Dear RN, Eric Fawcett sent this posting out to the Science for Peace list serv, which is largely Canadian, but it actually comes from the US (Znet) and applies as much to the US as to Canadians, to anyone living in any NATO country. all the best, Jan PS I hope you can take the time to read this slowly. An alternate title for this posting is: "A Century of Holcausts". ******************************************** Date: Thu, 11 Nov 1999 09:46:04 -0500 From: Eric Fawcett <•••@••.•••> Subject: sfp-87: Remembrance Day thoughts for Peoples of the Americas Canadians should reflect on this Commentary, since our government now regards us as a NATO satellite following the directions of the US superpower - see the previous sfp-86. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ JUST HOW MANY WARS SHOULD THE AMERICAN PEOPLES FORGET? ZNet Commentary by Blase Bonpane Just as a battered spouse who enables her partner to continue his abusive ways, so we, the people of Americas continue to enable the United States to be an incurable serial killer. The victims of the holocaust of the Third Reich have rightfully taken the position, "Never Again". Why cannot we, restrain the hand of our bloodthirsty and fascist foreign policy? Little is said after each holocaust perpetrated by the United States. Oh, yes, Vietnam was a tragic mistake, our government killed three million people, mostly civilians. And El Salvador, yes, that was a tragic mistake, the United States as in command and control of the Salvadoran Military and its adjunct death squads. Our government denied its role in every atrocity from raped and killed religious women to massacres of entire villages. Exposes of our direct role in such massacres filter out to the established press some twenty years later (El Mozote) and many respond with, "My, my, isn't it awful?" Our country used the philosophy of General Wilhelm in Central America and hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians were massacred. It was finally the United Nations that successfully moderated peace talks in Nicaragua, El Salvador and Guatemala. And the Iran/Contra Scandal was a tragic mistake, sometimes called a "caper". This caper of hiring any unemployed rapists and murders as mercenaries (President Reagan thought they were our Founding Fathers) took 40,000 Nicaraguan lives. A slap on the wrist to a few obedient functionaries and it was all over. A tragic mistake. Can't you just hear the abusive spouse saying that every one of his beatings was a tragic mistake on his part. Can't you just hear the enabling wife say she is sure he will never do that again? We, the enablers, continued to tolerate the serial killing. In Guatemala it began in 1954 and continued well into the 1990's. Our Embassy knew about all the torture, all the summary execution, all the ethnic cleansing. Some 200,000 people were eliminated in Guatemala as part of our on-going global holocaust. And suddenly, on a recent visit, our President decides to apologize to Guatemala. This certainly was a unique act for a U.S. President. In the spirit of Manifest Destiny, apologies are few or never. Honduras, of course, was the base for so many of our aggressive acts into the rest of Central America. The Central Americans called Honduras The Aircraft Carrier, because it was a permanent base for tens of thousands of U.S. troops ready for action in all directions. Our officials were completely aware of the murderous Battalions of Hondurans troops including the so-called "Cobras" or special forces. Our government not only knew about these atrocities but eagerly paid the bill with money that should have gone for educational and medical needs in the United States. The Social Security Trust Fund was dumped into the U.S. treasury as if it were part of the general fund from U.S. tax payers. It is not. Social Security is a bank account into which our citizens pay and from which they expect a return. This co-mingling of funds simply gives our citizens the impression that military spending is a smaller portion of the actual budget. When Social Security is maintained as a separate fund, as it should be, citizens can see the actual military budget representing about half of the budget of the United States. William Blum's book, "Killing Hope", documents an endless series of pre-meditated violent acts by our country designed to stop creativity or autonomy by other countries. Need we mention our role in the overthrow of the government of Chile in 1973? The military figure who lead that crime, Augosto Pinochet Ugarte was considered our friend. The fact that he was a genuine and bona fide Nazi was not considered to be a problem by Henry Kissinger. And such was our friendship, perhaps it should be called fiendship with a litany of tyrants, one worse that the next; Somoza, Papa Doc, Baby Doc, Stroessner, Videla, Banzer, Trujillo, and it continues with our love for the terrorist state developed by Fujimori in Peru. But vital national interests are involved here. And what might those be? Corporate profits, multiple military bases, repayment of debts incurred by the wealthy and repaid on the backs of the poor of Peru. Perhaps we forgot to mention the Christmas attack on Panama in 1989. The barrios of San Miguelito and El Chorillo were leveled in an attempt to kidnap Manuel Noriega. Hundreds of Panamanians were killed so we could capture their leader, who had been previously paid as a CIA asset but who now refused to cooperate in the overthrow of the Nicaraguan government. This must have also been a tragic mistake and surely our government would never do anything like this again. Remember all of the attacks mentioned here are actions of the strong against the weak. There is no question of a fair fight, whatever that might be. 250 million enablers are lulled into thinking that the serial killing might now stop. The mass media which is the loudspeaker for corporate capital creates a shabby rationale for why these massacres were...necessary. Remember Grenada? The slogan of that stupid attack was, "We got their just in time!" Isn't that impressive? Sounds like a John Wayne Western. Grenada has a smaller population than Santa Monica, California. But some Cubans were working on their airport. And the abuser was at it again. And that brings up the Cuban reality. Nine presidents have done their best to choke, kill, demonize attack and discredit Cuba Apparently they don't want it known that Cuba has guaranteed health care for all and we don't. They have rewarded people arriving from Cuba with instant legality while they have slammed Haitian refugees into Federal lock-ups. Why do we put up with the abuse of our brothers and sisters all over the world? Why do we allow our intelligence to be insulted on a daily basis by a corporate censored media? I suppose it is because this is our Daddy, this is our Fatherland. But mature offspring must not tolerate Daddy's abuse. It is time for us to confront the abuser. The nation is in the final stage of its psychotic militarism. A CIA without any credibility is pointing in all directions saying to nations large and small, "You might have a nuclear bomb!" Billions go into programs to catch the bombs from other nations in mid-air. Terrorist bombs, however, would most likely delivered by truck. And after searching for enemies throughout the world and behaving as a serial killer, should we be surprised by such attacks? We have been attacking a burned out ash called Iraq for some nine years. This is the country we supported in one of the most serious conflicts of the 20th Century, the Iran/Iraq War. We have recently destroyed Serbia under the banner of Humanitarian Bombing. Even the liberals were enablers. We need to completely change our way of thinking. The children can help us, especially the children of Colombia. It was a privilege to meet these Nobel Prize Nominees. They spearheaded a Children's Vote for Peace in Colombia. 2.7 million Colombians between the ages of 7 and 18 turned out to affirm the Children's Mandate for Peace and Rights. This magnificent vote took place in October of 1997. It was a cooperative effort between UNICEF, a host of civic and religious non-governmental organizations and most importantly, the children of Colombia. When both the rebels and military agreed to honor the safety of the children, the national referendum became a reality. The children were nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1998 but they did not win. The children have continued their campaign of "constructors of peace" by directing their attention to street violence, gang wars and creating youth, parent and police dialogues. CNN has produced a documentary film about the Colombian Children, "Soldiers of Peace". The premiere showing was in Culver City, California as part of A Season for Non-Violence, Peace Jam in Los Angeles. The documentary will air internationally this Fall. Flying in the face of the hopes and desires of the Colombians are various spokespeople for the military/industrial/prison and gun complex in the United States. Here are words of General Charles Wilhlem to the U.S. Congress: "I'm convinced that the Government must strengthen its negotiating position, and I believe that increased leverage at the negotiating table can only be gained on Colombia's battlefields." It is truly disgusting for a foreign militarist to propose a ground war in a nation where both adults and children are begging for peaceful negotiations. While I was in Colombia I found the United Nations ready and willing to act as mediator in such negotiations. Generals take note, at the beginning of the 20th century 15% of the casualties of war were civilians. At the end of the twentieth century 90% of the casualties of war are civilians. It would be good for General Wilhelm to know that battlefields went out with the Civil War. The twentieth century has been a century of holocausts.
