The completion of the agreement would advance China's global quest for new stocks of energy. It could also undermine U.S. and European initiatives to halt Tehran's nuclear plans, possibly generating friction in Beijing's relations with outside powers.

Caijing, a respected financial magazine based in Beijing, reported on its Web site on Thursday that a Chinese delegation comprised of officials from the National Development and Reform Commission -- a top economic policy body -- intends to visit Iran as early as next month to conclude an agreement. The deal would clear China Petrochemical Corp., also known as Sinopec, to develop the Yadavaran oil field in southern Iran.

Beijing and Tehran are attempting to swiftly conclude a deal in the next few weeks, ahead of the possible imposition of international sanctions against Iran, according to a report published in Friday's editions of The Wall Street Journal. The report relied upon unnamed Iranian government officials. Sanctions could hinder Chinese investments in Iran.

Chinese officials declined to comment, and calls to Sinopec's offices went unanswered. In a written statement, the Iranian Embassy in Beijing asserted that the two nations have been working together on energy development, "following the rule of mutual benefits and respect in all bilateral cooperation."

A deal would cement a memorandum of understanding signed by China and Iran in October 2004. The framework agreement pledges that Sinopec will develop the Yadavaran field in exchange for the purchase of 10 million tons of liquefied natural gas a year for the next quarter-century.

Analysts in China said the deal should primarily be seen as part of Beijing's global reach for new energy stocks to fuel its relentless development -- a drive that has in recent years led Chinese companies to invest in Indonesia, Australia, Venezuela, Sudan and Kazakhstan. China is now locked into a high-stakes competition with Japan for access to potentially enormous oil fields in Russia.

But the speed with which China and Iran are moving to conclude their agreement and begin development appears to signal Beijing's intent to limit the United States-led drive for sanctions against Iran to curb what the Washington describes as Tehran's rogue effort to develop nuclear weapons.

As one of the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, China can veto a sanctions proposal within the international body, or at least threaten to do so to restrict the bite and breadth of such an initiative.

"The timing is really interesting," said Shen Dingli, an international relations expert at Fudan University in Shanghai. "China and Iran appear to be collaborating not only for energy development but also to increase the stakes in case sanctions are imposed. This is a subtle message that even if sanctions are passed, you could have limited sanctions without touching upon oil. China is saying, 'This is my cheese. Don't touch.' "

China's voracious appetite for energy is increasingly guiding its foreign policy. China has used the threat of a Security Council veto to limit sanctions against Sudan, the African nation in which China's largest energy firm, China National Petroleum Corp., is the largest investor in a government-led oil consortium. China is the largest buyer of Sudan's oil, as well as the largest supplier of arms to its ruling regime. The Sudanese government has been accused of massacring villagers to clear land for further energy development and of committing genocide in its efforts to crush separatist rebels in the western region of Darfur.

China's pursuit of an energy deal with Iran comes as Tehran has announced the resumption of its uranium enrichment program. Tehran says this work is merely aimed at generating energy, while the Bush administration asserts it is a precursor to the development of nuclear weapons and has been lobbying its allies to take a hard line while threatening sanctions.

China has joined the international chorus in urging Tehran to halt its nuclear plans. But China's aggressive pursuit of an oil deal with Iran underscores how energy security has become a paramount concern for Beijing at a time of relentless industrial growth. Government forecasts show China's demands for imported crude oil swelling from about one-third of its total needs to about 60 percent by 2020.

Analysts assume that the Iranian field could produce as much as 300,000 barrels of oil per day, making it one of the larger overseas operations for a Chinese company. Sinopec would hold a 51 percent stake in the Yadavaran project, according to the Caijing report, while India's Oil and Natural Gas Corp. would hold 29 percent. The rest of the venture would be divided among Iranian companies and perhaps other outside investors.

Rice’s comments came a few days before a planned trip to the Middle East, during which she plans to hold talks with regional allies on containing a regime she said was bent on "political subversion, terrorism, and support for violent Islamist extremism."

Claiming success for recent US efforts to haul Iran before the UN Security Council for its nuclear activities, she added that it was not possible just to address Iran’s nuclear program “in a vacuum".

"Perhaps one of the biggest challenges we face is the policy of the Iranian regime, which is a policy of destabilization of the world's most volatile and vulnerable region," she said.

"It is Iran's regional policies that really are concerning as we watch them, with their sidekick Syria, destabilizing places like Lebanon and the Palestinian territories and, indeed, even in southern Iraq."

'Strategic challenge'

The United States has accused Iran of supporting militant groups such as Hezbollah in Lebanon, as well as Iraqi insurgents and Palestinian movements such as Hamas that are opposed to peace with Israel.

Rice's testimony came a day after she and other US officials signaled Washington's intention to launch a broadened diplomatic offensive against Iran calling it a "strategic challenge" to the world.

Meanwhile the Bush administration is hoping to put the spotlight on Tehran at a meeting of the Group of Eight industrial powers in Moscow next week, with plans also in the works for a NATO session specifically on Iran, officials said.

'Imperialism'

As its contribution to ratcheting up the pressure on Iran, the US House of Representatives voted 404-4 Thursday to approve a resolution condemning the government of Iran for resuming its nuclear activities.

Iran, which insists its nuclear program is strictly for peaceful purposes, pursued its own diplomatic maneuverings on Thursday to counter the American diplomatic onslaught.

Iranian parliament speaker Gholam Ali Hadad-Adel started a two-day visit to Cuba, proclaiming that Tehran was "facing imperialism in the front lines" and needed the Marxist-ruled island's continued support.

The Bush administration's new nuclear doctrine contains specific "guidelines" which allow for "preemptive" nuclear strikes against "rogue enemies" which "possess" or are "developing" weapons of mass destruction (WMD). (2001 Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) and Doctrine for Joint Nuclear Operations (DJNO) ).

The preemptive nuclear doctrine (DJNO), which applies to Iran and North Korea calls for "offensive and defensive integration". It explicitly allows the preemptive use of thermonuclear weapons in conventional war theaters.

In the showdown with Tehran over its alleged nuclear weapons program, these Pentagon "guidelines" would allow, subject to presidential approval, for the launching of punitive bombings using "mini-nukes" or tactical thermonuclear weapons.

While the "guidelines" do not exclude other (more deadly) categories of nukes in the US and/or Israeli nuclear arsenal, Pentagon "scenarios" in the Middle East are currently limited to the use of tactical nuclear weapons including the B-61-11 bunker buster bomb. This particular version of the bunker buster is a thermonuclear bomb, a so-called Nuclear Earth Penetrator or NEP. It is a Weapon of Mass Destruction in the real sense of the word. Its utilization by the US or Israel in the Middle East war theater would trigger a nuclear holocaust.

History of the B61 Thermonuclear Bomb

The B-61 thermonuclear bomb, first produced in 1966, is described as a light weight nuclear device. Its construction essentially extends the technology of the older version of tactical nuclear warheads. (for further details see, http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/Usa/Weapons/B61.html .

The B61-11 earth-penetrating version of the B61 was developed in the immediate wake of the Cold War under the Clinton administration. It was configured initially to have a "low" 10 kiloton yield, 66 percent of a Hiroshima bomb, for (post-Cold War) battlefield operations:

"In October 1993, Harold Smith, Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Atomic Energy, sought approval to develop an alternative to the B53 high-yield nuclear bomb, which was the principal "bunker buster" weapon in the U.S. arsenal. The B53 was also the heaviest payload nuke in use, weighing 8,900 pounds, and only deployable from the B-52 bombers. Under the guise of "weapons modernization," Smith was pushing the development of the B61-Mod 11.

... The B61-11 was developed and put into the stockpile without full-scale nuclear tests. Some critics have maintained that the B61-11 is a new nuclear weapon, but the US has said all along that the B61-11 is not new, but a modification of older B61s to give the weapon an earth-penetrating capability to destroy buried targets...."

http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/systems/b61.htm )

The B61-11 was intended for the Middle East. The Clinton administration had in fact threatened to use it against Libya, suggesting that Libya's alleged underground chemical weapons facility at Tarhunah "might be a target of the then-newly deployed B61-11 earth-penetrating nuclear weapon." ( The Record (Bergen County, NJ) February 23, 2003)

Military documents distinguish between the NEP and the "mini-nuke" which are nuclear weapons with a yield of less than 10 kilotons (two thirds of a Hiroshima bomb). The NEP can have a yield of up to a 1000 kilotons, or seventy times a Hiroshima bomb.

This distinction between mini-nukes and NEPs is in many regard misleading. In practice there is no dividing line. We are broadly dealing with the same type of weaponry: the B61-11 has several "available yields", ranging from "low yields" of less than one kiloton, to mid-range and up to the 1000 kiloton bomb. In all cases, the radioactive fallout is devastating. Moreover, the B61 series of thermonuclear weapons includes several models with distinct specifications: the B61-11, the B61-3, B61- 4, B61-7 and B61-10. Each of these bombs has several "available yields".

What is contemplated for theater use is the "low yield" 10 kt bomb, two thirds of a Hiroshima bomb.

Mini-Nukes in Conventional War Theaters

There are indications that the Bush administration does not exclude using thermonuclear bunker buster bombs in the Middle East war theater. These weapons were specifically developed for use in post Cold War conventional war theater "with third world nations".

In October 2001, in the immediate wake of 9/11, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld envisaged the use of the B61-11 in Afghanistan. The targets were Al Qaeda cave bunkers in the Tora Bora mountains.

Rumsfeld stated at the time that while the "conventional" bunker buster bombs "' are going to be able to do the job', ... he did not rule out the eventual use of nuclear weapons." (Quoted in the Houston Chronicle, 20 October 2001).

The use of the B61-11 was also contemplated during the 2003 bombing and invasion of Iraq. In this regard, the B61-11 was described as "a precise, earth-penetrating low-yield nuclear weapon against high-value underground targets", which included Saddam Hussein's underground bunkers:

"If Saddam was arguably the highest value target in Iraq, then a good case could be made for using a nuclear weapon like the B61-11 to assure killing him and decapitating the regime" (.Defense News, December 8, 2003).

There is no documentary evidence, however, that the B61-11 was used against Iraq.

"Safe for Civilians"

The B61-11 is categorized as a "deep earth penetrating bomb" capable of "destroying the deepest and most hardened of underground bunkers, which the conventional warheads are not capable of doing". The B61-11s can be delivered in much same way as the conventional GBU (gravity bomb), from a B-2. a 5B-2 stealth bomber or from an F-16 aircraft.

"military officials and leaders of America's nuclear weapon laboratories are urging the US to develop a new generation of precision low-yield nuclear weapons... which could be used in conventional conflicts with third-world nations.

Critics argue that adding low-yield warheads to the world's nuclear inventory simply makes their eventual use more likely. In fact, a 1994 law currently prohibits the nuclear laboratories from undertaking research and development that could lead to a precision nuclear weapon of less than 5 kilotons (KT), because "low-yield nuclear weapons blur the distinction between nuclear and conventional war."

... Senate Republicans John Warner (R-VA) and Wayne Allard (R-CO) buried a small provision in the 2001 Defense Authorization Bill that would have overturned these earlier restrictions... Senators Warner and Allard imagine these nuclear weapons could be used in small-scale conventional conflicts against rogue dictators, while leaving most of the civilian population untouched. As one anonymous former Pentagon official put it to the Washington Post last spring, "What's needed now is something that can threaten a bunker tunneled under 300 meters of granite without killing the surrounding civilian population." Statements like these promote the illusion that nuclear weapons could be used in ways which minimize their "collateral damage," making them acceptable tools to be used like conventional weapons." (See http://www.fas.org/faspir/2001 / click v54nl, italics added)

In an utterly twisted logic, the nuclear bunker buster bomb is presented as an instrument of peace-making and regime change, which will enhance global security. It is intended to curb the dangers of WMD proliferation by "nonstate organizations (terrorist, criminal)" and "rogue states". Pentagon propaganda has carefully distorted the nature of this bomb.

The B61-11 is casually described as causing an underground explosion without threatening "the surrounding civilian population".

The Pentagon has blurred the distinction between conventional battlefield weapons and nuclear bombs. Already during the Clinton Administration, the Pentagon was calling for the use of the "nuclear" B61-11 bunker buster bomb, suggesting that because it was "underground", there was no toxic radioactive fallout which could affect civilians.

The Bush administration has gone one step further in defining the use of tactical nuclear weapons, which are now part of America's preemptive arsenal. Essentially they are described defensive weapons. Under the preemptive nuclear doctrine, they are specifically identified for use in conventional war theaters.

The Pentagon claims that the use of the B61-11 minimizes the risks of "collateral damage". According to US. military planners, "potential adversaries" are hiding their WMDs in "fortified bunkers" below more than 100 feet of concrete. Yet test results indicate that the low yield B61-11 has never penetrated more than 20 feet below the ground (See also The Independent. 23 October 2003) :

"The earth-penetrating capability of the B61-11 is fairly limited. ... Tests show it penetrates only 20 feet or so into dry earth when dropped from an altitude of 40,000 feet. ... Any attempt to use it in an urban environment would result in massive civilian casualties. Even at the low end of its 0.3-300 kiloton yield range, the nuclear blast will simply blow out a huge crater of radioactive material, creating a lethal gamma-radiation field over a large area " (Low-Yield Earth-Penetrating Nuclear Weapons by Robert W. Nelson,Federation of American Scientists, 2001 ).

Nuclear Holocaust

According to GlobalSecurity.org , the use of the B61-11 against North Korea would result in extensive radioactive fallout over nearby countries, thereby triggering a nuclear holocaust.

"... In tests the bomb penetrates only 20 feet into dry earth,... But even this shallow penetration before detonation allows a much higher proportion of the explosion to be transferred into ground shock relative to a surface burst. It is not able to counter targets deeply buried under granite rock. Moreover, it has a high yield, in the hundreds of kilotons. If used in North Korea, the radioactive fallout could drift over nearby countries such as Japan" (http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/systems/b61.htm )

If it were to be launched against Iran, it would result in radioactive contamination over a large part of the Middle East - Central Asian region, resulting in tens of thousands of deaths, including US troops stationed in Iraq:

"The use of any nuclear weapon capable of destroying a buried target that is otherwise immune to conventional attack will necessarily produce enormous numbers of civilian casualties. No earth-burrowing missile can penetrate deep enough into the earth to contain an explosion with a nuclear yield [of a low yield B61-11] even as small as 1 percent of the 15 kiloton Hiroshima weapon. The explosion simply blows out a massive crater of radioactive dirt, which rains down on the local region with an especially intense and deadly fallout."(Low-Yield Earth-Penetrating Nuclear Weapons, by Robert W. Nelson, op cit )

At present, the B61-11 is slated for use in war theaters together with conventional weapons. (Congressional Report“ Bunker Busters”: Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator Issues , Congressional Research Service March 2005). Other versions of the B61, namely mod 3, 4 and 7, which are part of the US arsenal, involve nuclear bunker buster bombs with a lower yield to that of B61-11).

(For further details see http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/Usa/Weapons/B61.html )

While the US Congress has blocked further research funding in fiscal 2005 on new more robust tactical nuclear weapons, this decision does not affect the existing arsenal of tactical nuclear weapons including the B61-11, developed during the Clinton administration. The B61-11 bunker busters are fully operational, The B61-11 has apparently been tested "resulting in its acceptance as a standard stockpile item". It has been cleared for battlefield use.

Part II of this article is forthcoming on Global Research

Michel Chossudovsky is the author of the international best seller "The Globalization of Poverty " published in eleven languages. He is Professor of Economics at the University of Ottawa and Director of the Center for Research on Globalization, at www.globalresearch.ca . He is also a contributor to the Encyclopaedia Britannica. His most recent book is entitled: America’s "War on Terrorism", Global Research, 2005.

To order Chossudovsky's book America's "War on Terrorism", click here.

After an initial two-day stop in Venezuela, the delegation traveled to Cuba, where on Thursday National Assembly president Ricardo Alarcon pledged support to Iran in the nuclear dispute.

"No one has the right to deny any people the possibility of the peaceful use of nuclear energy," Alarcon said. "What the world should combat precisely is the monopoly that some have over arms of mass destruction - nuclear ones in particular."

Next, the Iranian delegation headed by parliament speaker Gholam Ali Haddad Adel planned to travel to Brazil and Uruguay, said Hojat Soltani, a spokesman at the Iranian Embassy in Caracas.

"This tour is for further deepening and broadening the relations we have with these counties," Soltani said.

Iran already has loyal backing from Chavez and Castro in the dispute over its nuclear program, but obtaining similar support from other Latin American nations such as Brazil could be difficult, said Larry Birns, director of the Washington-based Council on Hemispheric Affairs.

Of the International Atomic Energy Agency's 35 members, 27 nations voted last month in favor to referring Iran to U.N. Security Council over fears it aims to build an atomic bomb. Venezuela voted against the referral along with Cuba and Syria, while the remainder abstained.

"I don't think this is going to result in a diplomatic breakthrough for the Iranians. These Latin American nations may simply abstain from voting rather than vote against referring Iran to the council," Birns said.

"Chavez has opened the door for Iran. He's not going to let the White House control his guest list. Some may see this as a bad public relations move, but he genuinely believes in this type of solidarity," said Birns. "I don't think Brazil or Uruguay will be so accommodating."

The U.N. Security Council is to consider Iran's nuclear activities next month. Amid mounting tensions, Iran resumed small-scale uranium enrichment last week. Iran insists the enrichment is for nuclear energy, not arms.

While in Venezuela, Haddad Adel denied that Iran wants to produce nuclear arms but insisted that Tehran has every right to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes - a view strongly shared by Chavez, who has expressed interest in starting a nuclear energy program himself.

The Iranian parliament leader said Tehran had not discussed the possibility of cooperating with Venezuela in nuclear energy technology, but would be willing to consider it. "In the framework of the IAEA, all countries can help each other," he said through an interpreter.

He also proposed joining with Venezuela and other like-minded Latin American countries to help counter U.S. "imperialism."

"Iran and the Mideast and Venezuela and Latin America can act as two convergent axes to neutralize the plans of arrogant world (powers)," Haddad Adel said in a speech to the Venezuelan National Assembly on Tuesday.

Iran has become Venezuela's closest ally in the Middle East, and a range of joint projects include a $200 million development fund and factories to make tractors, auto parts and cement in the South American country.

Before leaving Venezuela, top Iranian and Venezuelan lawmakers signed a document Wednesday saying all nations have a right to peaceful nuclear energy.

They also pledged "joint actions" aimed at "achieving respect for the just cause" of Palestinians, whom they called an "oppressed people."

Venezuela has said it will welcome Palestinian leaders of the Hamas movement on an as-yet-unconfirmed South American tour following their electoral victory.

The United States and Europe consider Hamas a terrorist organization and have refused to deal with a Hamas-led Palestinian leadership.

Is the Iranian president crazy, or canny? Before you answer, consider the ace up his sleeve.

Iran has guts, there’s no doubt about it—what with its pressing forward with nuclear development while threatening to wipe Israel off the map. But these moves aren’t as careless as some people assume, considering the ace Tehran has up its sleeve.

Oil, that is.

The equation is simple. The advanced economies of America and Europe rely heavily on a stable supply of oil, much of it from opec member nations. Iran is the second-largest opec producer and a major contributor to the global oil supply.

In the same manner that nutrient-rich sap is the lifeblood of a tree, furnishing the energy needed to grow, oil provides energy (in many cases, literally) to the largest and most affluent economies on the globe. Oil is absolutely central to our modern lifestyles.

Although Iran can’t stop the flow of oil, it can reduce the volume of oil flowing onto the global market if it chooses. And any such restriction in oil flow would yield dire results for the economies of America, Europe and Asia—directly affecting transportation, manufacturing, industry, agriculture and the military, with indirect ramifications for every other economic sector. Even a couple of million fewer barrels of oil per day on the market would likely create economic chaos, which would precipitate political crisis.

But here is where the analogy breaks down. While a tree wouldn’t respond to a mere threat to reduce its sap flow, with oil it is different. Even the threat of there not being enough oil to meet global demands has an impact.

We experienced this phenomenon in late January. As Europe and America scrambled to drum up support for UN sanctions against Tehran for resuming its nuclear activities, the Iranian oil minister warned that one of the consequences of sanctions will be “the unleashing of a crisis in the oil sector and particularly a price hike” (Agence France Presse, January 19). The news of a potential disruption in the flow of oil from Iran caused oil prices to jump to near four-month highs.

This is quite startling. Iran didn’t actually reduce the amount of oil it contributes to global supply, it just threatened to reduce it—and look what happened.

The amount of influence Iran wields in this scenario is ridiculous. The Iranian oil minister makes a statement to the Middle Eastern press, and you have to pay more at the gas pump. This man is taking more money from your wallet, and there is little you can do to stop him.

Why? Because America, as well as Europe and Asia, absolutely must have a stable flow of oil. Oil has become the Achilles heel of the world’s greatest, most advanced nations. Even though the United States doesn’t receive oil directly from Iran, in the event of Tehran squeezing supply, those nations that do import Iranian oil would have to hunt elsewhere for it. In the end, it affects everyone.

Few Alternatives

As Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad swaggers, endorsing dangerous ideologies, flippantly throwing around offensive remarks that he remains arrogantly unapologetic for, many wonder if this politician isn’t slightly loco—if there aren’t some screws loose in his mind. What else would give him the gall to push around some of the most powerful nations and groups of nations in the world?

But is he crazy, or canny?

It is hard to deny the truth in a threat Ahmadinejad made this past January 14. The Guardian in Britain reported his statement: “Iran had a ‘cheap means’ of achieving its nuclear ‘rights,’ Mr. Ahmadinejad said, adding: ‘You [the West] need us more than we need you. All of you today need the Iranian nation’” (January 16; emphasis mine).

Iranian oil fuels and energizes some of the world’s leading nations. Fully aware of the resultant massive influence it wields on the world scene, Iran believes it can run the risk of pushing around global giants.

Iran is playing for the highest stakes in the global energy game, given that, based on latest figures, that country contains some of the largest proven reserves of hydrocarbons in the world.

That explains the West’s embarrassing timidity in invoking any real penalties on Iran for flouting conventions in its pursuit of nuclear capability. With Iran, regardless of the stridency of the rhetoric from the rest of the world, appeasement is the foreign policy of the day. The major energy-consuming nations dare not risk any move by Iran to further disrupt an already high-priced energy market.

The most ironic aspect of the situation is this: These nations’ response to Tehran’s prestige has gone well beyond mere inattention. In the scramble for energy resources, Germany, having the leading industrial economy in Europe, realized early that the nuclear option would be a prime negotiating tool in gaining favorable access to Iranian energy resources. Even 30 years ago, it ensured an early place in the development of Iran’s nuclear technology by signing its first contract to assist in this project. Since then, it has been joined by Russia and China in aiding and abetting Iran’s development of nuclear power, using various tricks of delay in contractual fulfillment as diplomatic carrots or sticks, depending on the mood reflected by their major Islamic client.

But there is now a stark new threat. The ayatollahs may have been extreme, but Ahmadinejad is truly a volatile, unpredictable customer whose violent vocalizing against Israel, the U.S. and EU members is forcing these nations to reassess their foreign policies toward this rising king of the south. Now Ahmadinejad has ripped the UN seals off Iran’s stalled nuclear program and declared his intention to proceed full-steam ahead with the development of a nuclear capability, despite any global opinion to the contrary.

Sure, UN sanctions would hurt the Iranian economy, and its national income would decrease substantially if it chose to withhold oil from the market. But Tehran knows such measures would hurt America and Europe even more. It could potentially devastate their economies! These facts infuse Iran’s leaders with tremendous confidence.

The Danger of Overconfidence

The Iranians are failing to consider all the ramifications of their flippant behavior, however. They are blinded by arrogance and overconfidence. They operate under the assumption that they can push Europe and America around without serious implications. Time will prove them wrong.

Europe is heavily dependent on outside sources for its energy. The lives and well-being of most Europeans depend heavily on Russian natural gas and opec oil. Threatening Europe’s supply of energy is the same as threatening the lives of Europeans! President Ahmadinejad is foolish for thinking Europe will roll over and acquiesce to Tehran’s wishes. To push at Europe by threatening its energy supply is naive and highly dangerous.

Facing Russian instability to the east and Iranian arrogance to the south, Europe has to secure the flow of oil and natural gas into its borders. And this will not be good news for Iran.

For more than a decade, our editor in chief has foretold of bullying tactics by Iran that would “push” Europe over the edge—inviting a blitzkrieg attack from the Europeans. This is based on a prophecy in Daniel 11 that shows Europe, a resurrection of the old Roman Empire—an outgrowth of Nebuchadnezzar’s Babylon—marching into the Middle East, partially to secure its energy supplies.

Europe’s energy issues will play a significant part in bringing this biblical prophecy to pass. Continuing resistance by Ahmadinejad to German-led EU initiatives on the nuclear front, stymieing EU efforts to tap further into Iran’s massive oil and gas reserves, will ultimately awaken the beast in the German breast. With the engines of this formidable global power needing fuel, and present sources proving so unpredictable, we can expect that, quite soon, Europe will rise up and impose its will on this energy-rich nation by force.

Three car bombs exploded in the capital Baghdad, killing an Iraqi civilian and wounding 18, an interior ministry source said.

Two of the bombs appeared to target passing police cars.

An army lieutenant-colonel was shot dead in southern Baghdad, while three municipal employees, including an Egyptian, were gunned down while working in the west of the capital.

Two of their colleagues were wounded.

Also in Baghdad, gunmen shot dead the Iraqi driver of a Jordanian embassy car at a petrol station, according to Jordanian government spokesman Nasser Jawdeh.

Outside of the capital two Shiite tribal leaders and a municipal head were shot dead in Khan Abi Saad, 30 kilometres north of Baghdad.

While 10 people were wounded as a roadside bomb and a booby-trapped motorbike blew up in nearby Baquba.

In the northern city of Kirkuk, police said, an army captain and a soldier, acting as his bodyguard, were shot and killed.

Insurgents change targets

"We`re seeing the insurgent move his target away from coalition forces to Iraqi security forces," US Major-General Rick Lynch said.

He attributed the spike to the increased role of Iraqi security forces, as well as the interim period between the December 15 elections and the formation of a new government, which is still pending.

"We have seen over the last several weeks about a 15 percent increase in civilian casualties, and we`ve seen about a 30 percent increase in attacks against security forces," he told reporters.

"The insurgents want to attack because they want to discredit the government in existence, so seeing spikes in attacks during this period in time was not indeed unpredicted." Major General Lynch added.

The government`s withdrawal plan includes moving the 600 troops to Kuwait by May as a first step, and recalling them to Japan by July, after cleaning their equipment and vehicles to pass quarantine inspections in Japan.

Although ground troops will be withdrawn, Japan`s air force will maintain and expand its logistic support for multinational forces in Iraq, the report said.

Japan reportedly wants to withdraw its troops around the same time as Britain, which is in charge of security in the Samawah region, where Japanese troops have been carrying out humanitarian tasks such as repairing buildings and providing medical training since early 2004.

Britain is set to start pulling out its troops in March and complete the withdrawal by the end of May.

Japan, Australia, Britain and the United States will hold a working-level meeting in London at the end of next week to discuss detailed withdrawal plans.

Copyright 2006 by United Press International

Iran's foreign minister called on Britain on Friday to pull its troops out of the southern Iraqi city of Basra, saying their presence was destabilising the city.

"The Islamic Republic of Iran demands the immediate withdrawal of British forces from Basra," Manouchehr Mottaki told reporters through an interpreter during a visit to Lebanon.

"We believe that the presence of the British military forces in Basra has led to the destabilisation of the security situation in the city," he said.

Prime Minister Tony Blair swiftly rebuffed Tehran, saying British soldiers were in Iraq under a United Nations mandate and warned Iran not to try to divert attention from international concern over its nuclear programme.

Mottaki also said the British presence had also negatively affected the security situation in southern Iran itself.

He was apparently referring to a spate of recent bomb attacks in southern Iran.

Iran last month accused the British military in Iraq of cooperating with Arab bombers who attacked targets in the Iranian oil city of Ahvaz, killing eight people. Britain has denied the allegation and condemned the attack.

The minister also denounced what he said were human rights violations by the British forces in Basra.

But Blair, speaking at a news conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin, said it was up to the U.N. and the Iraqi government to decide how long the troops stayed.

"British troops are in Iraq today under a United Nations mandate and with the consent of the Iraqi government. They stay as long as the U.N. mandate is in place and the Iraqi government wishes us to stay," he said.

"What I would say to the Iranians is that there's no point in trying to ... divert attention from the issues to do with Iran by calling into question the British presence in Iraq which is there, as I say, with a U.N. mandate and Iraqi support."

Of that amount, $38 billion will be spent for ongoing military operations, with $11 billion going to repair and replenish war-fighting equipment ravaged by wear and tear.

Another $1.9 billion is allocated for protecting against improvised explosive devices.

The blizzard of numbers boils down to nearly $7 billion a month.

"I'm still stunned that there's no downward motion at all in the monthly costs. And clearly in 2006, the administration plans on no end in sight to that," said Michael E. O'Hanlon, senior fellow in foreign policy studies at the Brookings Institution.

This increase would bring the cost of the war thus far to $400 billion — a far cry from the administration's original estimates.

Cost Estimates Were Off the Mark

Just before the invasion of Iraq in 2002, White House economic adviser Lawrence Lindsay estimated the cost would be $100 billion to $200 billion.

That estimate was later dismissed by Mitch Daniels, then director of the Office of Management and Budget, who said costs would be between $50 billion to $60 billion.

Today Democratic lawmakers called for the president to provide more information about spending on the war.

"The president has a responsibility," said Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill. "He has to tell us the true costs of the war."

"I am very concerned that we are going to be asked for a boatload of additional funding," said Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D.

The money from this supplemental request is expected to keep operations going only for the next eight months. The White House has already said an additional $50 billion for Iraq will likely be requested later this year.

Earlier students thought of Iraq as the country that was forever being denounced by the Clinton administration and by Bush's father when he was president. Why? Iraq, it seems, had some crazy notion that the US might attempt an invasion at some point in the future, and thus thought it had better prepare by spending money on its military. Its weapons program, however, was quickly dismantled under pressure from the UN.

Doubtful that Iraq had really given up the idea of creating a viable national defense, the US cobbled together extreme sanctions against the country, preventing it from trading with the world. The standard of living plummeted. Middle class merchants suffered. The poor died without the essentials of life. The child mortality rate soared. The head of the US State Department told a reporter on national television that even if US sanctions had resulted in 500,000 child deaths, they were “worth it.”

Jumping back earlier, the US had waged another war on Iraq. Bush Senior saw it as the war to end all aggressions, in this case an aggression of Iraq against its neighbor called Kuwait, a name that has been strangely absent from the news for the better part of ten years. What was strange was how the US had given the green light to Saddam to aggress against its neighbor, with the US ambassador having told Saddam Hussein that the US took no position on its long-running border dispute with its former province.

Now, if we jump back still further and consider the Reagan years, students would remember a long and boring but truly bloody conflict between Iraq and Iran. It lasted eight years, between 1980 and 1988. The US favored Iraq in this war. Saddam was a friend of the US, a man on the payroll. The weapons he used in this war on Iran were provided to him courtesy of the US taxpayer, as weapons inspectors in the 1990s were reminded when they went hunting for WMDs. There is a famous photo of one of Reagan’s weapons emissaries, Donald Rumsfeld, smiling broadly as he shakes hands with Saddam.

The war did not fully wreck Iraq, though many of its sons died. The country was secular and liberal by regional standards. There were private schools, symphonies, universities, and a complex and developing economy. Women had rights. They could drive and have bank accounts. They wore Western clothing. You could get a drink at a bar or buy liquor and have it at home. Christians were tolerated. They could worship as they pleased, and send their children to Christian schools. The electricity stayed on. You could buy gasoline. It was an old-fashioned dictatorship but it was, in regional terms, prosperous.

The war between Iran and Iraq was inconclusive. But today, we've come full circle. Iraq is a wreck. The Wall Street Journal ran a story the other day that documented how the prevailing political influence today in Iraq is Iran's ruling Shiite political party, which hopes to add another country to those ruled by Islamic law. So, from the vantage point of twenty-five years, it appears that the winner has finally been decided in the great Iran-Iraq war. The side that the US favored lost.

This is increasingly the pattern in the post-Cold War world. The US spends money, invades countries, sheds blood, and becomes ever more powerful at home and unpopular abroad. In the end, no matter how powerful its weapons or how determined its leaders, it loses. It loses because people resist empire. It loses for the same reasons that socialism and its central plans always fail. Large-scale attempts to force people into predetermined molds founder on the inability of the state to allocate resources rationally and to anticipate change, as well as the ubiquitous and pesky phenomenon called human volition. Mankind was not meant to live in cages.

Why did the US win wars in the past? Because it fought far poorer governments. Today it loses because it fights populations – people acting on their own, forming their own associations, using their brains to outwit bureaucrats, and cobbling together resources from underground markets. The market always outruns the planners for the same reason that guerilla armies usually win over regular armies. Decentralized and spontaneous associations of dedicated individuals are smarter and wiser and more committed than centralized and planned bureaucrats who follow their rule books.

This is a point well elaborated by the Austrian School of economics. The full critique of war would involve an elaboration on the work of F.A. Hayek and Murray Rothbard and their modern disciples. Time and space does not permit, so let me quickly draw your attention to the writings of Mises on this point.

In 1919, he wrote a book called Nation, State, and Economy. One of the many great discoveries of Guido Hulsmann was that Mises's original title is better translated in one word: Imperialism. It is a relentless attack on the idea of democratic empire, and an investigation of the role of the democratic state in foreign policy matters.

In the old world that was then passing, Mises wrote, imperial monarchs had ruled over large-scale, multi-ethnic, multi-lingual, and sometimes multi-religious territories with an eye to carefully balancing the relationships among groups and avoiding policies that set group against group. It was the only policy that made their rule viable. If they failed to do this, their rule was threatened. Royal families specialized in linguistic proficiency. They adopted an air of fairness, and tended over time to liberalize economic structures in the interest of harmonizing groups.

Mises welcomed the age of democracy because he believed that political democracy was the closest analogy to applying a market principle to the sphere of civic life. But he made an important proviso. Under a democratic regime, empires would have to come to end. There could be no rule over multi-ethnic, multi-lingual, multi-religious populations. Every group would need to be permitted self-determination. Democracy meant, in Mises's view, the right of groups and even individuals to choose their own state. There could be no rule over a people or part of a people without their consent.

Mises then observed a dangerous paradox. The onset of the age of democracy was also the age of the rise of socialism. Socialism requires control, not only over economic structures but also over all of civic life, including religions. The most extreme form of socialism was totalitarianism. Mises saw that socialism and democracy were based on incompatible principles. If people are given true choice in regimes, they can also choose the rules under which they live. But socialism is predicated on the supposition that people can be permitted no choice. They must live under a plan as crafted by a dictator.

Mises saw that the attempt to wed socialism and dictatorship would lead to unparalleled calamity, which indeed it did because Mises's pathway out of this problem was ignored. He mapped out his solution in his great book Liberalism, which appeared in 1927. Here he said that the foundation of liberty is private property. If property were protected from invasion, all else in politics follows. The state cannot be imperialistic because it cannot raise the funds necessary to fund adventures in foreign lands. On the other hand, he wrote, the more the state is given control over private property, the more it will be tempted toward imposing its rule via arms and war.

Therefore, he said, war and socialism are both part of the same ideological apparatus. They both presume the primacy of power over property. In the same way, peace and free enterprise are cut from the same cloth. They are the result of a society with a regime that respects the privacy, property, associations, and wishes of the population. The liberal society trades with foreign countries rather than waging war on them. It respects the free movement of peoples. It does not intervene in the religious affairs of people but rather adopts a rule of perfect tolerance.

I don't need to tell you that this is not the kind of regime under which we live in the US. The state is an empire, a democratic empire. It is aggressive internally and externally. Indeed, it is the richest and most powerful government on earth and in all of human history. Along with this has come a cultural change. The founding fathers loathed and feared war. They said that nothing ruins a country quicker than the warlike spirit. It brings bankruptcy, corruption, and tyranny. George Washington warned against war, and called for trade and friendship with all nations.

The ideology of war has infected our rulers. Mises explained it in his book Liberalism. This is an ideology against which rational argument does not work. If you say war leads to suffering, pain, and death, they will say: so be it. Instead, writes Mises, the warmongers claim that "it is through war and war alone that mankind is able to make progress. War is the father of all things, said a Greek philosopher, and thousands have repeated it after him. Man degenerates in time of peace. Only war awakens in him slumbering talents and powers and imbues him with sublime ideals. If war were to be abolished, mankind would decay into indolence and stagnation."

I submit to you that this is precisely the ideology that reigns in such publications as National Review. This is the view propounded from the lecterns at Republican gatherings. Speaker after speaker at conservative conferences echoes this very view. I've heard it again and again in private conversations among diehard Republicans. This view that war is good for us is sheer fantasy, a dangerous and violent fit of utter irrationality. But it persists. It infects. It kills.

What view should replace the ideology of war? Mises again:

"It starts from the premise that not war, but peace, is the father of all things. What alone enables mankind to advance and distinguishes man from the animals is social cooperation. It is labor alone that is productive: it creates wealth and therewith lays the outward foundations for the inward flowering of man. War only destroys; it cannot create. War, carnage, destruction, and devastation we have in common with the predatory beasts of the jungle; constructive labor is our distinctively human characteristic. The liberal abhors war, not, like the humanitarian, in spite of the fact that it has beneficial consequences, but because it has only harmful ones…. Victorious war is an evil even for the victor…peace is always better than war."

The US has already lost the war on Iraq. It should pull out. When? Now. What will happen? I don't know. No one knows. What will people do when you let them out of their cages? What will slaves do when you free them? What happens when you free those who are imprisoned unjustly? I don't know the answer to these questions, and no one does. I will observe that other countries count the day that the US soldiers left as the beginning of a bright future.

I think of Somalia, which – after a Bush Senior invasion – Clinton wisely left in a lurch after violence against American soldiers. Today warlords still compete for control of the capital. The CIA factbook contains a sentence that might have pleased Thomas Jefferson: Somalia has "no permanent national government." But the rest of the country has moved on. It has prospered.

Here is more from the latest CIA factbook:

"Despite the seeming anarchy, Somalia's service sector has managed to survive and grow. Telecommunication firms provide wireless services in most major cities and offer the lowest international call rates on the continent. In the absence of a formal banking sector, money exchange services have sprouted throughout the country, handling between $500 million and $1 billion in remittances annually. Mogadishu's main market offers a variety of goods from food to the newest electronic gadgets. Hotels continue to operate, and militias provide security."

The CIA chooses the word "despite" the seeming anarchy. I would like to replace that with "because" of the seeming anarchy.

If the US leaves Iraq, a big cost will be born by Americans. We have lost freedoms and rights. The military and spying sector has grown enormously. Big government abroad is incompatible with small government at home. To the extent we cheer war, we are cheering domestic socialism and our own eventual destruction as a civilization.

When you consider the full range of social, economic, and international planning on which it has embarked, you can know in advance that staying cannot work. Government is not God, nor are the men who run it impeccable or infallible, nor do they have a direct pipeline to the Almighty. Even if they were angels, they couldn't do it. The method they have chosen to bring about security and order is destined toward failure. But they are not angels. Their power has corrupted them, and the more absolute the power they gain, they more damage they create.

Let me state plainly too that we should end the entire war on terrorism because it cannot work and it is killing us instead of them. The pool of potential terrorists is unlimited, and it has been unleashed by the very means the state has employed. Bin Laden is still on the loose, and everyone knows that there are hundreds or thousands of additional Bin Ladens out there.

But can't the state just kill more, employ ever more violence, perhaps even terrify the enemy into passivity? A bracing comment from Israeli military historian Martin Van Creveld: "The Americans in Vietnam tried it. They killed between two-and-a-half and three million Vietnamese. I don't see that it helped them much." Without admitting defeat, the Americans finally pulled out of Vietnam, which today has a thriving stock market.

Can the US just back out of its war on terror? Wouldn't that mean surrender? It would mean that the state surrenders its role, but not that everyone else does. Had the airlines been in charge of their own security, 9-11 would not have happened. In the same way that the free market provides for all our material needs, it can provide our security needs as well.

The War on Terror is impossible, not in the sense that it cannot cause immense amounts of bloodshed and destruction and loss of liberty, but in the sense that it cannot finally achieve what it is supposed to achieve, and will only end in creating more of the same conditions that led to its declaration in the first place.

In other words, it is a typical government program, costly and unworkable, like socialism, like the war on poverty, like the war on drugs, like every other attempt by the government to shape reality according to its own designs. You can see the results in the fatality figures. You and I paid for those flags on the caskets of the soldiers. We paid for the war that cost them their lives. We paid for the cheaper coffins of the far more numerous Iraqi dead. We didn't do it voluntarily. The state forced us to do so, just as it is forcing Iraq to endure a dreadful occupation.

What is in the past is gone, a cost that is sunk and never to be regained. But we can control the future. Now is the time to end this ghastly undertaking in Iraq.

In American political culture, which is dominated by the competitive interest groups we call the two main political parties and their ideological compatriots, we are asked to choose between two false alternatives.

In the first, as that offered by the Left and the Democrats, we are asked to think of the state as an expansive Good Samaritan who clothes, feeds, and heals people at home and abroad. They completely fail to notice that this Samaritan ends up not helping people but enslaving its clients and leaving the rest of us like the robbery victim on the street.

In the second, as offered by the Right and the Republicans, we are asked to think of the state as an expansive Solomon with all power to right wrong and bring justice and faith to all peoples at home and abroad. They completely fail to notice that Solomon ends up behaving more like Caesar Augustus and his successors, sending all the world to be counted and taxed and then plotting to kill any competitive source of authority.

Are you independent minded? Reject these two false alternatives. Do you love freedom? Embrace peace. Do you love peace? Embrace private property. Do you love and defend civilization? Defend and protect it against all uses of Power, the evil against which we must proceed ever more boldly.

February 17, 2006

Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. [send him mail] is president of the Ludwig von Mises Institute in Auburn, Alabama, editor of LewRockwell.com and author of Speaking of Liberty.

Donald Rumsfeld, in a statement before House’s Armed Services Committee, acknowledged the re-branding of the conflict previously known as The Global War on Terror. He told the assembled committee members that we are “nation engaged in what will be a ‘long war.’” It’s a war that will be the central security issue of our time and will transform the way we defend our nation, he said.

The SecDef’s comments underlined a theme sounded by his Commander-in-Chief in the recent State of the Union speech. George Bush, insinuating himself into a pantheon of former presidents that included Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy, and Reagan, said, “our own generation is in a long war against a determined enemy.”

So much for setting a timetable for an American withdrawal from Iraq, or Afghanistan for that matter. When other recent remarks from multi-starred generals referring to a long war that could last ten to twenty years are taken in to account, it’s clear that we have achieved George Orwell’s state of perpetual war.

The administration’s depiction of our conflict in Iraq as an open-ended struggle with ever-shifting enemies is another of its deviously brilliant bits of PR chicanery. The adoption of a simple phrase — The Long War — eliminates expectations that there will be an end to the needless deaths of Americans, Iraqis, and Afghanis any time soon. War in distant, dusty places will become a mundane feature of American life just like higher gas prices, warrant less electronic surveillance, and curtailed civil liberties.

Five, ten, twenty years from now when the last American soldier has long been airlifted out of Iraq and someone says, “Tell me again, why are we fighting in Uzbekistan (or Kazakhstan or name your own favorite ‘stan),” the answer will come back, “Don’t you remember? We’re in a Long War against the terrorists who attacked us on Nine-Eleven.”

It is a particular stroke of genius to characterize this Long War as one waged against the nebulous foe of terrorism. With Communism, the last big bogeyman to feed our national nightmares, there was a well-defined dogma to identify who was a Communist and who was not. The problem, however, was that after the fall of the Soviet Union and the liberation of Eastern Europe, there weren’t a lot of Communists left over to get hysterical about. Sure, there was still Castro in Cuba and the Chinese. But Castro alone is hardly worth $400 billion in defense spending, and we’ve come to rely on the Chinese to make all the consumer goods Americans used to make.

Terrorism makes a much better bête noire because it’s a vaguer appellation. The terrorist label can be hung on, well, just about anyone. Terrorists can be desperate men armed with box cutters who fly airplanes into tall buildings. Or they can be radical Moslems who live in caves in Afghanistan. Or they can be Quaker peace groups who conspire to conduct candlelight vigils on village greens or nuns who attack ICBMs with ball peen hammers to demonstrate opposition to an illegal war or VA nurses so upset at the federal government they are moved to write angry letters to newspaper editors.

Soon, thanks to the creative wordsmiths in Boy George’s lawyer pool, terrorism will come to mean any expression against the established order, whether that expression is a car bomb or outraged e-mail to a like-minded friend.

This concept of terrorism is a self-fulfilling one. Wherever we go in search of terrorists, we are sure to find them. If they’re not present when we arrive, they will inevitably appear once American soldiers, in the name of advancing freedom, have kicked in enough doors, recklessly shot enough innocent civilians, and hauled away enough fathers and cousins and friends for questioning (read torturing). When outraged locals begin retaliating with roadside bombs, our leaders will tell us, “See we told you there were terrorists in (insert name of country here). It just took us some time to create them.”

“A Long War” and “Global Terrorism” are malleable phrases that can be applied to any situation in which a local populace seeks redress against the international organizations and multi-national corporations that control the levers of the world economy. They are equally applicable to turban wearing tribesman living in regions known only to readers of National Geographic or a neighbor who checked out the wrong book from the library. As this “Long War” progresses and the definition of terrorist becomes stretched far enough, who knows whom the FBI thugs will come for next.

Hold on a sec, I think I hear a knock at the door.

Copyright David Martin - damrtn48@ntplx.net

One of the fast participants is a man named Mike Ferner. I first heard of Mike when he traveled to Iraq in the winter of 2003 just before the US/UK invasion in March of that year. Mike is a Vietnam vet who served as a Navy Corpsman and then received an honorable discharge from the service as a conscientious objector. He is also a union organizer, member of Veterans for Peace, and served on the Toledo, Ohio city council. His book on his trips to Iraq (he went there again in 2004) is titled Inside the Red Zone: A Veteran For Peace Reports from Iraq, and is due out in August, 2006. I have maintained a rather loose email contact with Mike over the past several months and, when I heard he was participating in this fast, decided to ask him a couple questions. The email "conversation" follows.

Ron: Hi Mike, I heard that you were participating in the 34 day fast to protest the war in Iraq and thought I would check in with you. What made you decide to participate? Furthermore, since the administration is unlikely to be affected, whose conscience do you hope to stir with this action?

Mike: I decided to participate because I needed to do something more to up the ante against the war. If you go to the NCNV page and watch the video featuring Jackson Browne singing "Lives in the Balance," you'll get as good an idea as I can give you why we need to do more for peace. There ARE lives in the balance and we in this country are all complicit in the suffering our government is causing.

I agree with you that our fast/vigil/sit-ins won't affect the criminals waging the war. We certainly want to call people's attention to the crimes they are committing, but we know we won't change their behavior by our small presence in Washington over the next month. What will change their behavior (and hopefully impeach and imprison them) however, is if every person in the U.S. who opposes this war will stop and think for a moment about what they can do to up the ante. Those are the people whose hearts we need to reach. We can all do more—every one of us—no matter what our job or station in life. And if every person mad as hell that this war continues will think about what more they can do for peace it will indeed make a difference...and more than just "make a difference" in some abstract way. It will throw a wrench into the gears of the war machine and grind it to a halt. This we can do, if every person of good conscience decides they have to do more than they thought they could do.

Ron: You have a book scheduled to be published in late summer 2006. What is it about and when did you write it?

Mike: We just settled on a title, Inside the Red Zone: A Veteran For Peace Reports from Iraq. It's about my trips to Iraq and the people I met. People in the peace movement, Iraqis, G.I.'s, and journalists. My first trip was just prior to the U.S. invasion when I went with Voices in the Wilderness for a month. The second trip was in early 2004 for two months when I went specifically to report and write. I wasn't thinking at the time of writing a book, actually, but the more I worked at the stories, the more I realized I had experienced something that needed to be told.

Ron: From your involvement in Voices for Creative Nonviolence, it seems apparent that you believe in the power of nonviolent direct action as practiced and preached by Martin Luther King, Jr. What experiences in your life led you to this commitment?

Mike: First off, I don't consider myself a pacifist...yet, anyway. Even though I'm learning more about Gandhi and King and nonviolent principles and I'm getting closer to being a pacifist the older I get, I can still see why people will resort to violence if they're oppressed long enough. What has lead me to a life of activism was, initially, being a hospital corpsman during the Viet Nam war and taking care of the young men who came back in pieces from that conflict. Few things will turn you against war quicker than that kind of work. Then, through life I realized that the Viet Nam war wasn't the only injustice, simply the first one I had experienced directly. I got involved in the environmental movement and the labor movement over the years. So social change has been the constant theme in my life since getting out of the Navy.

Ron: What do you think lies ahead for the people of Iraq?

Mike: While the U.S. continues to occupy it, nothing but violence and suffering. I believe that every political institution created in Iraq since the invasion will be seen as tainted by the invader, and as such, stands a good chance of being torn down once we are finally gone. That is not a pleasant picture to imagine, but it will happen whenever we leave. And until then, the violence and suffering will continue because our presence is fueling the resistance. Withdraw that fuel and the fire will subside. Who knows what will follow, but whatever it is, it will happen when (not if) we leave. Then, the peace movement's mettle in the U.S. will be put to the test to see if we can force our government to make amends for what we've done to the extent that is possible.

Ron: How about the people of Iran?

Mike: Our government leaders will seal the case for their insanity diagnosis if they take military action against Iran. If they do so, however, it won't be anything like the Iraq war. Iran has got military capabilities far in excess of Iraq's. They have missile systems that will inflict terrible damage and casualties to U.S. ships and ground forces in the region. Beyond that, of course, violent reprisals will become the order of the day and we will have succeeded in making the world considerably more unbalanced and frightening.

Ron: The people of the US?

Mike: That's a good question, isn't it? Do we think that except for the relatively small number of military casualties coming back from Iraq we will be unaffected? I'm sure that's what our "leaders" would like to promote, but that's not the reality. Every G.I. that's been killed, and every one of the tens of thousands who've been wounded—physically and mentally—has a family; has a city or town they're from; had hopes and dreams and skills they would have shared fully with their communities and society. Instead, we will bear the financial and emotional costs of dealing with the families of those men and women and everyone their pain has touched, radiating out in ever-larger circles—for the rest of their lives. Say nothing of the opportunities lost, the health care these billions could have provided, the civil liberties we have lost, etc. etc. Just the direct costs, financial and emotional, from this war will be felt for generations. And as a people we will be much less safe when it is finally over. Look at what other countries thought of the U.S. right after September 11, 2001, and what they think of us now. We are making a dangerous world for our children and grandchildren.

Ron: Despite my better judgment, I occasionally get incredibly frustrated with the failure of the antiwar movement to end this damn war. In fact, sometimes I feel like going the route of the Weather Underground. I know I am not alone in this. Indeed, I would imagine that you feel this way sometimes. What do you do to convince yourself to continue the struggle?

Mike: It is most definitely frustrating, without a doubt. Is violence the answer? I can understand what drives oppressed people to it, but I still think it can never really be the answer.

Ron: Last fall before the big antiwar march on Washington you wrote an article calling on people to sit-in around the White House a la the Chinese occupation of Tianamen Square. Do you still think this is a good strategy?

Mike: Actually, my suggestion was that when we were hundreds of thousands strong we sit down then, not two days later in a staged sit-in at the White House, which is what happened. Bless every one of those 400+ people who got arrested there (I was arrested earlier that morning at the Pentagon with 40 others), but at some point we have to take seriously the idea of putting a very large wrench into the gears of this war machine—make the nation simply ungovernable in every way we can. We have to do more.

Ron: Back to the fast—will there be a way for people to keep in touch with this campaign and publish its progress on their email lists and in their local organizations?

Mike: Check out the Voices for Creative Nonviolence website for updates. MORE IMPORTANTLY, organize a fast, or a vigil, or better yet, a sit-in at your local congressional offices, and let us know what you're doing so we can fan the flames of protest.

Ron: As a vet, do you have any special message for women and men who are currently in the service (or considering joining)?

Mike: If you're thinking of joining, don't. It ain't worth it. And I don't just mean you might get killed or wounded. The military is not what we should be using as a tool to protect the holdings of the empire, and that's its basic role no matter what the enlistment commercials say. If you're already in and have come to believe what we're doing is wrong, call the G.I. Hotline 800-394-9544 and find out what you can do to get out.

Ron: Thanks for your time. I'll keep in touch.

******

Ron Jacobs is author of The Way the Wind Blew: A History of the Weather Underground (Haymarket Series), just republished by Verso. Jacobs' essay on Big Bill Broonzy is featured in CounterPunch's new collection on music, art and sex: Serpents in the Garden.

While the Tories and Lib Dems press for a cross-party consensus on how to deal with the threat, the Prime Minister isn't interested. Instead he insists on ill-judged shows of "toughness" designed to portray the Opposition as soft.

Why, for example, did he push through this week's vote against the "glorification" of terror?Itwasn't because thelaw needed to be changed. After all, Abu Hamza was jailed under existing legislation.

No, a Government that disgracefully ignored his sermons of hate for years just wanted to be seen doing something - the same motive that prompted its plans for ID cards, which probably won't work.

The sadness is that Gordon Brown - who is untainted by the mendacity associated with Tony Blair - is lending his huge authority to this partisan charade. He talks of reviving 90 days' detention, which reminds Archbishop Tutu of the apartheid regime.

These are grim developments at home. But what is happening abroad is infinitely more damaging. Remember how Mr Blair went to war in Iraq under the banner of justice, democracy and human rights? Now those values are flung back in our faces across the Islamic world, after those pictures of British troops abusing rioters and the even more sickening scenes of U.S. guards degrading prisoners at Abu Ghraib.

But these excesses pale to relative insignificance when compared with the contempt for morality and the basic principles of law shown by our American allies at Guantanamo Bay, where hundreds of suspects have been kept in ghastly conditions for four years without charge, trial or independent lawyers.

Britain's response to this monumental aberration has been pitifully ambivalent. And the Bush administration? It just doesn't get it. The cloth-eared Republicans in the White House don't grasp the consequences. They refuse to listen when they are condemned by the UN. They don't understand how they are shaming America. And they don't care about the damage to Britain.

No, they continue to stir up Muslim hatred of the West, make a mockery of democratic values and encourage young hot-heads to flock to the terrorist cause. Osama bin Laden couldn't have been handed a greater propaganda gift.

At least some British politicians see the dangers. In Washington, Shadow Foreign Secretary William Hague warned America of the "critical erosion" of its moral authority.

But Mr Blair? The man who misled Britain into a disastrous war might go some way towards redeeming himself if he exerted his influence with the President to insist that America ends the disgrace of Guantanamo Bay.

Yet if influence exists, he doesn't use it. Instead, he feebly suggests something should be done "sooner or later".

So the abuse goes on. Britain is seen to share the shame. Enemies multiply. And the loudest defence of our most fundamental values comes not from politicians, but an African archbishop.