, 2002
The following article is a translation of an article appearing in the October 25 issue of Lutte Ouvrière, the newspaper edited by our comrades in France.
On October 18, a general strike and demonstrations hit Italy. In response to a call by the CGIL (Italian General Confederation of Labor), workers in 120 cities participated, with massive participation in the biggest cities. It was incontestably a success.
The processions were particularly numerous in Milan, Rome, Naples and Turin. In Palermo, the workers at a Fiat factory led the march. They came from one of the few big factories of Sicily, which is today threatened with closure.
This day of action came after the national demonstration last March 23 in Rome, at the call of the CGIL alone; and after the general strike of April 16 called for by three unions, the CGIL, the CISL (Italian Confederation of Workers’ Unions) and the UIL (Italian Union of Labor), against a proposed bill to abolish Article 18 of the Labor Law which prohibits layoffs or firings except for cause. But at the beginning of July, the two unions UIL and CISL signed a "pact for Italy" with the Bertusconi government, which agreed to give up part of Article 18.
This October 18, the workers of the entire Italian peninsula responded to the call of the CGIL alone. This was a disavowal of the two unions which were ready to make an agreement with Berlusconi. It remains to be seen what the leaders of the CGIL will do with this success.
"A strike for Italy," "No to the budget, Yes to rights and development"–which includes the defense of Article 18–it was under these vague slogans that the leadership of the CGIL called the strike. In other words, while it tried to make this day of action show the influence of the confederation, it also refrained from giving the workers objectives which could have become aims for a real struggle.
The strong participation in the strikes and demonstrations for the defense of Article 18 nevertheless shows how many workers are conscious of the necessity of defending their rights. At a moment when the bosses and the government put in question all the workers’ conquests while spreading job insecurity everywhere, when Fiat announces more than 8,000 layoffs and the bosses clearly announce their intention to make the workers pay the costs of a deteriorating economic situation, the workers feel the need to respond.
In fact, after years of attacks, low wages, layoffs and growing job insecurity, while the bosses’ profits establish new records, it is time for a counter-offensive. And it’s not only a question of the defense of Article 18, which only prohibits layoffs for workers who have permanent full-time jobs. It’s necessary to impose the guarantee of employment for all workers who aren’t in this situation: temporary workers, workers employed in pretended "cooperatives," part-time workers and others–of whom the number has multiplied these part years. It’s necessary to end the scandalously low wages which have been imposed, most often with the aid of the unions. It’s necessary to take on Fiat’s profits and those of other companies, rather than have the workers pay for the crisis.
On March 23, April 16 and now October 18, the Italian workers have shown their awareness, their readiness to struggle for their general objectives. Now the Italian working class needs clear objectives and a plan of struggle, and not general phrases about the necessity of "industrial plans" or "alternative models of development" which the union leaders–including those of the CGIL–speak so much about.
Oct 28, 2002
On Monday, October 21, another car bomb exploded killing 14 people in the north of Israel. Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the bombing in the name of revenge for the civilian victims of a recent Israel army attack on the refugee camps of Khan Younes and Rafah.
This latest attack is another illustration of the dead-end road of Sharon’s repressive and deadly policy–a trap in which not only is he caught, but also in which he imprisons the entire Israeli population. The acts carried out by the Israeli army and the Jewish settlers, the daily humiliation imposed on the Palestinian population can only feed the return of terrorist groups. And neither the cordoning off of territories by the army, nor the construction of gigantic cement walls, nor the deployment of even the most sophisticated surveillance equipment can stop this reaction.
Even when Sharon pretends to oppose the extremist settlers, he can only produce more anger from the Palestinians. One example was his recent attempt to dismantle a new settlement near Naplouse in the West Bank, which was established as a symbolic settlement practically without inhabitants. The confrontations between the army and the settlers resulted in about 50 injuries among the soldiers and the settlers, who were supported by the extremist nationalist and religious communities that immediately rebuilt what the army tore down. In this case, however, the Israel army reacted very differently than it does with the Palestinians, and in no case were any military arms used against the settlers or their supporters.
By ordering the symbolic dismantling of a few of the illegally installed settlements on Palestinian territory, the Israeli Minister of Defense Ben Eliezer, was acting above all for political reasons. As head of the Labor Party, he undoubtedly hoped to repaint his image, since the primary election in which he is a candidate is drawing near. As for Sharon, this initiative didn’t do him any damage either, given that the American government and the press are calling for gestures by Israel towards the Palestinians in order to calm the conflict.
In fact, the number of settlements in the Palestinian Territories has continued to multiply since 1967, when Israel occupied them. Since 1996, at least a hundred new settlements have been set up, most often with the approval and the support of the Israeli government that has aided the settlers; and in some cases by the settlers taking the initiative and presenting the government with a fait accompli. The passivity of the Israeli authorities can only encourage the Jewish extremists to continue to expand these "unauthorized" settlements; even more so today as they hope to annex the maximum amount of Palestinian territory in order to impede eventual peace negotiations.
In total, there are today 215,000 Jews installed in 145 settlements, located throughout the West Bank and the Gaza strip as well as in the very center of some Palestinian towns like Hebron. Not only have these settlers expropriated from the Palestinians their housing and their land, but these settlements that are protected by the Israeli army also serve as the launching grounds from which soldiers carry out expeditions to terrorize the Palestinian population, ravage their crops and massacre their animals, finally forcing them to abandon their neighborhoods and villages. According to Israeli human rights organizations, these settlers have taken control over some 42% of the territory of the West Bank.
These acts explain why the settlers are often the first targets of the terrorist groups. The settlers will never have peace until they and the army evacuate the lands stolen from the Palestinians.
Oct 28, 2002
DMC, the Detroit Medical Center, a very large "non-profit" medical conglomerate in Detroit, Michigan, says it will sell eleven of its community clinics to private doctors, or close them if it can’t sell them. Ten of these eleven clinics are in Detroit. DMC says it is not being paid enough by Medicare and Medicaid.
DMC owns eight hospitals–and six of these eight are now put into the Detroit Medical Center complex, near Wayne State University. It has bought up, consolidated, and closed three local hospitals in the last 10 years and more before that. When they closed the hospitals, DMC assured the communities around them that people could still get care at the DMC neighborhood clinics. Now the clinics are being axed.
Closing clinics means that some people will be able to find no care. It means that others will have to make a long trip downtown to DMC’s hospital complex. With Detroit’s bus system, that trip can take all day. Not to mention the wait at DMC.
DMC is divesting itself of these clinics in order to maintain its much more profitable hospital center. This in turn reflects increasing competition in the field of medical care. DMC wants to improve its bottom line in order to be able to attract the investors it needs.
Other health care systems in the Detroit Metropolitan area are doing the same thing. For example, at the same time as DMC’s announcement, the Henry Ford Health System announced it will be closing one of its hospitals in a downriver suburb of Detroit–Riverside Hospital, sending patients to a hospital further away.
The medical industry’s restructurings have nothing to do with improving patient care, but everything to do with improving the bottom line.
Oct 28, 2002
Ever since the West Coast dockworkers’ contract ran out on July 1, the employers have claimed that the dockworkers have been slowing down the work. First, the Pacific Maritime Association (PMA) used this claim to justify locking the workers out at the end of September. Then almost immediately after the Bush administration ordered the longshore workers back to work under the Taft-Hartley law, the PMA used these same charges as an excuse to demand that the U.S. Justice Department seek massive fines against the workers’ union the ILWU (International Longshore Workers Union), claiming that the workers were not working "at a normal and reasonable rate of speed."Let’s look at what the bosses, the government and the news media consider "normal and reasonable." Since the beginning of the year, seven workers have been killed while working on the docks.
–On March 14 at the Port of Long Beach, John Prohoff was killed when he was struck by a spreader bar that fell from a crane.
–On March 15 at the Port of Los Angeles, Mario Gonzalez was killed when he was struck by a hydraulic-activated door on an auto shredder.
–On June 1 at the Port of Eureka, Richard Peters was killed when a ship-board gantry crane swung and crushed him against the ship.
–On June 23 at Port Hueneme in California’s Ventura County, Richie Lopez Jr. was run over by a forklift.
–On September 3 at the Port of Long Beach, Rudy Acosta was killed when he was run over by a top handler, a cargo-moving device.
This is what happens when the workers work at a "normal rate of speed." Seven deaths are what the bosses consider "reasonable."After the 10-day lock-out ended on October 9, the docks were more congested than usual, with the containers and materials stacked up higher than usual. The conditions were thus more dangerous.
In the Port of Los Angeles, only two days after the workers returned to work, a truck hit a cart. A short while later, a union official was hit by another truck. Only after the union shut down the port for safety reasons did the bosses finally assign a guard to direct traffic in the very congested terminal area.
A couple of days later in the Port of Los Angeles, a mechanic was shocked with 480 volts when unplugging a refrigerated container. The man was so badly injured that he remains in the hospital.
No, the workers shouldn’t be working faster, but much slower for safety reasons. They should have been working slower all along. At the same time, the entire labor movement should be up in arms against these murderous bosses, who are trying to use the workers’ response to these working conditions as an excuse to try to impose even more murderous conditions and other concessions on the workers and to break the union if it won’t go along with the plan.
One thing is for sure. If the longshore bosses, with the help of the government, succeed in imposing the murderous speed-up, this will only encourage other bosses to do the same against other workers. Every worker in this country has a stake in this battle. Every worker, every union should find a way to support the longshore workers against these murderous attacks.
Oct 28, 2002
Workers at Chrysler’s McGraw Glass Plant hear rumors that their plant might be closing. Workers at the Mound Road Engine plant are hearing rumors that their plant could be closing. And workers at Trenton Engine are hearing rumors about their plant.
And yet thirty applications for new jobs were given out at a union meeting at McGraw. Why would Chrysler be hiring if it’s closing down all these plants?
If it’s true that these three plants–all in the Detroit area–are going to close, then workers with low seniority will not be picked up anywhere soon. And then the job applications won’t mean anything.
But is Chrysler really closing plants or is it just spreading rumors to get older workers to retire before they want to?
We know that Chrysler would like to have more new workers, since the contract lets them pay lower wages, with fewer benefits for years.
It’s also possible that Chrysler is floating all these rumors in order to get workers to give up concessions next year.
What’s obvious is that workers lack information on what’s happening.
But with or without the information, workers have the means to show that they won’t settle for anything less than a job for everyone.
Oct 28, 2002
On Saturday, October 26, thousands of people flooded into Washington, D.C. to protest Bush’s plans for war against Iraq. The D.C. police and park officials indicated that the size was over 75,000 and they usually grossly underestimate such numbers. They were joined by demonstrations in cities and towns across the country on the same day, with numbers ranging from a few dozen to a few thousands in other places.
As we have seen before, many of those who demonstrated were people who had opposed the Vietnam war. They have the reflex to demonstrate against government policies, even in times like these when it seems as though nothing is possible. But they were joined by many tens of thousands of young people. And that’s important.
These demonstrations give voice to the growing sentiment against a war, and they call Bush’s bluff when he pretends to speak for the American people.
Oct 28, 2002
Between 1962 and 1973, the U.S. government tested chemical and biological weapons–that is, weapons of mass destruction–on its own population, both military and civilian in the U.S. It also tested these weapons on people in Puerto Rico, Canada, the United Kingdom and several islands in the Pacific.
According to a new report released by the Pentagon, the U.S. military used sarin and VX gas, which are some of the most poisonous gases, as well as such deadly germs as anthrax and various strains of e-coli bacteria in tests, whose purpose was to find out the effectiveness of special suits and masks in protecting troops against gases and germs, as well as the ability of U.S. military personnel to carry out their duties while under chemical or biological attack. At least 5,500 military personnel were used as human guinea pigs. And some of these tests were carried out near populous areas–on bases, such as Edgewood Arsenal, (later known as the Aberdeen Proving Ground) in Maryland. Thus, the U.S. military also exposed thousands of civilians to these deadly agents.
All of these tests were done in secret. Not even those who participated in the tests were informed about what was being tested, or what risks they ran. And the military did not keep track afterwards of what happened to the health of the people who participated in the tests. The aim of the tests was simply to find out whether soldiers could function in the middle of chemical or biological attacks, whether carried out by the enemy of by "the good guys."It was not until 55 sick veterans filed claims asserting that their illnesses resulted from their exposure to nerve gases while on U.S. warships, that the Pentagon was finally forced to release a report.
One of the charges that the Bush administration makes against the regime of Saddam Hussein in Iraq is that it used poison gas or other weapons of mass destruction against its own people. By testing the very same gases on its own people, the U.S. government had beaten Hussein to the punch by more than three decades.
Oct 28, 2002
In the middle of October, the director of the CIA announced that the risk of another terrorist strike is likely–as likely, he said, as in the period of September 11 last year.
Is it true, or just more of the kind of warnings they keep issuing to keep us lined up behind Bush? Who knows?
But if it’s true, it reflects Bush’s threats to carry out a much worse war against Iraq–that is, the use of terror against a whole people.
When Bush smugly pronounces himself ready to create another cataclysm for the people of Iraq, this can only inflame people around the world who already have enormous grievances against the U.S.
The exploitation of their wealth and labor to the benefit of big U.S. corporations is enforced by the U.S. military and by the military dictators this country props up. And this has created a vast and growing reservoir of people who are deeply outraged by the U.S. It’s in this reservoir that terrorist organizations find recruits.
If there is to be another terrorist attack, it will be Bush and other U.S. leaders who provoked it.
Oct 28, 2002
One year to the day after the U.S. went to war against Afghanistan, Bush spoke via TV to Congress, asking for a blank check to carry out a new war against Iraq. And why? "On any given day"–so declared Bush–Iraq could attack the U.S. or its allies with chemical or biological weapons launched from Iraq. Moreover, Saddam Hussein was poised and ready to hand over "weapons of mass destruction" to Al-Qaida.
Never mind that such claims had already been refuted by George Tenet, head of the CIA. And even Britain’s prime minister, Tony Blair, who is trying so hard to be Bush’s sidekick, hadn’t dared to say such nonsense.
But Bush’s concern is hardly accuracy, much less the truth. He simply was looking for something that Congress would go for to justify a declaration of war. And Congress went for it–the more outrageous the lie, the better. They voted, Republicans and Democrats to authorize Bush to carry out war when he wanted, how he wanted, for whatever ridiculous excuse he might come up with.
Outrageous–and not simply because Bush was so ready to thumb his nose at the truth, and Congress so willing to help him do it!
It’s outrageous because the U.S. already is carrying out a war against Iraq, a disastrous war for the Iraqi people. Practically every day, new reports come in of U.S. or British bombing raids over Iraq.
The U.S., in fact, has carried out a never-ending war against Iraq ever since the bombing and invasion of that country in 1991. U.S. troops may have been pulled out of Iraq, but the bombing has continued unrelenting.
The people of Iraq continue to pay a horrifying price: at least a million and a half Iraqis are dead, over 80% of them after the so-called end of the Gulf War in 1991. Over half of the dead are children.
And they are continuing to die. They die from cholera, typhoid and other various diseases springing from bacteria-ridden water. The U.S. leaders targeted water treatment facilities for destruction–which could only lead to the spread of disease and germs throughout Iraq. And Bush dares to talk about germ warfare! The Iraqi people are dying a slow death by starvation and disease, produced by the boycott which still limits the import of food and medical supplies. They are wasting away as the result of contact with the depleted uranium-tipped armaments that the U.S. used–the same armaments that are believed to have produced the Gulf War syndrome among U.S. veterans.
If Bush follows through on his threats, the consequences can only be more horrifying for the people of Iraq.
And not just for the people of Iraq, but for the people of the United States also. An attack on Iraq won’t prevent terrorism–in fact, it gives every promise of provoking more terrorist attempts. U.S. military actions around the world against other people have created a deep reservoir of anger against the U.S. This is what a terrorist like bin Laden draws on.
Bush plays with war, but we will pay its price as the victims of new terrorist attacks. And the workers of this country once again will spill their blood on new battlefields. We will be called upon for sacrifices, in the name of any war against Iraq, so that the capitalist class can increase its wealth.
And why? Not because Iraq has "weapons of mass destruction," but because Bush is using the threat of war against Iraq to draw attention away from the corruption of his own regime and the disastrous situation of the economy.
Bush says that "a regime change is needed"–yes! But the regime that needs to be changed is the one which Bush himself heads. They are the ones who threaten the people of the world, including the people in the United States of America. Change this whole regime–Bush, the capitalist class whose interests he represents and the state apparatus which sends its armed forces to war to defend U.S. corporate interests overseas–toss them all out.