The scheme contemplated is a series of dishes, termed the Square Kilometre Array (SKA), forming what essentially constitute colossal fields of antennae which detect radio waves. Twenty countries have been involved in the project, though as ever, the big question was which location would suffice. Enter, then, the bidding war.

The Australians and New Zealanders were hoping for a considerable slice of this scientific pie, if not all of it. They were fortunate in the end to end up with a considerably downsized version. At first instance, their joint bid failed to persuade the panel in question, the SKA Site Advisory Committee, that they could offer a more desirable location over the South African-led proposal. The board of directors seemed to agree – there would be only one winner.

The principle behind the initial decision to award it to South Africa lay in remoteness. While Australia and New Zealand offer some of the most remote locations on earth, such attributes were evidently insufficient in the scientific context. Radio telescopy works best away from sources of radio waves. It had also been suggested that the South Africans were fronting the technically better bid, one that would comprise the erection of dishes in Botswana, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia and Zambia.

Then came the twist to the tale. Australia and New Zealand were not to miss out entirely. ‘We have decided,’ announced SKA chairman John Womerley at a press conference at Schiphol airport in Amsterdam, ‘on a dual site approach.’ A few teasing morsels will be thrown down towards the antipodes. Australia is to receive the low frequency antennae that are stationary and collect signals from the whole sky simultaneously (Guardian, May 25). South Africa shall receive the steerable high frequency type, and the biggest share of the project – approximately 70 percent in all.

The South Africans were initially perplexed. Evidently, they thought it was all in the bag. The project director Dr. Bernie Fanaroff decided to be diplomatic, even if he was keeping the champagne on ice. ‘It’s obvious that we would have preferred the whole thing to be in Africa, but we recognise the need for inclusivity and to maximise the investments that have already been made’ (Guardian, May 25).

Suspicions were always bound to lie behind the decision and science, a mere sideshow, was hardly going to feature. The Australians have made little secret of the fact that endorsing a proposal that would involve a host of African sites could only be viewed as an economic matter. What of stability and safety on the Dark Continent? A suggestion has been made that European countries involved in the project would see such a project as a form of development aid (Sydney Morning Herald, Mar 10). In 2010, the then Australian science minister Kim Carr suggested there were ‘better ways to sustain development, if that’s what your primary purpose is.’ Besides, the Australian bid offered ‘security, an attractive lifestyle and conducive business development’.

Those behind the project are attempting to excite both the public and politicians. Enchanting details on how many large iPods could be filled a day with the data generated from the array, and the depths human star gazing will be able to go, have been released. Journalists have been excited about the prospect of finding ‘alien intelligence’ given the sheer strength of the proposed project. But the most alien intelligence remains, until shown to be otherwise, human, the only animal, as Mark Twain claimed, that needs to blush.

Were it Syria or Iran, the rhetoric from Washington would be stern, aggressive even. But since the repressive ruling clique is the military junta in Egypt, the lectures are timid – and coupled with a handout. Indeed, as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton just announced, the Obama administration is waiving a legislative requirement that made military assistance to Egypt conditional on its rulers “implementing policies to protect freedom of expression, association, and religion, and due process of law.” This allows the U.S. government to send Egypt’s rulers $1.5 billion in taxpayer money, more than 85 percent of which is explicitly set aside for the armed forces.

If one only pays attention to what politicians say, ignoring what they do, this may come as a surprise. President Barack Obama, after all, has voiced support for the Arab Spring. He gave a speech in Cairo full of lofty words about the people of the region’s legitimate democratic aspirations. So why would his administration lavish a regime that cracks down on pro-democracy forces with money for weapons?

Simple: for America’s weapons makers, there’s big money at stake. According to “administration and congressional officials” speaking to the Washington Post, some of the biggest lobbyists for sending our tax dollars to Egypt are military contractors – BAE Systems, General Dynamics, General Electric, Raytheon and Lockheed Martin among them – “eager to keep lucrative contracts attached to the annual aid.” These companies kept Hosni Mubarak’s military well stocked with fighter jets, tanks, armored personnel carriers, Apache helicopters, anti-aircraft missile batteries and aerial surveillance aircraft. For them, military rule is just good business.

The Pentagon, meanwhile, is in lockstep with its contractors and “does not want to risk its ties with the Egyptian military,” according to the Post. So that takes care of the military-industrial complex. And it doesn’t hurt the munitions-for-Egyptians cause that said military has pledged to buck popular opinion and maintain close relations with Israel.

So with generals and General Electric whispering in his ear, Obama – not exactly the type to challenge military-industrial consensus – will be sending more than a billion dollars to subsidize regime that has killed hundreds of people in the year since former dictator Hosni Mubarak was forced to resign.

“Given the human rights violations in Egypt, the US State Department cannot in good faith certify to the US Congress that the Egyptian government is protecting human rights,” Amnesty International wrote in a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Egypt’s military rulers, while promising a transition to civilian control, have “engaged in a wave of repression that has broken the promise of the uprising that began in January 2011 for a new future for the country,” according to the group. There have been killings of “numerous civilians,” along with the persecution of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and their Egyptian and American employees for the crime of sowing discontent with seditious calls for civilian rule.

Clinton’s response: Whatever. On Friday, State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland confirmed that Clinton had approved transmission of the aid on the grounds of “regional stability,” simply ignoring petty concerns about democracy and systematic human rights abuses.

“Secretary Clinton has certified to Congress that Egypt is meeting its obligations under its Peace Treaty with Israel,” Nuland said in a statement. “The Secretary has also waived legislative conditions related to Egypt’s democratic transition, on the basis of America’s national security interests, allowing for the continued flow of Foreign Military Financing to Egypt.” When push comes to shove, the demands of militarism trump the desire for democracy every time.

That’s the message even from most liberal Democrats: Democracy’s great and all, but it takes a back seat to stability and preserving the status quo.

“The interest of Egypt and surrounding area as well as the United States is well served by a strong and stable Egypt,” said House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi during a recent trip to the region. “To the extent that that [military] assistance is in furtherance of that stability, we will certainly be there.”

It sounds like Pelosi didn’t talk to many Egyptians on her trip, for they would have told her that if the U.S. had $1.5 billion just laying around, it would be better to use that to boost Egypt’s economy than its military. But that request would not go down well with the U.S. weapons makers who contribute to Pelosi and her colleagues’ election campaigns. And for the most part, it’s just not how foreign aid works.

Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy is one of the few senior Democrats who have called on the Obama administration to withhold funding for tyranny in Egypt, that task having largely been left – strangely enough – to conservative Republicans. In a letter to Secretary of State Clinton, Tennessee Senator Rand Paul and Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann call for freezing the aid, saying that dispersing it now “would send the wrong message to the Egyptian government that U.S. taxpayers will subsidize the Egyptian military while it continues to oversee the crackdown on civil society and to commit human rights abuses.”

That’s an argument both fiscal conservatives and liberal humanitarians should theoretically be able to get behind. But when Paul offered an amendment on the Senate floor to freeze the military aid, it was California Democrat Barbara Boxer who blocked it from being put to a vote. “We need to be smart and strategic when we have people in harm’s way in another country,” she lectured on the Senate floor, which makes perfect sense: if confronted with a repressive regime, it’s best to stay cool and subsidize its tools of repression.

In a recent report on post-Mubarak Egypt, the U.S. government’s Congressional Research Service noted a “tension” that has long existed in America’s relations with Egypt “and is expected to continue unabated and perhaps amplified as a result of the revolution”: the “pursuit of U.S. national security interests,” on the one hand, “the promotion of American values and universal human rights” on the other.

Here’s the thing, though: a bandit is no less a bandit because he talks a lot about being a saint. One’s true values are reflected in one’s actions, not words. And in the case of U.S. relations with Egypt, under Obama just as much as George W. Bush, those actions have been firmly in support of dictatorship and repressive – but pro-American – rule. Unfortunately, that doesn’t cause a tension with our values: it exposes them for what they are.

There is no doubt whatsoever that the Lord’s Resistance Army is a brutal scourge on the African people. Its members have indeed “murdered, raped, and kidnapped tens of thousands of men, women, and children in central Africa” as Obama has stated. For example, according to Human Rights Watch, over the course of just four days in 2009, the LRA viciously killed at least 321 civilians and abducted more than 250 others (likely for use as child soldiers, sex slaves, and other horrible purposes). Most of those killed (including a three year-old girl and a 72-year old man) were first tied up, then hacked or beaten to death with machetes, axes, or clubs. We should all hope for the end of this organization, and on an individual level do whatever we can to speed its demise.

As an individual, I could choose to travel to central Africa to volunteer as a human shield, standing between the LRA and its victims. Or, as a less extreme option, I could donate my time and/or money to a non-governmental organization that is working to end the violence in the region through capacity-building and demobilization of child soldiers. I could engage in any number of actions as an individual that would be both moral and beneficial to the people of Uganda and other affected countries.

If only we could trust governments to make good and moral decisions that would always reflect what we would do as individuals. Unfortunately for us all, the US government is not known for this, especially when it comes to propping up authoritarian regimes, arming dictators with weapons to use against their own people, and training military-types to more effectively and efficiently torture and otherwise “control” human beings. See, for example, US military “aid” to Afghanistan, Bahrain, Colombia, Indonesia, Israel, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Pakistan, Peru, the Philippines, Lebanon, Oman, Turkey, and the West Bank/Gaza, all of whom received more than $100 million each just between 2002 and 2004 and tend to be regularly cited by even the US State department for things such as ethnic/minority oppression, oppression of women, threats to civil liberties, child exploitation, religious persecution, and judicial/prison abuses.

The simple truth is that throughout history, violence perpetrated by governments (often against their own people) tends to far outstrip violence perpetrated by non-state actors, including terrorist organizations, rebel groups, and individual criminals. This is not because governments are any less moral than violent non-state actors, but rather because governments have more resources at their disposal with which to wreak their terror.

In his statement celebrating the enactment of the Lord’s Resistance Army Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act of 2009, Barack Obama commended the government of Uganda “for its efforts to stabilize the northern part of the country” against the LRA and noted that we “have supported regional governments as they worked to provide for their people’s security.” The people of Uganda might wonder exactly when it is that their government is providing for their “security”: is it when Ugandan women are gang raped by members of the military and/or police? Or perhaps it is when state security forces mutilate the genitals of Ugandan men through kicking, beating with sticks, puncturing with hypodermic needles, and tying the penis with wire or weights. These are just a few examples of the “efforts” of the Ugandan government in what Human Rights Watch describes as a “state-sanctioned campaign of political suppression” which includes “illegal and arbitrary detention and unlawful killing/extrajudicial executions, and using torture to force victims to confess to links to the government’s past political opponents or current rebel groups” in its 2004 report “State of Pain: Torture in Uganda.”

The details of violence and torture are difficult to even read, but it is important to understand exactly what sort of activities our government is supporting in our names. Put yourself, for instance, in Derrick’s shoes – his story was also recounted in the Human Rights Watch report mentioned above. One day in Uganda, Derrick was riding in a bus which was hijacked by five or six armed members of the Ugandan military in civilian clothes. The men pulled two passengers from the bus, executed them, and then asked Derrick if he knew them. When he denied it, they started beating him, shoved a gun into his mouth, then dragged him to the headquarters of the Ugandan military intelligence organization. He was there beaten with an electrical wire and a hammer, cut deeply with a knife across his back, stabbed in his testicles with needles, and finally shocked and burned with electricity before he lost consciousness. He woke up under the steps of a nearby building; his captors apparently had no more use for him.

Now put yourself more realistically in the shoes of his torturers and their employer, the Ugandan government, which Barack Obama commends. Make no mistake: it is they who we support with our “aid” – not Derrick, and certainly not the people of Uganda. Ending the threat to Ugandan civilians posed by the Lord’s Resistance Army is a noble goal (for who and under what authority are separate questions). But at what moral cost do American military personnel “advise” the Ugandan military? When we support brutal governments in foreign countries – be it through aid, training, or troops on the ground – there are real and lasting consequences for the people who live there. There are many reasons to oppose the US incursion into Uganda (the risk of blowback, the chance of escalation, the furtherance of the imperial presidency, the financial cost, the practical fact that we can’t intervene everywhere, and so on), but the most important argument is moral.

In 1967, Martin Luther King, Jr. rightly called the United States government “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.” He was not seeking merely to criticize, but rather to acknowledge the moral hypocrisy of his calls for non-violence in the civil rights movement while implicitly supporting the violent actions of his own government. “For the sake of those boys,” he continued, “for the sake of this government, for the sake of the hundreds of thousands trembling under our violence, I cannot be silent.” For the sake of us all, we cannot be silent now. It is fundamentally immoral to arm, train, or otherwise “advise” any government that engages in torture and/or other forms of repression, no matter who our common enemy may be. As the still-reigning greatest purveyor of violence worldwide, the single most important action the United States government could take against the horrors of the world would be to stop contributing to them. Please join me in demanding an immediate end to US military operations in and aid to the Ugandan government.

On August 6 a unit of the 12,000 member United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) based in the Central Plateau city of Hinche was caught dumping feces and other waste in holes a few meters from a river where people bathe and drink. After complaints by locals and an investigation by journalists, city officials burned the waste near the Guayamouc river. The mayor of Hinche, André Renaud, criticized MINUSTAH’s flagrant disregard for the community’s health and called for the expulsion of some foreign troops.

On August 21 the UN was again accused of improper sewage disposal fifteen kilometers from Hinche.

As is their wont, MINUSTAH officials simply deny dumping sewage. Last Thursday the UN released a statement claiming they had no reason to dump waste since the base in Hinche built a treatment plant and sewage disposal on June 15. “The United Nations Mission for Stabilization in Haiti (MINUSTAH) formally denies being responsible for the dumping of waste in Hinche or elsewhere in the territory of Haiti.”

For anyone who has followed MINUSTAH’s operations this denial rings hollow. Ten months ago reckless sewage disposal at the UN base near Mirebalais caused a devastating cholera outbreak. In October 2010 a new deployment of Nepalese troops brought a disease to Haiti that has left 6,200 dead and more than 438,000 ill.

The back story to this affair is that the waste company managing the base, Sanco Enterprises S.A., disposed the fecal matter from the Nepalese troops in pits that seeped into the Artibonite River. Locals drank from the river, which is how the first Haitians got infected with cholera.

Despite a mountain of evidence collected from local and international researchers, the UN refuses to take responsibility for the cholera outbreak. A November investigation by prominent French epidemiologist, Renaud Piarroux, pointed to the Nepalese troops as the probable origin of the cholera strain, as did a study published by the journal of the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention and an investigation by Nepalese, Danish and Americans researchers at the “Translational Genomics Research Institute” in Arizona. Released last Tuesday, the latter study showed that the genomes of bacteria from Haitian cholera patients were virtually identical with those found in Nepal when the peacekeepers left their country in 2010.

A week ago MINUSTAH spokesperson Vincenzo Pugliesse said the international organization was aware of the new study but maintained that “we follow the recommendations of the report released by the group of experts appointed by the Secretary-General.” That report refused to pinpoint any single source for the cholera outbreak, concluding it was caused by a “confluence of circumstances.”

The debate over cholera’s origin takes places as the disease continues to ravage the country. In June, the beginning of the rainy season, there were a whopping 1800 new cases per day.

Despite the ongoing impact of cholera and widespread anger at MINUSTAH over the issue, the UN’s sewage disposal has been of little interest to the international media. Recently, the weekly Haiti liberté published a picture of a UN vehicle dumping sewage into a river on its front page, but an English-language Google search found no reports in the global press about the criticism towards the international organization’s waste disposal (aside from passing mentions in the leftist San Francisco Bay View and Truthdig).

Media indifference to the UN’s lax health standards is mirrored in the aid world. Supposedly concerned with Haitian well being, the innumerable foreign NGOs working in Haiti have said little about MINUSTAH’s waste disposal and disregard for public health. In fact, when the cholera outbreak began, various international humanitarian organizations belittled those calling for an investigation into its source. A few weeks after the outbreak Médecins sans frontières’ Head of Mission in Port-au-Prince, Stefano Zannini, told Montreal daily La Presse, “Our position is pragmatic: to have learnt the source at the beginning of the epidemic would not have saved more lives. To know today would have no impact either.” For their part, Oxfam criticized those who protested the UN bringing a disease with no recorded history in Haiti. “If the country explodes in violence then we will not be able to reach the people we need to”, an Oxfam spokeswoman, Julie Schindall, told the Guardian after the outbreak.

Rather than support calls for UN accountability, the NGOs jumped to the international organization’s defence. Highly dependent on Western government funding and political support, NGOs are overwhelmingly focused on a charitable model that fails to challenge the political or economic structures that cause the poverty and illness they seek to cure. But without political pressure the practices that engender poverty and illness will continue, a point driven home with the UN’s waste disposal and cholera. Without pressure MINUSTAH will continue to dispose of waste however they see fit.

To right some of what’s wrong MINUSTAH needs to immediately stop dumping sewage without concern for public health. They should also apologize for introducing cholera to Haiti and to make the apology meaningful the UN ought to compensate Haitians by making the country cholera-free through massive investments in the country’s sanitation and sewage systems.

When the Europeans discovered America five hundred years ago, their economic system went viral. Increasingly, European powers realised that the balance of power at home would be dictated by the strength they were able to draw from their colonies abroad. Imperialism (aka capitalism) has been the fundamental hallmark of the world’s economic structure ever since.

For Africa, this has meant non-stop subjection to an increasingly systematic plunder of people and resources that has been unrelenting to this day. First was the brutal kidnapping of tens of millions of Africans to replace the indigenous American workforce that had been wiped out by the Europeans. The slave trade was devastating for African economies, which were rarely able to withstand the population collapse; but the capital it created for plantation owners in the Caribbean laid the foundations for Europe’s industrial revolution. Throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, as more and more precious materials were found in Africa (especially tin, rubber, gold and silver), the theft of land and resources ultimately resulted in the so-called “Scramble for Africa” of the 1870s, when, over the course of a few years, Europeans divided up the entire continent (with the exception of Ethiopia) amongst themselves. By this point, the world’s economy was increasingly becoming an integrated whole, with Africa continuing to provide the basis for European industrial development as Africans were stripped of their land and forced down gold mines and on to rubber plantations.

After the Second World War, the European powers, weakened by years of unremitting industrial slaughter of each another, contrived to adapt colonialism to the new conditions in which they found themselves. As liberation movements grew in strength, the European powers confronted a new economic reality – the cost of subduing the ‘restless natives’ was starting to near the level of wealth they were able to extract from them. Their favoured solution was what Kwame Nkrumah termed ‘neo-colonialism’ – handing over the formal attributes of political sovereignty to a trusted bunch of hand-picked cronies who would allow the economic exploitation of their countries to continue unabated. In other words, adapting colonialism so that Africans themselves were forced to shoulder the burden and cost of policing their own populations.

In practice, it wasn’t that simple. All across Asia, Africa and Latin America, mass movements began to demand control of their own resources, and in many places, these movements managed to gain power – sometimes through guerrilla struggle, sometimes through the ballot box. This led to vicious wars by the European powers – now under the leadership of their upstart protege, the USA – to destroy such movements. This struggle, not the so-called “Cold War”, is what defined the history of post-war international relations.

So far, neo-colonialism has largely been a successful project for the Europeans and the US. Africa’s role as provider of cheap, often slave, labour and minerals has largely continued unabated. Poverty and disunity have been the essential ingredients that have allowed this exploitation to continue. However, both are now under serious threat.

Chinese investment in Africa over the past ten years has been building up African industry and infrastructure in a way that may begin to seriously tackle the continent’s poverty. In China, these policies have brought about unprecedented reductions in poverty  and have helped to lift the country into the position it will shortly hold as the world’s leading economic power. If Africa follows this model, or anything like it, the West’s five hundred year plunder of Africa’s wealth may be nearing a close.

To prevent this ‘threat of African development’, the Europeans and the USA have responded in the only way they know how – militarily. Four years ago, the US set up a new “command and control centre” for the military subjugation of the Africa, called AFRICOM. The problem for the US was that no African country wanted to host them; indeed, until very recently, Africa was unique in being the only continent in the world without a US military base. And this fact is, in no small part, thanks to the efforts of the Libyan government.

Before Gaddafi’s revolution deposed the British-backed King Idris in 1969, Libya had hosted one of the world’s biggest US airbases, the Wheelus Air Base; but within a year of the revolution, it had been closed down and all foreign military personnel expelled.

More recently, Gaddafi had been actively working to scupper AFRICOM. African governments that were offered money by the US to host a base were typically offered double by Gaddafi to refuse it, and in 2008 this ad-hoc opposition crystallised into a formal rejection of AFRICOM by the African Union.

Perhaps even more worrying for US and European domination of the continent were the huge resources that Gaddafi was channelling into African development. The Libyan government was by far the largest investor in Africa’s first ever satellite, launched in 2007, which freed Africa from $500 million per year in payments to European satellite companies. Even worse for the colonial powers, Libya had allocated $30 billion for the African Union’s three big financial projects, aimed at ending African dependence on Western finance. The African Investment Bank – with its headquarters in Libya – was to invest in African development at no interest, which would have seriously threatened the International Monetary Fund’s domination of Africa – a crucial pillar for keeping Africa in its impoverished position. And Gaddafi was leading the AU’s development of a new gold-backed African currency, which would have cut yet another of the strings that keep Africa at the mercy of the West, with $42 billion already allocated to this project – again, much of it by Libya.

NATO’s war is aimed at ending Libya’s trajectory as a socialist, anti-imperialist, pan-Africanist nation in the forefront of moves to strengthen African unity and independence. The rebels have made clear their virulent racism from the very start of their insurrection, rounding up or executing thousands of black African workers and students. All the African development funds for the projects described above have been ‘frozen’ by the NATO countries and are to be handed over to their hand-picked buddies in the NTC to spend instead on weapons to facilitate their war.

For Africa, the war is far from over. The African continent must recognise that NATO’s lashing out is a sign of desperation, of impotence, of its inability to stop the inevitable rise of Africa on the world stage. Africa must learn the lessons from Libya, continue the drive towards pan-African unity, and continue to resist AFRICOM. Plenty of Libyans will still be with them when they do so.

The earthquake made Mathias homeless when it crushed his apartment and killed his cousin and younger brother. He and his wife first stayed in a park next to St. Anne’s Catholic Church. Then the family moved to what they thought was a safer place, Sylvio Cator stadium. They put up a tent on the lawn inside the stadium and stayed there for several months. The authorities then moved them just outside of the stadium so the soccer team could practice. They lived in a tent outside the stadium with 514 other families for over a year until they were ordered to leave in July 2011. Each family was told they had to leave and were given 10,000 Goudes (about $250 in US dollars) to assist in their relocation. Where did the 514 families go? No one knows for sure. About 150 families stayed together and live under tarps beside Mathias. Some used the money to build new tarp shelters elsewhere and some used it for food. The rest? No one knows. No one is keeping track.

When I asked what Mathias would like to say to the human rights community, he said:

The life of the people living in the tents is not a human life. Our human rights are not respected. No institutions are taking care of us, we are the forgotten. We want people to remember us and help us to have the human life we should have. It’s not our choice to live this way. The situation of life bring us here. We hope to have a normal life. But the hope is very far from us.

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) reported August 19, 2011 that there are about 594,800 people living in about 1000 displacement camps in Haiti. Most want to leave but have nowhere to go. Nearly 8000 people have been evicted in the last three months. Their report concludes by saying “With nearly 600,000 internally displaced persons still in camps, the scale of Haiti’s homeless problem remains daunting.”

Complicating the problem is the increasing wave of forced evictions happening in Haiti. These are evictions without any legal process, often by police, frequently accompanied by violence.

Landowners use armed police and private security to carry out evictions and scare people away. They rarely go to court because they usually cannot prove they own the land. So they resort to brute force to overwhelm the families. Police and private security use guns, machetes, batons and bulldozers to push people out.

The administration of President Michel Martelly has apparently given a green light to widespread violent demolition of camps without any legal process. Though the administration announced plans to relocate families from six camps, nothing has happened.

The Haitian human rights law firm Bureau des Avocats Internationaux (BAI) reports that before June they were receiving several threats of forced evictions per month. Since June, the threats increased to several per week. Now they are receiving several reports of forced evictions every day.

Dozens of human rights activists called on the United Nations to condemn these illegal evictions and to make Haiti impose a moratorium on illegal evictions until there are realistic plans to house the families being uprooted.

These evictions are in defiance of a ruling by the Inter American Commission on Human Rights which issued precautionary measures asking Haiti to cease illegal evictions. On November 18, 2010, the IACHR expressed concern over forced evictions of the displaced and sexual violence against women and girls. Specifically, the IACHR wrote Haiti asking the government to “offer those who have been illegally expelled from the camps a transfer to places that have minimum health and security conditions, and then transfer them if they so agree; guarantee that internally displaced persons have access to effective recourse before a court and before other competent authorities; implement effective security measures to safeguard the physical integrity of the inhabitants of the camps, guaranteeing especially the protection of women and children; train the security forces in the rights of displaced persons, especially their right not to be forcibly expelled from the camps; and ensure that international cooperation agencies have access to the camps.”

Residents recently surveyed by BAI and the University of San Francisco said money given them upon eviction was insufficient to relocate or pay rent anywhere. Small grants worth about $250 are not enough to build even the most basic 12×10 shack with plywood walls, a corrugated metal roof and concrete floor – leaving many of those evicted without any shelter except to go put up a tarp in another displacement camp. No wonder that 35 percent of them reported being the victims of physical harm or threats of physical harm.

The following are recent examples of illegal forced evictions, all have occurred since Martelly became President.

On May 27, 2011, at 6am, Haitian National Police wielding machetes and knives stormed a camp in the Delmas 3 neighborhood destroying about 200 makeshift tents, and forcing people to flee, according to Jacqueline Charles of the Miami Herald. There was no court order of eviction.

In early June, Haitian National Police showed up and began destroying tarps and tents of hundreds of families camped at the intersection of Delmas and Airport Roads. The police fired shots and swung batons as people protested in front of their camp. This was done without legal authority.

Later in June, at another camp in Delmas 3, truckloads of agents armed with machetes descended on another camp and dismantled it. After the tents were destroyed a bulldozer showed up and leveled what was left. This too was without any legal process.

In a midnight raid on July 3, 2011, police and private security forces completely destroyed tents of about 30 families in Camp Eric Jean-Baptiste in the Port au Prince suburb of Carrefour.

On July 18, 2011, Haitian National Police entered the displacement camp in the parking lot of Sylvio Cator sports stadium and destroyed the tents and belongings of 514 families. There was no lawful process. People were given about $250 to pay for new shelters. Many told human rights monitors that they did not want the money, they wanted to stay but accepted the money as they had no other options. These illegal evictions were condemned by the UN Office of High Commissioner for Human Rights.

On July 27, 2011, members of the Haitian National Police arrested, assaulted and ransacked tents of internally displaced people protesting against the illegal eviction of dozens of families at Camp Django. Camp residents were given about $125 for their destroyed shelters.

So, what should be happening?

The Interim Haiti Recovery Commission, co-chaired by former US President Bill Clinton, just pledged $78 million to fund a housing plan for 16 districts in Haiti. But, as Haiti Grassroots Watch reports, even if all the planned repairs and construction of 68,025 units takes place, that is only 22 percent of what is needed since there are over 300,000 families and 600,000 people living in camps.

It is time for the Interim Haiti Recovery Commission, the UN, The US and the international community to stand up for the human rights of the hundreds of thousands of people like Mathias. Housing is a human right. Using force to evict homeless survivors of Haiti’s earthquake from one spot to make them homeless in another place is illegal, senseless and violent. Mathias and his family deserve much more.

• Vladimir Laguerre helped with this article.

Three days into the fast, lethargy set it. The end seemed near. Although I fared well in my first attempt at fasting for an entire month, I had my weak and reprehensible moments. I hid in dark corners with my favorite snacks: a cucumber, a tomato, a loaf of pita bread. To be caught would be shameful and degrading, a regression back into childhood, a terrible example to my younger siblings, and a ripe topic of ridicule from my older brothers.

Ramadan in a Gaza refugee camp is an entirely different experience from Ramadan anywhere else. A malnourished population of impoverished refugees abstains from food and gives endless thanks for life’s fortunes. The irony didn’t escape me then, as it doesn’t escape me now. The Imam of our refugee camp’s Great Mosque would spend much time thanking Allah for his numerous gifts. Hands extended to the sky, and faces lowered to the ground, the faithful would repeat in impressive unison: ‘Amen’. Even as Israeli helicopters buzzed above their heads and military vehicles speed nearby, the faithful kept their faces lowered. Even as the smell of gunpowder and teargas poisoned the atmosphere, their hands stayed extended. “Alhamdulilah,” said the Imam. Thanks to God. And the crowd repeated, “Amen.”

I tried to make sense of all this as I struggled with my hunger pains. I questioned the wisdom of the whole endeavor. At times, I even challenged my mother. Fasting herself, she had no room for a self-indulgent, sacrilegious eight-year-old. “We fast to feel the pain of others,” she said simply. Any child in a refugee camp could understand the meaning behind her words. Our refugee camp was rife with ‘others’ in pain. One of them was Umm Ali, a mother forced to take her children out of school and send them to work as cheap laborers in Israel. Another was Abu Musa, a construction worker in Tel Aviv who just about managed to feed his own children, but never managed to repair his decaying house.

Since my family was also a member of the ‘others’ club, I fasted. And like all the ‘others’, I thanked God with a lowered gaze and extended arms.

Years later, in 1999, I joined a group of journalists and peace activists on a trip to Iraq. The aim was to stand in solidarity with all those devastated by the US-led siege. According to modest UN estimates, hundreds of thousands of people – the majority of whom were children under the age of five – were killed as a result of the decades-long sanctions.

For this trip, we flew in from different countries and congregated in Jordan. I myself had flown in from the US. One delegation member arrived from Gaza with nearly $10,000 dollars, which he had collected from schools, mosques and the street. The Israelis didn’t allow him to haul boxes of medicine donated by Gaza hospitals, and the Iraqis didn’t allow him entry because his passport had been stamped in Hebrew letters. The young man left the money in trusted hands, asking them to purchase medicine for Iraqi children from Amman. As he turned back at the Jordan-Iraq border on the way back to Gaza, he asked me to convey the solidarity of Palestine and Gaza to the people of Iraq.

In this way, Gaza speaks. Gaza Feels. Gaza takes stances and Gaza conveys regards.

Expectedly, the Horn of Africa famine is now generating quite a stir in Gaza. Starving Somalis are also now the ‘others’ whose pain we are urged to feel. 11 million people are reeling under the encroaching famine, and tens of thousands have already died. Somalia is the epic center of the disaster. The hunger of its people shames humanity to its core. Stories from the region tell of the absolute horror experienced by whole generations. Yet scenes of mothers tenderly comforting their dying children also tell a different story. It is a story of love, one that no statistic can capture, no politician can override.

Gaza, itself under a harsh Israeli siege imposed since Hamas was elected to power in 2006, has been one of the first places to respond to calls for help.

During a recent Al Jazeera interview, the head of a Somalia-based charity mission decried the lack of support his people were receiving. He lambasted the world, particularly Arabs and Muslims. He seemed puzzled by the fact that little support is reaching the victims even during the holiest of Muslim periods. Then he spoke of the aid arriving from Gaza. The news anchor cut him off quickly at this point, and moved on to a ‘related topic’: aid sent by the Qatari government.

I wondered about it myself. Could Israel-besieged Gaza really be sending aid to famine-besieged Somalia?

Indeed.

One of multiple Gaza-led charity campaigns to aid Somalia is called “From Gaza: hand in hand to save the children of Somalia”. According to Ma’an News Agency, this latest effort is led by the Arab Medical Union. “The campaign aimed to demonstrate the extent of physical cohesion between besieged Gaza and Somalia and that the Palestinian people are capable to support and stand with the Somali people,” Ma’an reported on August 2. Palestinians in the West Bank are also mobilizing around help for Somalia. The doctor’ union has opened several bank accounts to accommodate donations.

My mother’s generation must be immensely proud. Their endless sermons about the ‘pain of others’ has registered well in the minds and hearts of their children. Somalis, too, I am certain, can fully appreciate the pain of Gaza.

Gaza. Somalia. Even in its darkest moment, humanity somehow lives on.

Regarding this issue, since March fourth to date the international media, especially based in Miami, Washington and Madrid, are concentrating on Havana, the Gross trials and legal challenges.

For those who may be puzzled by the Supreme Court decision, it would be useful to examine briefly what has happened in the United States — not Cuba — between March fourth to date in order to perhaps shed some light onto the Supreme Court’s confirmation of the lower court’s resolution. In this five-month period, the Obama Administration has on many occasions repeated its policy of interfering in the internal affairs of Cuba under the guise of “democracy promotion”. For example, the Congress has recently ratified once again the decision to spend 20$ million in the next year explicitly dedicated to subversion in Cuba, including the type of activities that Gross had carried out and for which he has been arrested, tried, found guilty and sentenced. On many occasions the Obama Administration in collaboration with their mercenaries on and off the island did not reduce, but rather reinforced, their provocative activities against the sovereignty of Cuba, one of the legal principles violated by Gross as a US agent contractor.

While Obama visited Chile on March 21, 2011, not long after the original trial and sentencing of Gross, the US President spoke about the need to defend “democracy and human rights within our borders [USA and Chile], let us recommit to defending them across our hemisphere…. And yes, that includes the people of Cuba.”

How do readers think that the Cuban government and judiciary had taken this? By adding insult to injury, Obama stated in an interview to a Chilean newspaper as a prelude to his visit to Santiago de Chile that “The Chilean experience, and more particularly its successful transition to democracy and its sustained, growing economy, is a model for the region and the world.”

When the news was released on August fifth regarding the Cuban Supreme Court decision, it was the same day that those of us who follow the news through Telesúr and other alternative media were able to bear witness to how the Chilean police violently attacked the students and professors demanding education, economic and political rights. There were according to official sources 874 arrests and hundreds wounded. Is this the example that Obama meant of Chile being a model of democracy and economic development for Cuba? The scenes of Chilean state brutality resembled more the emblematic steps (Escalanita) of the University of Havana before the January 1, 1959 Triumph of the Revolution, when the US-backed Batista dictatorship unleashed their forces so many times against the youth, professors and workers. Many students were killed in these assaults in Havana, but so far at the time of writing in any case, there has been no deaths in Chile during the course of the current confrontations.

Despite the demands to Obama from around the world declared by Nobel Prize winners, individual parliamentarians, parliaments and personalities for the release of the Cuban Five, what has Obama done between March fourth and today? He has done nothing, and we are heading into a most crucial period for the soon-to-be concluded Habeus Corpus process for Gerardo Hernández Nodelo, with nothing yet positive in sight at this time. The Cuban Five are imprisoned since 1998 because they attempted to curb US-backed terrorist interference in the internal affairs of Cuba.

Given all these provocations and repeated confirmations from the White House and the US Congress that they have every intention to continue their program of attempting to subvert Cuba’s constitutional order, how else can the Cuban government and judicial authorities react? They have no choice but to make it clear that they will continue to defend their sovereignty as it is the right of every country to do so, big or small.

Allan Gross and his family should blame their own government for their predicament. The White House got him into it in the first place. By carrying out the same policies against Cuba since March fourth to date, it has given no reason for the Cuban judiciary to decide otherwise.

Around 10.7 million people already need urgent humanitarian assistance, while many thousands are fleeing a devastated Somalia each day to take refuge in makeshift camps across Ethiopia and Kenya. The United Nations has now officially declared two regions of southern Somalia to be in famine – a situation in which at least 20 percent of households face a complete lack of food and other basic necessities, and starvation, death and destitution are evident. As the Famine Early Warning Systems Network makes clear, the currently inadequate levels of humanitarian response are likely to see famine spread across all eight regions of southern Somalia within two months and could lead to “total livelihood/social collapse”.

With food insecurity in the East African region remaining an ongoing concern for decades, many humanitarian agencies have been trying to draw attention to a potential famine in these countries for some time. The UN made an appeal for $500m in 2010 to assist with food security, but managed to secure only half from donors. Consequently, hunger levels have rocketed over recent months, and in some areas the number of young children suffering malnutrition is now three times the normal emergency level. At least half a million children risk death if immediate help does not reach them, according to the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF).

The humanitarian coordinator for Somalia has also described the lack of resources as alarming, with insufficient donations of food, clean water, shelter and health services to save the lives of hundreds of thousands of Somalis in desperate need. The underlying problem is repeated by various aid organisations: that the international response is not commensurate with the urgent requirements of those affected by the humanitarian catastrophe, and there is a lack of international support to address the deep-seated causes of the crisis or to mitigate future crises.

Yet the extreme deprivation being widely reported across East African is just the tip of the iceberg. Needless impoverishment and death is an ongoing catastrophe that unfolds daily, largely without any attention from the world’s media or the public. At least 41,000 people in the developing world continue to die each day from easily preventable diseases that barely occur in high-income countries, such as diarrhoea, malaria or nutritional deficiencies. Despite the scale of these preventable deaths – amounting to 15 million lives lost each year, half of which affect young children before their fifth birthday – there is no official recognition that such extreme deprivation should also be considered a humanitarian catastrophe and treated accordingly.

These shameful mortality rates occur as a result of the ongoing silent disaster of world poverty, which receives a similarly inadequate international response to the periodic famines or food crises in countries like Somalia. For over a decade, international efforts to reduce poverty have centred around the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), a set of globally agreed targets that are set to expire in 2015. Although the MDGs have done much to focus attention on global poverty, they are widely considered an insufficient and superficial approach to economic development and saving lives.

A Deadly Lack of Ambition

The politically sensitive principles of equity and distributive justice that featured in the original Millennium Declaration have gradually faded from the official development discourse, accompanied by a deadly lack of ambition. Even if the MDG goal on halving rates of poverty is met, a staggering 882 million people will still be living in absolute poverty in 2015. In effect, the MDG’s focus on merely reducing over time the number of people living below the threshold of human survival tacitly accepts the continuance of poverty-related deaths each day. Similarly, goals four and five commit to reduce maternal mortality by only three quarters by 2015, and under-five child mortality by two-thirds, which accepts not only a high number of preventable maternal and child deaths remaining at the end of the MDG period, but also many millions of such needless deaths in the interim.

In an interdependent and globalised world, there can be no meaningful process of development whilst so many people living in poverty die prematurely and unnecessarily. The impact on families, communities and economies are devastating, and preventing these deaths is an urgent moral necessity. Even in the crudest economic calculations, putting an end to avoidable deaths would amount to a significant investment in human capital, as healthy individuals whose basic needs are secured are far more likely to contribute to the growth of communities and nations. It is objectionable from any social, moral or economic viewpoint that sufficient resources are not immediately made available to address the crises of extreme deprivation, especially in its most acute manifestation well before the situation degenerates into a full-blown famine.

International efforts to address the life-threatening poverty of millions of people in the poorest countries must aim far higher and provide much more than the current insufficient, voluntary and often conditional donations of overseas aid and disaster assistance. A massively upscaled redistribution of resources from North to South is essential to avert humanitarian disasters and prevent extreme deprivation and poverty-related deaths. Given the scale of these related crises, an international program of emergency relief must become the highest priority of world governments, followed by assistance for developing countries to secure ongoing state-provided welfare and essential services for all their citizens. Efforts to improve the redistribution of wealth nationally through the development of local industries, better taxation and the provision of comprehensive social protection for all people should become the new focus of international development policy.

Central to this transformation of development is the principle of sharing, which embodies universally accepted ethical values that reflect our common humanity. Aligning the international policy discourse more closely to our shared moral obligations can help redeem decades of unjust economic and social policy, prevent future famines and help manifest an inclusive vision of progress and development. In the simplest economic terms, sharing points to the need for a redistribution of wealth from rich to poor, and a shift in power relations from financial and commercial interests to the world’s majority population. The East African crisis presents another opportunity for civil society to demand that wealth and resources are shared more equitably across the world, and that policy-makers prioritise the complete eradication of poverty above all other concerns.

Moalim, quoted by the British Telegraph, was not posing as spokesperson to the estimated 11 million people (per United Nations figures) who are currently in dire need of food. About 440,000 of those affected by the world’s “worst humanitarian disaster” dwell in a state of complete despair in Dadaab, a complex of three camps in Kenya. Imagine the fate of those not lucky enough to reach these camps, people who remain chronically lacking in resources, and, in the case of Somalia, trapped in a civil war.

All that Batula Moalim was pleading for was “plastic sheeting for shelter, as well as for food and medicine.”

It is disheartening, to say the least, when such disasters don’t represent an opportunity for political, military or other strategic gains, subsequently, enthusiasm to ‘intervene’ peters out so quickly.

UN officials from the World Food Programme (WFP) are not asking for much: $500 million to stave off the effects of what is believed to be the worst drought to hit the Horn of Africa in 60 years. This is not an impossible feat, especially when one considers the geographic extent of the drought and creeping famine. Ethiopia, Somalia, Djibouti, Kenya are all affected, and terribly so. Sudan and Eretria are also not far from the center of this encroaching disaster.

60 percent of the amount requested by WFP has already been raised. More is needed, however, especially as the reverberation of the drought is already surpassing the immediate need for food and shelter. Five million are already at risk of cholera in Ethiopia alone, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Hundreds have reportedly died, and many more are likely to follow.

Cholera requires an immediate remedy as the intestinal infection leads to sever diarrhea, dehydration and death. Other figures are equally grim. 8.8 million people, also in Ethiopia, are at risk of contracting malaria, according to Tarik Jasarevic, WHO spokesman.  Jasarevic has also told journalists that these ailments have already been reported in Somalia, and other Ethiopian regions. This means the disaster is not confined to refugee camps and is thus much harder to control.

For refugees, there is nothing worse than having no safe haven in sight. Still, they must escape when death becomes the only alternative to aimless journeys. While hundreds of thousands are gathering in Kenya’s camps, an average of 1,700 Somali refugees venture to Ethiopia each day. The latter, a country with a population of about 85 million, is fully embroiled in the crisis. 4.5 million Ethiopians need assistance, a rise of over 50 percent in less than three months, according to WHO. One can only try to envisage the speed at which this disaster is unraveling.

International organizations, including WFP, WHO and UNICEF have made numerous appeals. Some major media outlets responded by giving the humanitarian crisis a degree of coverage. While donations have bashfully trickled in, the goals are yet to be reached. According to a report by the Telegraph, “no African country has offered a donation to help drought victims in the Horn of Africa outside of those affected.”

The report, published July 15, quoted Michael O’Brien-Onyeka, Oxfam’s Regional Campaigns Policy Manager for East and Central Africa, who said it was “disappointing” that “African states insist on ‘African solutions for African problems’ with regard to Libya but fail to respond to droughts and famines.”

On the subject of Libya, it may be helpful to consider some financial figures.

“The British Government has pledged £38 million in food aid to Ethiopia,” reported the Telegraph. The following day, British Daily Mirror reported on the seemingly different subject of Libya. Four more British jets were recently deployed to the war zone near Libya, raising the total to 22 RAF jets, according to James Lyons in the Mirror (July 16). The cost thus far is £260 million, only £40 million short of the total amount needed by the WFP to feed 11 million starving people.

Here is another example of the dubious nature of British involvement in the war on Libya (falsely slated as a war to prevent imminent massacres of civilians): “Tornado GR4s cost around £35,000 for every hour they are in the air and are having to fly long distances from their base in Gioia del Colle, southern Italy, to Libya,” according to the Mirror.

Major African countries and Britain are not the only parties involved in acts of duplicity. The US military adventurism in the Horn of African, especially Somalia, and its renewed use of costly unmanned drones can feed, cloth, shelter and treat countless refugees. More, Arab and Muslim countries tend to be the least responsive parties in such situations. While it is true that the chief of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu made several appeals for help, such singular calls generate feel-good moments but no major mobilization for action.

The disaster in the Horn of Africa is partly man-made. Countries with ‘failed states’ status (in other words, victims of outside interventions) cannot possibly fend off crises of this magnitude. For the last 20 years, Somalia has had no central government controlling the country’s territories. Outside intervention has made it impossible for any party to unite the disjointed country. What is a Somali refugee to do?

To help the millions disaffected by the multilayered disaster in the Horn of Africa, we need more than appeals for blankets and food stuff.  We also need a degree of human decency and common sense. We need to re-channel some of the funds wasted on disastrous wars into actually saving lives. If warning parties would ground their Tornado GR4s and other warplanes for a few days, the single action alone could save the entire region.

For now, though, let us all do what we can to help the Horn of Africa survive this terrible ordeal.

But he made no mention of powerful American ally Saudi Arabia, which has not escaped the Arab Spring uprisings. One report noted: “Saudi Arabia’s worst nightmare – the arrival of the new Arab awakening of rebellion and insurrection in the kingdom – is now casting its long shadow over the House of Saud. Provoked by the Shia majority uprising in the neighbouring Sunni-dominated island of Bahrain, where protesters are calling for the overthrow of the ruling al-Khalifa family, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia is widely reported to have told the Bahraini authorities that if they do not crush their Shia revolt, his own forces will.”

When the White House backed the uprisings beginning with the fall from power of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, another long-time U.S. ally, Saudi Arabia might have been worried about what Obama’s 19 May (2011) speech might have contained. They need not have.

The relationship between the U.S and Saudi Arabia is a long and complex one. The public attention that the Arab Spring uprisings brings to Saudi Arabia has the potential to drive a wedge between the two countries. Attention to the Saudi-American relationship tends to focus on the idea that America is Saudi’s protector in the region. This is an idea rejected by the House of Saud. But it was only in 1990, when Iraq’s Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait that the Saudis turned to the U.S. military for protection. Iran is considered as an enemy state by both the US and Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabian concern about U.S. policy in the Middle East is deep-seated, dating to the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq, which brought into being the first Shiite-led Arab nation in modern history. In Lebanon, Washington has not been able to stop Iranian-backed Hezbollah from steadily expanding its political clout.

Recent events are also ominous. The Saudis, armed with the best U.S. military technology, are claiming themselves as guardians of the Arab status quo. They have made it clear that they will not accept popular rule anywhere in the states under the Council for the Arab States of the Gulf.

It is the status quo (including American support) that is the very thing the Arab Spring protesters want to overthrow. Moreover, America has steadily become wedged itself, accounting for its slow official response to the events that have been occurring in Northern Africa and the Middle East since December 2010.

Successive American administrations have not as been as strident on human rights abuses in Saudi Arabia as they have been elsewhere. This is the trade off for having Saudi Arabia as an American sphere of influence in the region. Now with the protestors demanding reform, a rejection of regimes backed by outside states for geo-political self-interests, and the delivery of human rights, America is itself wedged and the Saudi’s have been worried about why Barrack Obama might do.

Associated Press has reported that there is a “deepening political divide” between the Obama administration and the rule of King Abdullah bin Abdul-Aziz. Privately however the U.S. and the Saudi Arabia are quietly expanding defense ties on a vast scale, led by a little-known project to develop an elite force to protect the kingdom’s oil riches and future nuclear sites. The U.S. also is in discussions with Saudi Arabia to create an air and missile defense system with far greater capability against the regional rival the Saudis fear most, Iran.

Britain’s Amnesty International had already issued a press release ahead saying Obama needed to make it clear that his administration is “committed to promoting freedom, justice and accountability with friend and foe alike”. This seems problematic given the Saudi government ranks low on The Economist’s Democracy Index.

For a president elected on a platform of change, and with a speech embracing opportunity, Obama’s silence on Saudi Arabia is deafening.

It is clear that the Haitian people desperately need decisive action to be taken towards rebuilding the country. However, Martelly is an ardent proponent of neoliberalism and a supporter of the 2004 coup against former president Aristide, and remains a staunch opponent of Lavalas- the only political party in Haiti to attempt to improve the lives of the poor. Worryingly, he also has ties to the Duvalierist order and plans to reinstate the Haitian Army. His victory represents simply a continuation of the existing iniquitous order, with statements that Haiti is “open for business now” strongly suggesting that plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.

In order for the significance of these contemporary events to be fully understood though, they must be situated within Haiti’s history of subordination and exploitation and the context of global power relations, along with the influence that the international community has long had in Haiti’s domestic affairs. The problems which prevent real change in Haiti are arguably systemic, rooted in Haiti’s history of exploitation and exclusion, and corresponding lack of power within the world-system.

The Haitian people were given very little say in terms of the election itself. The international community pressured the Preval government to drop specific candidates from the race, in favour of positioning Mirlande Manigat and Michel Martelly in line for the runoff. This disjuncture between the Haitian people and the State is not new — few governments in Haitian history have obtained their position without the acquiescence of the US government. Such approval has always come with the requirement that Haiti’s government adopt specific policies in keeping with prevailing global economic orthodoxy. As a result, control over the State has generally remained strictly within the hands of the US (and the domestic elite) at the expense of the poor majority.

The neoliberal State building framework represents the contemporary manifestation of the historic inequalities of power between different States. First introduced to Haiti in the 1970s, it is based on the assertion that free-market reforms (a deceptive term given the need for heavy government interference to enforce such destabilising policy) and structural adjustment will generate economic growth, the benefits of which will eventually ‘trickle down’ to those below.

However, the majority of Haitians have experienced structural adjustment as spiralling social inequality and the further impoverishment. According primacy to the ‘free-market’ allows human life to be subjugated to the vagaries of the market and international capital. Statistics from a 2009 International Monetary Fund Report show that 76% of Haitians live on less than $2 a day- an increase from previous years. The drastic reduction of trade tariffs on rice during Clinton’s government left farmers unable to compete with heavily subsidised US products and set the country on a path towards import (and aid) dependence. This precipitated high rural-urban migration to seek work in export processing zones. Prior to the January 2010 earthquake unemployment stood at around 70% while wages fell in real terms below 20% of 1981 levels, while prices of basic commodities rose, culminating in riots in 2008. At the State level neoliberalism has continued to reproduce asymmetries in economic power between Haiti and the dominant States.

Despite the human cost of neoliberalism, and the very specific conception of ‘progress’ it is based upon, it remains hegemonic and continues to be promoted by the international community in the post-earthquake period. The Draft Private Sector Plan indicates that Haiti’s reconstruction will follow the same principles as previous international interventions in its economy. Haitian control over the reconstruction process is minimal: the Interim Haiti Reconstruction Commission (IHRC) accords fifty percent of the vote to Haitian members and the other fifty to international donors, naturally including the US, France, Canada, the IMF, the World Bank, and the Inter-American Development Bank, but the Haitian members of the ICRC have complained of their excluded from the decision-making process, and the expectation that they approve decisions that have already been made.

The privatisation of relief and reconstruction efforts in the wake of the January 2010 earthquake can also be viewed as a continuation and expansion of neoliberal policy towards Haiti. Statistics indicate the existence of a burgeoning disaster economy where $98.40 of every $100 awarded in reconstruction contracts by the US government is consequently recycled back to the US from the local economy through the salaries of international aid workers/contractors. Reports show that jobs are often outsourced to foreign workers despite unemployment rates of 85%.

The overwhelming number of NGOs in Haiti (approximately 12,000) combined with how they operate continues to undermine the Haitian government. This is despite an ECOSOC Report emphasising “the need to shift from an NGO-driven model of development to a State-driven model” in order for there to be a level of transparency and accountability. The absence of adequate regulation erodes government capacity by permitting funds to be channelled to a multitude of different projects without any coordination between NGOs themselves or through consultation with the relevant government ministries.

NGOs share the objectives and ideology of their donors and are by no means apolitical. Their proliferation in Haiti can be traced to the ‘rolling back’ of the State in the 1970s where they effectively lent legitimacy to the neoliberal reforms through replacing the State as service providers. Certain NGOs also played a key role in destabilising the Aristide government when his cautious efforts to implement agrarian and educational reforms came up against the domestic and international elite with a vested interest in the enforcement of neoliberal reform. As the head of USAid recently stated, aid forms part of a strategy to achieve the economic goals of donor governments.

The feasibility of a State-driven model has been questioned due to Haiti’s weak institutions and heavily damaged infrastructure. Of course, according greater responsibility to the State would still entail extensive international support: Haiti desperately needs aid and reconstruction assistance. However, such resources ought to be used in such a way as to support rather than undermine the State, as is happening at present. The international community could use the reconstruction efforts to improve state capacity and public services. Perhaps a first step would be to reapportion power within the IHRC, enabling the Haitian board members to have more than a token role with regard to reconstruction. NGOs could be subject to proper regulation and coordination by government ministries, and in harnessing the resources and expertise they bring, have a more sustainable and coherent impact. Haiti’s numerous civil society organisations, largely excluded so far by the international community, also represent a significant untapped resource and could be used to fill in the gaps or complement the State where it lacks capacity. Such groups already have much experience of collective organisation and service provision and provide an existing infrastructure for resource allocation.

A State-driven model has much to offer in theory, but of course it must be asked: what type of State is envisioned here, and whose interests would it reflect? At present reconstruction nonetheless remains subject to the approval of the usual powerful actors and thus trapped within the parameters of dominant development ideology. Even assuming that Haiti had a government that was willing to act in the interests of the majority of its people, it is hard then to imagine how it could be expected to bring about significant change because of the inherent difficulty in transforming Haiti’s peripheral position and relative powerlessness vis-a-vis other States and international institutions within the global capitalist system. This problem is self-perpetuating: only candidates who will toe the neoliberal line are permitted to stand for election, whilst those that represent real change are prevented from participating. This further marginalises those individuals and groups who have the potential to transform Haiti if given the opportunity, and supported — rather than undermined — by the international community.

Haiti’s lack of economic power, rooted in colonialism and dictatorial rule, has never been adequately addressed and this power imbalance continues to be replicated today through the international community’s insistence on the neoliberal model. Debates surrounding Haiti must move towards a deeper critique that connects crises at the State level with dominant economic and development frameworks, and examine existing power structures that prevent real change. In the meantime the ongoing impoverishment and suffering of the majority of Haitian people remains a stark warning of the failures of the neoliberal State building project.

Detroit is a city of high unemployment rates, empty neighborhoods, houses with boards over the windows and closed factories. It was once the crown jewel of the rust belt, home of the automobile engineering giants General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler – a booming industry that put countless citizens to work in the four thousand factories that dotted the area. But as the world modernized through the march of globalization, the global manufacturing economy became driven by cheap labor, resulting in the gradual close of a great many factories. Thousands were left unemployed and impoverished. Soon, the hundreds of closed schools gave way tens of thousands of empty homes, rampant crime, and a population that is 47% functionally illiterate – an urban wasteland crumbling away in degradation.

In the summer of 2010, something happened. From across the nation, droves of activists, speakers, and interested people descended upon the city to attend the US Social Forum (USSF), the American branch of the global World Social Forum. A “movement building process,” the USSF aims to bring people together for workshops, courses in grassroots fundraising, cultural exhibits, and assemblies to “provide space” in which to “strategize how to reclaim our world.” Anti-corporate activists, environmentalists, socialists and a vast array of leftists of every stripe met together, discussing how to build an alternative to the prevailing norm of globalized capitalism – “tear down poverty” to “build an alternative, solidarity economy.” The topics discussed ranged from the problems of modern day globalization to community outreach to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict in the Middle East.

Sitting on the USSF’s National Planning Committee, the administrative branch of the Social Forum, are two ardently pro-Palestinian organizations – the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network and the US Palestinian Community Network. However, a strange anomaly can be found here; at the top of the National Planning Committee list sits the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO), the largest trade union federation in the United States. While the Social Forum tosses around the idea of a Boycott, Divest and Sanction (BDS) movement aimed at Israel, hoping to pressure the country by targeting the nation’s exports, the AFL-CIO’s current president, Richard Trumka, has made clear his stance on the issue. Speaking at the 2009 Jewish Labor Committee awards dinner, Trumka said:

Given the traditions, the heritage, the commitment – and given the values – Jewish workers have always brought to the labor movement, I don’t think it ought to come as any surprise that the Jewish community here – and around the world – has never had a stronger ally than the AFL-CIO! And, tonight, let me tell you that, so long as I’m president, you will never have a stronger ally than the AFL-CIO! That’s why we’re proud to stand with the JLC to oppose boycotting Israel! Brothers and sisters, there is only one way we’re going to stop the violence in the Middle East – and it’s not by bashing Israel – it’s by supporting President Obama’s peace initiative!¹

The AFL-CIO has a long history of doing things that would seem contrary to the ideals of the US Social Forum. Under the hawkish presidency of George Meany the federation supported the Vietnam War on the grounds of anti-communism. Earlier still, the AFL-CIO’s international arm, the American Federation for Free Labor Development, provided training and funding to opponents of the democratically elected president of Brazil, Juan Bosch, who in two years would be ousted from power.² More recently, in the wake of Chavez’s tightening control of Venezuelan oil fields, the AFL-CIO worked with the State Department’s National Endowment for Democracy (NED) in organizing a massive general strike, alongside CTV, the country’s large labor union. The plans for the strike were drawn up in a closed-door forum, where CTV representatives met with the NED and AFL-CIO to “discuss the chances for a coup in Venezuela.”³

Throughout 1980s and 1990s, the top movers and shakers of the AFL-CIO were intimately intertwined with the leadership of the Social Democrats USA. By the time the labor union became affiliated with the Social Democrats, the large left-leaning organization had traded their commitment to building a participatory democracy for strangely neoconservative ideals, ranging from calling for aid to the Contra rebels in Nicaragua, to saber-rattling for regime change in Iraq, to unconditionally supporting Israel. The AFL-CIO, however, isn’t the only organization on the US Social Forum’s National Planning Committee to show support for American hegemony; listed after the AFL-CIO on the committee is Amnesty International, the global human rights advocacy organization. As Professor Francis A. Boyle, a former board member of the organization puts it:

Amnesty International is primarily motivated not by human rights but by publicity. Second comes money. Third comes getting more members. Fourth, internal turf battles. And then finally, human rights, genuine human rights concerns. To be sure, if you are dealing with a human rights situation in a country that is at odds with the United States or Britain, it gets an awful lot of attention, resources, man and womanpower, publicity, you name it, they can throw whatever they want at that. But if it’s dealing with violations of human rights by the United States, Britain, Israel, then it’s like pulling teeth to get them to really do something on the situation. They might, very reluctantly and after an enormous amount of internal fightings and battles and pressures, you name it. But you know, it’s not like the official enemies list.⁴

Funding a “smarter globalization”

One of the larger workshops held at the 2010 USSF was the “Historic Moment for Funding Social Justice Organizing in the 21st Century.” Attended by “community organizers, researchers, and a large number of foundation staff and board members,” the four-hour seminar primarily discussed “funding and how it impacts social justice work in a variety of formats, including small organizations.”⁵ It was held by several large grassroots organization, along with the Funders Network on Transforming the Global Economy (FNTG), “an alliance of grantmakers committed to building just and sustainable communities around the world.”

The FNTG would certainly seem at odds with the purported ideals of the Social Forum, despite their rhetoric about sustainable communities. Their mission statement never overtly condemns the globalization movement, but focuses instead on how new and different approaches can be taken to make international, integrated capitalism more acceptable to its leftist critics. “A vital issue to consider is that many civil society organizations perceived to be “anti-globalization” and “anti-trade” are neither,” the FNTG states, before commenting that “we must deepen our understanding of these issues” to help “shape a globalization” that reflects the ethics and values of the malcontents.

In short, they advocate an economic globalization based in international trade and the capitalist business model that wears the aesthetics of social consciousness. One needs to look no further than several listed members of the FNTG to understand the motivations of the group. There is the Ford Foundation, whose goal is “making the world safe for capitalism, reducing social tensions by helping to comfort the afflicted, provide safety valves for the angry, and improve the functioning of government.”⁶ Then there is the Open Society Institute, the philanthropy vehicle of George Soros that helped organize disconnected youths into grassroots coalitions that installed pro-Western, capitalist regimes in Georgia and Ukraine. FNTG’s next partner, the Rockefeller Foundation, seeks to make international capitalism’s bitter medicine a bit sweeter with the softer, gentler “smart globalization.” It does this by not only giving money to activist groups, but also working to further the goals of globalized economic integration; the foundation provides funding for the Council on Foreign Relations, a pro-globalization think-tank that attracts politicians, businessmen, and media figures from around the globe.

These same criticisms can be applied to the US Social Forum’s international counterpart, the World Social Forum [WSF], which is entirely dependent on grants from the Ford Foundation for the continued existence of the program. One could argue that just because the forum receives money from active, capitalist-oriented grant-making foundations, it doesn’t mean that the stated intentions of building an “alternative globalization” are compromised. Unfortunately, this line of wistful thinking is far from the truth:

Remarkably, an International Council member of the WSF [World Social Forum] reports that the “considerable funds” received from these agencies have “not hitherto awakened any significant debates [in the WSF bodies] on the possible relations of dependence it could generate.” Yet he admits that “in order to get funding from the Ford Foundation, the organizers had to convince the foundation that the [Brazilian] Workers Party was not involved in the process.”⁷

The WSF’s charter states that the forum rejects any “reductionist views of economy, development and history.” By disavowing this approach, Marx’s entire critique of capitalism, conducted by examining the individual functions of the system’s parts, is rejected from the processes of the forum. This, in turn, leaves a space to debate not a post-capitalist world, but simply how to build upon the existing capitalist structure to better suit the demands of its dissidents. This seems to be strikingly in line with the intentions of the WSF’s initiators, the French NGO ATTAC – Taxation of Financial Transactions for the Aid of Citizens. With the slogan “the world is not for sale,” ATTAC’s position is not one anti-globalization per se, but simply the ‘smarter globalization’ of the Ford and Rockefeller Foundations. ATTAC sees the key to this goal being the use of the Tobin Tax – an international “general tax for financial transactions.” Other organizations or individuals who have shown interest in the Tobin Tax (named for the economist James Tobin, a former board of governors member for the Federal Reserve Bank) include the Ford Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, the AFL-CIO, George Soros, and Joseph Stigltz – the latter of which spoke at the 2004 World Social Forum in Mumbia, India. While the Tobin Tax will certainly give the appearance of a pro-active government willing to tackle big business, it leaves the central most components of both globalization and capitalism unchanged. The top corporations of the Fortune 500 will still rule over the markets – an added tax charge of a mere 0.5% on transactions⁸ will do nothing to alter the business models of the giants because they have the financial capabilities to cope with such a proposal.

Furthermore, in Tobin’s own words, this tax plan is not built to be contrary to globalized capitalism in the slightest. “I am an economist, and like most economists, I support free trade,” Tobin said in Der Spiegel interview in 2001. “I am in favor of the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and the World Trade Organization.” After stating that the “IMF has to be strengthened and broadened,” Tobin argues that the consortium of international financial organizations ought to have the power to prevent countries from engaging in protectionist trade policies: “the WTO ought to be able to prohibit the industrialised countries from blocking the imports of developing countries by putting up obstacles to trade.”⁸ For Tobin, the strengthening of these organizations is a must, for they are the organizations that would administer his plan, thus helping to maintain the status quo of the financial power in the world.

Co-opting Dissent and Ignoring the Problem

It is certainly a worrying overlap of organizations. Through the AFL-CIO and the assorted array of grant-making foundations, the anti-globalization left is fraternizing dangerously close with the same economic and political imperialists that they claim to be fighting. With the Ford Foundation’s desire to “provide a safety valve for the angry,” the Rockefeller’s calls for a “smarter globalization” and the World Social Forum’s banning of certain groups and viewpoints, this can be seen as nothing more than a corporate co-opting of the left. This tactic is nothing new. In 1966, Professor Carroll Quigley wrote about this same topic in his seminal opus, Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in Our Time:

More than fifty years ago the Morgan firm decided to infiltrate the Left-wing political movements in the United States. This was relatively easy to do, since these groups were starved for funds and eager for a voice to reach the people. Wall Street supplied both. The purpose was not to destroy, dominate, or take over but was really threefold: (1) to keep informed about the thinking of Left-wing or liberal groups; (2) to provide them with a mouthpiece so that they could ‘blow off steam,’ and (3) to have a final veto on their publicity and possibly on their actions, if they ever went ‘radical.’ There was nothing really new about this decision, since other financiers had talked about it and even attempted it earlier. What made it decisively important this time was the combination of its adoption by the dominant Wall Street financier, at a time when tax policy was driving all financiers to seek tax-exempt refuges for their fortunes, and at a time when the ultimate in Left-wing radicalism was about to appear under the banner of the Third International.⁹

The tactic of cooption was utilized again during the Great Depression by President Franklin Roosevelt. With labor movements on the rise, and a sharp increase in the memberships of the socialist and communist parties, Roosevelt responded to this threat to the American system by “incorporating in his own rhetoric [into] many of their demands” and absorbing “leaders of these groups into his following.”¹⁰ After cutting off the heads of the leftist coalitions, and presenting the population with the sanitized corporate welfare package known as the New Deal, “Franklin Roosevelt succeeded in undercutting the growth of left-wing political movements” that made revolution appear imminent.

The “safety valve” aspects of this theory explains the repeated notions of “space” – the US Social Forum, the World Social Forum, and the FNTG all aspire to provide “space” for these ideas to foster and flourish. “Space” seems to have its roots in the concept of the Temporary Autonomous Zone (TAZ), first proposed by anarchist writer Hakim Bay. The TAZ would be a temporary space, free from the imposing constraints of the hierarchies of capitalist system– a momentary utopia where the individual can disassociate himself from the harsher realities of the global order. The problem with the TAZ concept is that the zone itself is illusionary; capitalism, exploitation and imperialism still persist outside its borders.

Furthermore, the illusion itself is integrated into the prevailing capitalist framework. The functionality of a commune in the modern world will still depend on goods manufactured in the capitalist production model, and if it’s an inner city commune, odds are that the water and electrical that its inhabitants use is provided by privatized companies. The chances are that a great deal of the attendees of the US Social Forum drove many miles to voice their disenchantment with globalization in cars made on foreign production lines by underpaid and exploited workers, their tanks filled with petroleum brought to them by imperialist wars and environmental plundering. The accountants of the World Social Forum are forced to become capitalist workers themselves, hunched over ledgers, busy balancing receipts for money bestowed upon them by their international capitalist grant-making institutions. Even as I sit here writing this my laptop is a result of capitalist production in some far off country, brought to me by nothing more than globalization.

It is almost impossible to break away from the global order to forge a new tomorrow and build a sustainable world that is better for its inhabitants. But what a great number of the left need to do is to begin to see beyond this illusionary world, to see that their temporary space is granted unto them by the ones that they are fighting, a safety valve to make sure that their efforts never go beyond mere rhetoric and the occasional instance of community empowerment. “Smarter globalization” is not the answer, for it still leaves workers exploited and nations ripped open, stripped of their assets and resources. The left has a great many numbers. They need to make their own means.

1. “Richard Trumka’s Remarks at October 2009 JLC Dinner,” Jewish Labor Committee.
2. Harry Kebler, “The AFL-CIO’s Dark Past Part 4: U.S. Labor Reps. Conspired to Overthrow Elected Governments in Latin America,” The Labor Educator, November 29, 2004.
3. Katherine Hoyt, “Concerns Over Possible AFL-CIO Involvement in Venezuela Coup Led to February Picket,” Labor Notes, May 1, 2002.
4. Dennis Bernstein, “Interview with Professor Francis A. Boyle” Covert Action Quarterly, No. 72, Summer 2002, pg. 9-12.
5. Walter Davis, “2010 US Social Forum Reflections,” National Organizers Alliance, 2011.
6. Ford Foundation president McGeorge Bundy (1966-1979), quoted in Michel Chossudovsky “‘Manufacturing Dissent’: the Anti-globalization Movement is Funded by the Corporate Elites” Centre for Research on Globalization, September 20, 2010.
7. “The Economics and Politics of the World Social Forum: Lessons for the Struggle against ‘Globalisation’,” Centre for Research on Globalization, September 5, 2010.
8. “James Tobin: ‘The antiglobalization movement has hijacked my name,” Der Spiegel, September 3, 2001.
9. Carroll Quigley, Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in Our Time, Gsg & Assoc., 1966, pg. 938.
10. Seymour Martin Lipset and Gary Marks, “How FDR Saved Capitalism,” Hoover Digest, January 30, 2001.

To the United States, terrorism has one principal appearance, the faces of those who committed the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack on U.S. soil. From this cataclysmic event, U.S. authorities shaped their definition of terrorists and devised a strategy to combat them. Due to a lack of recognition of the contradictions between an asymmetrical war and a war to achieve global objectives, the War on Terrorism has been converted into conflicts to preserve American corporate interests. The U.S. government has sidetracked its assignment and betrayed its duty to the American public.

Almost immediately, the battle to prevent terrorism evolved into conflagrations in Iraq and Afghanistan; the former having no relation to terrorism and the latter still of undefined meaning. As of March 2011, total U.S. military deaths in the post 9/11 engagements in Iraq (4441), Afghanistan (1401,) together with deceased due to violence in the Gulf States (100), approximately 6000, more than double the 2752 civilian deaths incurred in the 9/11 attack. Add to the casualty list, thousands of wounded, psychologically destroyed, and distraught families from the two wars. Combine economic casualties from the effects of a shift of priorities during an economic decline with the battle casualties, and the War on Terrorism seems to have served the “terrorists.” Consider that Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan have suffered several 9/11’s due to the wars, and we have the War on Terrorism equating to another, “We had to kill them in order to save them.”

Despite the severe negative balance in its War on Terrorism, and the counter-productive effects on its own citizens, the U.S. administration refuses to modify its strategy, hoping that a failing and contradictory strategy will miraculously change and accomplish desired results. One glaring failure in the strategy – an inability to recognize who might serve as principal allies in the battle and who already serve as principal contributors to terrorism. Start from a well known beginning.

U.S. actions motivated a successful formation of Al Qaeda

Although the Soviet Union had significant influence in Afghanistan’s affairs and the Asian nation was only peripheral to the Cold war struggle, the Soviet Union’s intervention in Afghanistan provoked U.S. President Jimmy Carter to exclaim “The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan is the greatest threat to peace since the Second World War.” U.S. military assistance to the Mujahideen, funneled through Pakistan, assisted the Afghani insurgents to expel their Soviet occupiers. After the United States exited from the battle, the Pakistan government enabled the Taliban to stabilize a strife-ridden Afghanistan and Osama bin-Laden to find a new home.

Bin-Laden arrived in Pakistan during the mid-’80′s to disburse Saudi funds to the Mujahideen and provide training camps in Pakistan for foreign fighters. His organization, Al Qaeda (the Base), emerged from the Maktab al-Khadamat (MAK), the Afghan Services Bureau, which is believed to have been founded in 1984 with the purpose of raising funds and recruiting foreign fighters for the war against the Soviets. Bin-Laden eventually moved his operations to the Taliban controlled land. The rest is history.

The U.S. government followed its first gigantic error – assisting a Radical Islamic movement in the replacement of the Soviets – with a counterproductive program that promotes terrorism. The U.S. contests nations that contest terrorists and assists nations that spawn terrorists. Reference to nations in the map of the Middle East demonstrates the veracity of this charge.

The Middle East can be conveniently divided between the nations that the U.S. confronts and have been antagonistic to Radical Islam and the nations that the U.S. befriends and whose policies have contributed to terrorist actions against the United States.

The former nations, The Islamic Republic of Iran, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon, occupy the northern area of the Middle East. The latter nations, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Yemen occupy the Middle East’s southern frontier.

Iran, Saddam Hussein’s’ Iraq, Lebanon’s 21st century Hezbollah and Gaza’s Hamas have not contributed any fighters to the international terrorist organizations that are accused of attacking the United States or its interests. A few terrorists have been of Syrian origin. All of these nations have fought counterparts of Al-Qaeda on their soil and have been sworn enemies of bin Laden.

Examine these nations more closely.

Iran tried reconciliation and assistance after the 9/11 tragedy

At the Tokyo donors’ conference in January 2002, the Iranians showed willingness to create a new Afghanistan by pledging $560 million worth of assistance, which is a large amount for a not-fully-developed country and about the same amount as the United States pledged at the same conference.

After the Northern Alliance Afghan troops played a significant role in driving the Taliban out of Kabul in November 2001, the alliance demanded 60 percent of the portfolios in an interim government and blocked agreement with other opposition groups. According to the U.S. envoy to Afghanistan, Richard Dobbins, Iran played a “decisive role” in persuading the Northern Alliance delegation to compromise its demands and “insisted on including language in the Bonn agreement on the war on terrorism.”

Dobbins mentioned a March 2002 meeting with an Iranian delegation and a General who had been responsible for military assistance to the Northern Alliance during its engagements with the Taliban. “The general offered to provide training, uniforms, equipment, and barracks for as many as 20,000 new recruits for the nascent Afghan military. All this was to be done under U.S. leadership,” Dobbins recalls, “not as part of a separate program under exclusive Iranian control.”

After briefing Secretary of State Colin Powell, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, and Secretary of Defense David Rumsfeld of his meeting, Richard Dobbins later claimed: “To my knowledge, there was never a response.”

Iran has arrested Al-Qaeda agents on its territory and has ample reason to combat bin-Laden’s organization. Al-Qaeda has linked the Shiite Muslims, represented by Iran and Hezbollah, with “the Crusaders, Zionists and Jews” as its most bitter enemies. Deceased al-Qaeda in Iraq leader, Al-Zarqawi, in a speech, said: “Days go by, and events follow one after the other. The battles are many, and the names used are varied. But the goal (of the Crusaders) is one: a Crusader-Rafidite war against the Sunnis.” Who are the Rafidites? Sunnis who refuse to accept Shi’a Islam as a valid form of Islam use the word “rafida” to identify the Shi’a.

The U.S. gave al-Qaeda affiliates, who were previously constrained to Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, a base to maneuver in Iraq. Except for Ansar al-Islam, a northern radical Islamic group close to the Iran border, Saddam Hussein’s Iraq contained no Al-Qaeda affiliated elements. In 2003, Taliban fugitives, housed in Western Pakistan, became irritated with neighboring and uncontrollable Al-Qaeda members. Due to the friction, the Taliban permitted Pakistan military to operate against Al-Qaeda in South Waziristan and demolish its training camps. After the U.S. invasion of Iraq destroyed the Iraqi armed forces and policing functions, fleeing Al Qaeda members moved into Iraq, the Kurdish Ansar al-Islam terrorist group fortified itself throughout the East of the Kurdish province, and foreign fighters entered the hostile atmosphere and formed a new ally of Al-Qaeda. The latter eventually termed themselves ‘Al-Qaeda in Iraq.’

By invading and occupying Iraq, the U.S. extended the battle against terrorism rather than confining it. The extension of the battlefield weakened available resources required for the battle.

Secular Syria has been fighting Radical Islam in its northern provinces

According to U.S. officials, after Sept.11, 2001, Syrian information was instrumental in catching militant Islamists around the world.

Nicholas Blanford | Special to The Christian Science Monitor, May 14, 2002.

“In July 2005, the Syrian government returned alleged Islamist terrorists to Saudi Arabia and Tunisia. In June 2006, Syria’s state security forces and Islamists fought a gun battle in Damascus. The Syrian government cited the September 27, 2008 car bombing in Damascus, which killed seventeen people, as an indication that Islamist terrorists—in this case it named Fatah al-Islam—had targeted the country for its cooperation with U.S. efforts to strengthen security along its border with Iraq.”

The U.S. characterization of Hezbollah and Hamas as terrorist organizations is dubious

Both organizations have issues with Israel, which is separate from international terrorism. Neither of these organizations has committed verified terrorist acts against the United States.

Fateh el-Islam, a terrorist group that battled the Lebanese army at the Nahr el-Bared Palestinian refugee camp in Tripoli for over three months in 2007, received no support from Hezbollah. In Gaza, Hamas has fought Jund Ansar Allah, a radical Islamic group that wants to proclaim an Islamic Emirate in Gaza. Weakening Hamas strengthens Jund Ansar Allah and other radical Muslim groups in Gaza.

The positive qualities of the northern Middle East nations, all of which could be beneficial to the U.S in its anti-terrorism activities, are politely neglected. None of these nations have identity with al Qaeda, none of them have supplied terrorists from their ranks who have confronted Americans, and none of them have perpetrated terrorist attacks against U.S. interests.

The Middle East nations in the southern frontier, those of Israel, Egypt, Morocco, Yemen, and Saudi Arabia present an opposite image

Is there any doubt that America’s unqualified support of Israel has provided terrorists with a reason to augment its ranks? Evidently Osama bin Laden believes this to be true and he should know:

(AFP) – Sep 13, 2009, WASHINGTON

“Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin-Laden told Americans in a new message that their support for Israel had prompted him to launch the September 11, 2001 attacks, a US-based terror monitoring group said.”

Regardless of what many Americans believe, the United Nations and most of the world’s peoples characterize Israel’s occupation of Palestinian lands as defiance of UN resolutions, its settlements in the West Bank as illegal, and its treatment of the Palestinians as brutal.

Poll explores Arabs’ views on Obama, Israel and Iran by Safaa Abdoun Daily News Egypt, August 6, 2010

“When asked to name two countries that pose the biggest threat to Arabs, Israel came in first with 88 percent followed by US with 77 percent.”

Israel is not struggling against an insurrection in its own lands; it has caused an insurrection by usurping lands owned by Palestinians. It is not fighting to maintain its own territory. It is fighting to gain new territory and, at the same time, is bringing about the total destruction of the Palestinian community. Making it seem that the Palestinian rebellion is part of a larger international plot to destroy western civilization diverts attention from Israel’s own military actions.

Terrorists recruit by intimidation and provocation. Israel helps in the recruitment by reactions to its intimidations, indoctrinations, and teachings.

Shulamit Aloni, former Member of Knesset who served in Labour government Cabinets; Ha’aretz, March 7th, 2003.

“Many of our children are being indoctrinated, in religious schools, that the Arabs are Amalek, and the bible teaches us Amalek must be destroyed. There was already a rabbi (Israel Hess) who wrote in the newspaper of Bar Ilan University that we all must commit genocide, and that is because his research showed that the Palestinians are Amalek. Murder of a population under cover of righteousness.”

No matter how many terrorists the U.S. forces remove from the international terrorism scene, without an agreed solution to the Palestinian/Israeli crisis, the terrorists will continually replace their ranks and terrorist actions will continue.

Mubarrak’s previous Egypt, and President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s Yemen exhibit commonalities and are discussed together

Each of these nations has had cordial relations with the United States, each has contributed many terrorists in actions against the United States and each has rebellious populations demanding democracy. In totality, they have been ineffective in preventing the training of terrorists on their lands, have highlighted the hypocrisy of U.S. promotion of democracy and have aroused severe resentment in their populations due to oppressive policies, which fuel terrorism.

Relations with Saudi Arabia clearly demonstrate how the U.S. has blended its battle against terrorism with preservation of American global interests

The Saudi Arabia kingdom can be the poster child for a characterization of the Middle East as an area that contains despotic governments and deprives its peoples of freedom and basic human rights. Most of the 9/11 conspirators and other al-Qaeda members, including bin-Laden, were of Saudi origin. Saudis have been accused of financing terrorist activities, and the Saudi government’s support of worldwide Islamic charities and schools, which have questionable links to terrorism, has been criticized.

Although claiming to adhere to Koran principles, the desert kingdom allows the United States, a hostile and non-Muslim nation, to construct bases on its territory, accumulates vast wealth for a few extended families, refuses equitable income distribution, and uses oil revenue to support the lifestyle of a group of jet setters. These operations enrage Islamist extremists, who sense the Saudi family is hypocritical and violates religious tradition. Authoritarianism, political persecution and extensive human rights violations fuel a bubbling dissent that is prepared to explode. The vast and barren areas are not easily controlled and terrorists have both internal support and places to hide. It is certainly not deliberate, but Saudi Arabia is fertile ground for producing international terrorists.

During the 1980′s the Saudi Kingdom supported Saddam Hussein in his war against Iran and had friendly relations with the Taliban until the 9/11 terrorist attack. The monarchy, as part of its commitment to Islam, funds Islamic schools and charities, some of whom have been accused of fomenting anti-Western attitudes, contributing to terrorist organizations and developing terrorists. Most damaging is evidence that linked the wife of the Saudi ambassador in Washington to the family of a Saudi man in San Diego who befriended and assisted two of the Sept. 11 hijackers. Princess Haifa al-Faisal, the wife of Ambassador Bandar bin Sultan, provided tens of thousands of dollars in what she believed were charitable gifts for medical care to Osama Bassnan. After learning they had befriended and assisted two of the Saudi hijackers, Khalid al-Midhar and Nawaq Alhazmi, the F.B.I. questioned Mr. Bassnan and a Saudi neighbor, Omar al-Bayoumi.

Although reports of the FBI meetings have been classified, the New York Times, August 2, 2003, claimed the two Saudis might have been Saudi intelligence agents.

James Risen and David Johnston, Washington, Aug. 1, 2002

“The classified part of a Congressional report on the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, says that two Saudi citizens who had at least indirect links with two hijackers were probably Saudi intelligence agents and may have reported to Saudi government officials, according to people who have seen the report.”

Most of the Al-Qaeda operatives in post-Hussein Iraq came from Saudi Arabia and neighboring Yemen. These terrorists, as well as those training and operating on Saudi soil are undoubtedly receiving funds from a close source. Considering the vast and unchecked funds flowing through Saudi banks and institutions, it’s reasonable to assume that some of the oil revenues are unknowingly being siphoned to illicit activities and arrive in terrorist hands. The Saudi Ministry of Interior detained 520 terror suspects, who they claimed had targeted an oil facility. One of them admitted to receiving an equivalent of $133,000 (from whom?) and Saudi security forces seized another equivalent of $40,000 cash, which was hidden in remote desert areas. Although Mauritania, Yemeni and Iraqi nationals, some of who had university degrees and came to the Kingdom on private drivers’ visas, composed the terrorist cell, Saudis composed the majority of those detained.

Associated Press, December 8, 2006
By SALAH NASRAWI in CAIRO, Egypt (AP)

“Private Saudi citizens are giving millions of dollars to Sunni insurgents in Iraq and much of the money is used to buy weapons, including shoulder fired anti-aircraft missiles, according to key Iraqi officials and others familiar with the flow of cash. Saudi government officials deny that any money from their country is being sent to Iraqis fighting the government and the U.S.-led coalition. But the U.S. Iraq Study Group report said Saudis are a source of funding for Sunni Arab insurgents. Several truck drivers interviewed by The Associated Press described carrying boxes of cash from Saudi Arabia into Iraq; money they said was headed for insurgents.”

Separate the battle against international terrorism from general foreign policy initiatives and compare the activities of the Northern Arab nations, with whom the U.S. is extremely hostile, with the southern Arab nations and Israel, whom the U.S. supports. Comparison demonstrates the U.S. is confusing the objectives of its War on Terrorism with its global objectives and complicating its War on Terrorism.

The United States government has made the battle against terrorism its highest priority. It owes its citizens constructive policies that do not disable those who impede terrorism and do not enable others to create terrorism. It’s a fine line in foreign policy, but the margin between victory and defeat can be a fine line, or as Somerset Maugham wrote, “as sharp as a razor’s edge.”

The words they find it very difficult to say — “civil war”.

Libya is engaged in a civil war. The United States and the European Union and NATO — The Holy Triumvirate — are intervening, bloodily, in a civil war. To overthrow Moammar Gaddafi. First The Holy Triumvirate spoke only of imposing a no-fly zone. After getting support from international bodies on that understanding, they immediately began to wage war against Libyan military forces, and whoever was nearby, on a daily basis. In the world of commerce this is called “bait and switch”.

Gaddafi’s crime? He was never respectful enough of The Holy Triumvirate, which recognizes no higher power, and maneuvers the United Nations for its own purposes, depending on China and Russia to be as spineless and hypocritical as Barack Obama. The man the Triumvirate allows to replace Gaddafi will be more respectful.

So who are the good guys? The Libyan rebels, we’re told. The ones who go around murdering and raping African blacks on the supposition that they’re all mercenaries for Gaddafi. One or more of the victims may indeed have been members of a Libyan government military battalion; or may not have been. During the 1990s, in the name of pan-African unity, Gaddafi opened the borders to tens of thousands of sub-Saharan Africans to live and work in Libya. That, along with his earlier pan-Arab vision, did not win him points with The Holy Triumvirate. Corporate bosses have the same problem about their employees forming unions. Oh, and did I mention that Gaddafi is strongly anti-Zionist?

Does anyone know what kind of government the rebels would create? The Triumvirate has no idea. To what extent will the new government embody an Islamic influence as opposed to the present secular government? What jihadi forces might they unleash? (And these forces do indeed exist in eastern Libya, where the rebels are concentrated.) Will they do away with much of the welfare state that Gaddafi used his oil money to create? Will the state-dominated economy be privatized? Who will wind up owning Libya’s oil? Will the new regime continue to invest Libyan oil revenues in sub-Saharan African development projects? Will they allow a US military base and NATO exercises? Will we find out before long that the “rebels” were instigated and armed by Holy Triumvirate intelligence services?

In the 1990s, Slobodan Milosevic of Yugoslavia was guilty of “crimes” similar to Gaddafi’s. His country was commonly referred to as “the last communists of Europe”. The Holy Triumvirate bombed him, arrested him, and let him die in prison. The Libyan government, it should be noted, refers to itself as the Great Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya. American foreign policy is never far removed from the Cold War.

We must look closely at the no-fly zone set up for Iraq by the US and the UK (falsely claimed by them as being authorized by the United Nations) beginning in the early 1990s and lasting more than a decade. It was in actuality a license for very frequent bombing and killing of Iraqi citizens; softening up the country for the coming invasion. The no-fly zone-cum invasion force in Libya is killing people every day with no end in sight, softening up the country for regime change. Who in the universe can stand up to The Holy Triumvirate? Has the entire history of the world ever seen such power and such arrogance?

And by the way, for the 10th time, Gaddafi did not carry out the bombing of PanAm Flight 103 in 1988.1 Please enlighten your favorite progressive writers on this.

Barack “I’d kill for a peace prize” Obama

Is anyone keeping count?

I am. Libya makes six.

Six countries that Barack H. Obama has waged war against in his 26 months in office. (To anyone who disputes that dropping bombs on a populated land is act of war, I would ask what they think of the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor.)

America’s first black president now invades Africa.

Is there anyone left who still thinks that Barack Obama is some kind of improvement over George W. Bush?

Probably two types still think so. 1) Those to whom color matters a lot; 2) Those who are very impressed by the ability to put together grammatically correct sentences.

It certainly can’t have much otherwise to do with intellect or intelligence. Obama has said numerous things, which if uttered by Bush would have inspired lots of rolled eyeballs, snickers, and chuckling reports in the columns and broadcasts of mainstream media. Like the one the president has repeated on a number of occasions when pressed to investigate Bush and Cheney for war crimes, along the lines of “I prefer to look forward rather than backwards”. Picture a defendant before a judge asking to be found innocent on such grounds. It simply makes laws, law enforcement, crime, justice, and facts irrelevant.

There’s also the excuse given by Obama to not prosecute those engaged in torture: because they were following orders. Has this “educated” man never heard of the Nuremberg Trials, where this defense was summarily rejected? Forever, it was assumed.

Just 18 days before the Gulf oil spill Obama said: “It turns out, by the way, that oil rigs today generally don’t cause spills. They are technologically very advanced.”¹ Picture George W. having said this, and the later reaction.

“All the forces that we’re seeing at work in Egypt are forces that naturally should be aligned with us, should be aligned with Israel,” Obama said in early March.² Imagine if Bush had implied this — that the Arab protesters in Egypt against a man receiving billions in US aid including the means to repress and torture them, should “naturally” be aligned with the United States and — God help us — Israel.

A week later, on March 10, State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley told a forum in Cambridge, Mass. that Wikileaks hero Bradley Manning’s treatment by the Defense Department in a Marine prison was “ridiculous, counterproductive and stupid.” The next day our “brainy” president was asked about Crowley’s comment. Replied the Great Black Hope: “I have actually asked the Pentagon whether or not the procedures that have been taken in terms of his confinement are appropriate and are meeting our basic standards. They assure me that they are.”

Right, George. I mean Barack. Bush should have asked Donald Rumsfeld whether anyone in US custody was being tortured anywhere in the world. He could then have held a news conference like Obama did to announce the happy news — “No torture by America!” We would still be chortling at that one.

Obama closed his remark with: “I can’t go into details about some of their concerns, but some of this has to do with Pvt. Manning’s safety as well.”³

Ah yes, of course, Manning is being tortured for his own good. Someone please remind me — Did Georgieboy ever stoop to using that particular absurdity to excuse prisoner hell at Guantanamo?

Is it that Barack Obama is not bothered by the insult to Bradley Manning’s human rights, the daily wearing away of this brave young man’s mental stability?

The answer to the question is No. The president is not bothered by these things.

How do I know? Because Barack Obama is not bothered by anything as long as he can exult in being the president of the United States, eat his hamburgers, and play his basketball. Let me repeat once again what I first wrote in May 2009:

The problem, I’m increasingly afraid, is that the man doesn’t really believe strongly in anything, certainly not in controversial areas. He learned a long time ago how to take positions that avoid controversy, how to express opinions without clearly taking sides, how to talk eloquently without actually saying anything, how to leave his listeners’ heads filled with stirring clichés, platitudes, and slogans. And it worked. Oh how it worked! What could happen now, having reached the presidency of the United States, to induce him to change his style?

Remember that in his own book, The Audacity of Hope, Obama wrote: “I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views.”

Obama is a product of marketing. He is the prime example of the product “As seen on TV”.

Writer Sam Smith recently wrote that Obama is the most conservative Democratic president we’ve ever had. “In an earlier time, there would have been a name for him: Republican.”

Indeed, if John McCain had won the 2008 election, and then done everything that Obama has done in exactly the same way, liberals would be raging about such awful policies.

I believe that Barack Obama is one of the worst things that has ever happened to the American left. The millions of young people who jubilantly supported him in 2008, and numerous older supporters, will need a long recovery period before they’re ready to once again offer their idealism and their passion on the altar of political activism.

If you don’t like how things have turned out, next time find out exactly what your candidate means when he talks of “change”.

Dear Lord, please save us from the Holy Republican Empire

Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin, Mike Huckabee, John Boehner, and many other Republicans often find it difficult to speak about domestic or foreign issues without bringing religion into the picture. Speaker of the House of Representatives John Boehner, for example, in a recent talk at the National Religious Broadcasters conference stated that America’s national debt is a “moral hazard.” The Washington Post (March 5, 2011) reported, “Boehner made clear that this fiscal crisis requires people to get on their knees.”

Rep. Joe Barton of Texas justified his opposition to controlling greenhouse gases because “you can’t regulate God.”

Arizona Senator Jon Kyl accused Democratic Senate Leader Harry Reid of “disrespecting one of the two holiest of holidays for Christians” for considering keeping Congress in session during Christmas.

Rep. Steve King of Iowa compared Democrats to Pontius Pilate, the ancient Roman official who sentenced Jesus to be crucified.⁴

And South Carolina Senator Jim DeMint recently declared that “the bigger government gets, the smaller God gets. … America works, freedom works, when people have that internal gyroscope that comes from a belief in God and Biblical faith. Once we push that out, you no longer have the capacity to live as a free person without the external controls of an authoritarian government. I’ve said it often and I believe it –– the bigger government gets, the smaller God gets. As people become more dependent on government, less dependent on God.”⁵

So, in a futile attempt to enlighten the likes of these esteemed Republican members of Congress, I feel obliged to point out the following:

On the 4th day of November 1796, a “Treaty of peace and friendship between the United States of America and the Bey and subjects of Tripoli, of Barbary” was concluded at Tripoli [Libya]. Article 11 of the treaty begins: “As the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion … ” Be it further noted: Article VI, Section II, of the United States Constitution states: “This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.”

The creed of America’s founders was neither Christianity nor secularism, but religious liberty.

After the terrorist attacks of 9-11, a Taliban leader declared that “God is on our side, and if the world’s people try to set fire to Afghanistan, God will protect us and help us.”⁶

“With or without religion, good people will do good things and bad people will do bad things. But for good people to do bad things — that takes religion.” — Steven Weinberg, Nobel Prize-winning physicist

The Bad Guys

I’ve written on many occasions about America’s ODE — Officially Designated Enemies: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Hugo Chávez, Fidel Castro, Daniel Ortega, Hasan Nasrallah, Moammar Gaddafi, and others. Once the government of the United States of America makes it clear that an individual foreign leader is not one of the Good Guys, that he doesn’t believe that America is God’s gift to humankind, and that he is not willing to allow his country to become an obedient client state, the US mainstream media invariably picks up on this and goes out of its way to denigrate the individual at every opportunity. (If any reader knows of any exceptions to this rule I’d be interested in hearing from them.)

Juan Forero has long been a Latin American correspondent for the Washington Post. He’s also the same for National Public Radio. I used to send letters to the Post pointing out how Forero was distorting the facts each time he wrote about Hugo Chávez, errors of omission compounded with errors of commission. None were printed, so I began to send my missives directly to Forero. He once actually replied saying that he (sort of) agreed with me on the point I had raised and implied that he would try to avoid similar errors in the future. I actually detected some improvement after that for a short period, then it was back to usual. During the current unrest in Libya he wrote: “Chavez said it ‘was a great lie’ that Gaddafi’s forces had attacked civilians.”⁷

Well, how stupid can Hugo Chávez think the world is? We’ve all seen and read of Gaddafi’s attacks on civilians.

But it turns out that if you find the original Spanish you get a fuller and different picture. According to the United Press International (UPI) Spanish-language report, Chávez said that the fighting in Libya was a civil war and those who were attacked were thus not simply protestors or civilians; they were on the other side of the civil war; i.e., combatants.⁸

Al Jazeera in America

The uprisings in North Africa and the Middle East have given a great boost to al Jazeera, the television network based in Doha, Qatar. Until recently Americans shied away from the station; it was just too easily associated with the Middle East and Muslims, which of course leads easily to thinking about terrorists and “terrorists”; and certainly any well-brought-up American knew that the station could not be as unbiased as CBS, CNN, NPR or Fox News. The station had reason to be paranoid about its office in the United States, land of ten million crazies (more than a few of them holding public office). It occupies six floors in a downtown Washington, DC office building, but its name doesn’t appear on the building directory.

But US mainstream media now quote al Jazeera English and show their news footage. Many progressives, including myself, have taken to watching the station in preference to US mainstream media. In general, the news is of more substance, the guests are mainly more or less progressive, and there are no commercials. However, the more I watch it the more I realize that the station’s presenters and correspondents are not necessarily as well imbued with the progressive perspective as they should be.

One case in point of many I could give: On March 12 al Jazeera correspondent Roger Wilkinson was reporting about the trial in Cuba of Alan Gross, the American arrested after he dispensed electronic equipment to Cuban citizens. Gross entered Cuba as a tourist but was actually there in behalf of Development Alternatives Inc. (DAI), a private contractor working for the Agency for International Development (AID), a division of the State Department. Gross was thus a covert unregistered agent of a foreign government. Wilkinson reported this very controversial story with all the innocence and distortion of the US mainstream media. He mentioned in passing that the Cuban government tries to control the Internet. What can one conclude from that other than that Cuban officials want to hide certain information from its citizens? Just like the US mainstream media, Wilkinson gave no examples of any Internet sites blocked by the Cuban government; for the simple reason, perhaps, that there aren’t any. What is the terrible truth that Cubans might learn if they had full access to the Internet? Ironically, it’s the US government and US multinationals who impinge upon this access, for political reasons and by pricing their services beyond Cuba’s means. This is why Cuba and Venezuela are building their own undersea cable connection.

Wilkinson spoke of AID’s program of “democracy promotion”, but gave no hint that in the world of AID and the private organizations that contract with it — including Gross’s employer — this term is code for “regime change”. AID has long played a subversive role in world affairs. Here is John Gilligan, Director of AID during the Carter administration:

“At one time, many AID field offices were infiltrated from top to bottom with CIA people. The idea was to plant operatives in every kind of activity we had overseas, government, volunteer, religious, every kind.”⁹

AID has been but one of many institutions employed by the United States for more than 50 years to subvert the Cuban revolution. It is because of this that we can formulate this equation: The United States is to the Cuban government like al Qaeda is to American government. Cuba’s laws dealing with activities typically carried out by the likes of AID and DAI reflect this history. It’s not paranoia. It’s self-preservation. In discussing a case like Alan Gross without considering this equation is a serious defect in journalism and political analysis.

Hopefully the Gross case will serve to temper the nature of US “democracy promotion” efforts in Cuba.

Washington’s policy — and therefore Britain’s policy — toward Cuba has always stemmed mainly from a desire to keep the island from becoming a good example for the Third World of an alternative to capitalism. But Western leaders actually do not, or do not dare, understand what can motivate people like the Cuban leaders and their followers. Here’s one of the Wikileaks US-Embassy cables, March 25, 2009 — William Hague, then-British Conservative MP and Shadow Foreign Secretary, giving the US embassy in London a report on his recent visit to Cuba: Hague “said that he was slightly surprised that the Cuban leadership did not appear to be moving toward more of a Chinese model of economic opening, but were rather still ‘romantic revolutionaries’.” In his conversation with Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez “the discussion turned to political ideology, during which Hague commented that people in Britain were more interested in shopping than ideology.” [Oh dear, what a jolly good defense of the Western way of life. Rule Britannia! God Bless America!] Hague then reported that “Rodriguez appeared disdainful of the notion and said one needed shopping only to buy food and a few good books.”

Japan devastated by an earthquake and tsunami. America devastated by the profit motive.

Christine Todd Whitman, George W. Bush’s first Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administrator, speaking of how the nuclear industry has learned from every previous nuclear accident or disaster: “It’s safer than working in a grocery store,” she said.

Whitman is now co-chairwoman of the nuclear industry’s Clean and Safe Energy Coalition.¹⁰

1. Washington Post, May 27, 2010.
2. March 4, 2011, Democratic Party function, Miami, FL, CQ Transcriptions.
3. Los Angeles Times, March 11, 2011.
4. For this and the previous two examples, see “Jim DeMint’s Theory Of Relativity: ‘The Bigger Government Gets, The Smaller God Gets’“, Think Progress, March 15, 2011.
5. Fox News Sunday, December 19, 2010.
6. Washington Post, September 19, 2001.
7. Washington Post, March 7, 2011.
8. UPI Reporte LatAm, March 4, 2011 (email me for the text).
9. George Cotter, “Spies, strings and missionaries”, The Christian Century (Chicago), March 25, 1981, p.321.
10. “Former EPA chief: Nuke crisis ‘a very good lesson‘,” Politico, March 14, 2011.

An analysis of the source of wealth of the super-rich, the distribution in the world economy and the methods of accumulation highlights several important differences with major political consequences. We will proceed to identify these specific features of the super-rich, starting with the United States and follow with an analysis of the rest of the world.

The Super-Rich in the US: the Biggest Living Parasites

The US has the most billionaires in the world (413), better than one third of the total, the greatest proportion among the “big countries” in the world. A closer look also reveals that among the top 200 billionaires (those with $5.2 billion and more) there are 57 from the US (29%). Over one third made their fortune through speculative activity, predators on the productive economy and exploiters of the property and stock market. This is the highest percentage of any major country in Europe or Asia (with the exception of England). The enormous concentration of wealth in the hands of this tiny parasitical ruling class is one reason why the US has the worst inequalities of any advanced economy and among the worst in the entire world. Speculators do not employ workers, they secure tax loopholes and bailouts and then press for cuts in the social budget, since they do not require a healthy, educated workforce (except for a tiny elite). In 1976 the top 1% held 20% of the wealth; in 2007 they commanded 35% of total wealth. Eighty percent of Americans own only 15% of the wealth. The recent economic crises, which initially reduced the total wealth of the country, did so in an uneven fashion – hitting the majority of workers and employees worse. The Bush-Obama bailout led to the economic recovery, not of the “economy in general”, but was confined to further enhancing the wealth of the billionaires – which explains why the unemployment/under employment rate has hardly moved, why the fiscal debt and trade deficit grows and the state lowers corporate taxes and slashes federal, state and municipal budgets. The “dynamic” sector composed of parasitical capitalists employ few workers, exports no products, pays lower taxes and imposes greater cuts in social spending for productive workers. In the case of the US billionaires, their wealth is largely accrued via the pillage of the state treasury and productive economy and via speculation in the information technology sector which houses one-fifth of the top billionaires.

BRIC’s New Billionaires: Exploiting Labor of Nature

The leading emerging capitalist countries, Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC) hailed by the mass media for their rapid growth over the past decade are producing billionaires at a faster rate than any bloc of countries in the world. According to the latest data in Forbes (March 2011), the number of billionaires in BRIC increased over 56% from 193 in 2010 to 301 in 2011, exceeding that of Europe.

The high growth of BRIC has led to the concentration and centralization of capital, in every case promoted by state policies which provides low interest loans, subsidies, tax incentives, unrestricted exploitation of natural resources and labor, the dispossession of small property owners and the give-away of publicly owned enterprises.

The dynamic growth of billionaires in BRIC has led to the most egregious inequalities in the world. Among BRIC, China leads the way with the greatest number of billionaires (115) and the worst inequalities in all of Asia, in sharp contrast to its Communist past when it was the most egalitarian country in the world. An examination of the source of wealth of China’s super rich reveals that it has resulted from the exploitation of labor in the manufacturing sector, speculation in real-estate, construction and trade. China has surpassed the US as the world’s biggest manufacturer in 2011, as a result of the super-exploitation of labor in China and the growth of parasitical financial capital in the US.

In contrast to the US, China’s working class is making significant inroads into the profiteering of its manufacturing and real estate elite.As a result of working class struggle, wages have been growing between 10% and 20% over the past 5 years; protests by farmers and urban households against state sanctioned evictions by real estate speculators have exceeded 100,000 per year.

The wealth of Russian billionaires on the other hand resulted from the violent theft of public resources (oil, gas, aluminum, iron, steel, etc.) developed by the previous Communist regime. The great majority of Russian billionaires depend on the export of commodities, pillaging and devastating the natural environment under a corrupt and deregulated regime. The contrast in living and working conditions between the western=oriented billionaires and the Russian working class is largely the result of the siphoning off of wealth to overseas accounts, offshore investments, and extraordinary personal luxuries including multi-million dollar real estate. In contrast to China’s industrial elite, Russia’s billionaires resemble the parasitical rentiers found among Wall Street speculators and Persian Gulf sheiks.

India’s billionaires are a combination of old and new rich drawing their wealth by exploiting low wage industrial workers, dispossessing slum and tribal peoples, as well as from diversified holdings in real estate, IT, and software. India’s billionaires accumulated their wealth through their class-kin linkages to the very corrupt higher echelons of the political class, securing monopolies via state contracts. India’s high growth over the past decade (averaging 7%) and the upsurge in billionaires upward to 55 by 2011, are both linked the neo-liberal policies of deregulation, privatization and globalization, which have concentrated wealth at the top, undermined small scale producers and dispossessed tens of millions.

Brazil’s billionaire class has expanded rapidly, especially under the leadership of the Workers Party, to 29, up from single digits a decade earlier. Today over two-thirds of Latin America’s billionaires are Brazilians. The centerpiece of Brazil’s super-rich wealth is the financial-banking sector which has benefited enormously from the monetary, fiscal and neo-liberal policies of the Lula Da Silva regime. Billionaire bankers have been the principle beneficiaries of the agro-mineral export economy which has flourished over the past decade, at the expense of the manufacturing sector. Despite claims by Workers Party leaders, the class inequalities between the mass of minimum wage workers ($380 per month as of March 2011) and the super-rich continues to be worst in Latin America. An analysis of the source of wealth among Brazilian billionaires reveals that 60% accrued their wealth in the finance, real estate and insurance (FIRE) sector and only one (3%) in the capital or intermediary manufacturing sector. Brazil’s boom in economic growth and billionaires fits the profile of a ‘colonial economy’: heavy in conspicuous consumption, commodity exports and presided over by a dominant financial sector which promotes neo-liberal policies. Over the course of the past decade despite the populist political theatrics and paternalistic poverty programs sponsored by the “center-left” Workers Party, the major socio-economic outcome has been the growth of a class of “super-rich” billionaires concentrated in banking with powerful links to the agro-mineral sectors. The free-market high growth financial-agro-mineral class has degraded the manufacturing sector, especially textiles and shoes, as well as capital and intermediary goods producers.

BRIC are producing more,and growing faster than the established imperial powers in Europe and the US, but they are also producing monstrous inequalities and concentrations of wealth.The socio-economic consequences have already manifested themselves in increasing class conflict especially in China and India, as intensive exploitation and dispossession have provoked mass action. The Chinese political elite seems to be the most conscious of the political threat posed by the growing concentration of wealth and is in the midst of promoting substantial wage increases and greater local consumption which seems to be lowering profit margins among some sectors of the manufacturing elite. Perhaps the ‘historical memory’ of the “cultural revolution’ and the Maoist legacy plays a role in alerting the political elite to the political dangers resulting from “capitalist excesses” associated with the high levels of exploitation and the rapid growth of a class of politically connected kinship based billionaires.

Middle East:

Over the past decade the most dynamic country in the Middle East has been Turkey. Led by a liberal democratic regime of Islamic inspiration, Turkey has led the region in GDP growth and in the production of billionaires. The Turkish economic performance has been presented by the World Bank and the IMF as a model for the post dictatorial regimes in the Arab world – ‘high growth’, a diversified economy based on the growing concentration of wealth. Turkey has 35% more billionaires (37) than the Gulf and North African states combined (24). The ‘secret’ of Turkish growth is the high rates of investments in diverse industries and the intensive exploitation of labor. Many Turkish billionaires (14) derive their wealth via ‘conglomerates’, investments in diverse manufacturing, finance and construction sectors. Apart from the ‘conglomerate billionaires,’ there are ‘specialist billionaires’ who have accumulated wealth from banking, construction, and food manufacturing. One of the reasons Turkey has rebuked and challenged Israeli power in the Middle East is because its capitalists are eager to project investments and penetrate markets in the Arab world. Apart from the highly Zionized US political system, the ruling elites and public in Europe and Asia have looked favorably on Turkey’s opposition to Israel’s massacres in Gaza and violation of international law on the high seas. If a modern liberal Islamic regime can grow rapidly through the rapid expansion of a diversified class of the super-rich, so does Israel, a modern neo-liberal-Judaic state based on the rapid growth of a highly diverse class of billionaires. Israel with 16 billionaires is a country with the fastest growing class inequalities in the region — with the highest per-capita billionaires in the world… Israel’s ‘growth sectors,’ software, military industries, finance, insurance and diamonds and overseas investments in metals and mining are led by billionaires and multi-millionaires who have benefited from Zionist induced financial handouts from the US pillage of resources from the ex-USSR and transfer of funds by Russian-Israeli oligarchs and through joint ventures with Jewish-American billionaires in software corporations, especially in the “security” sector. Israel’s high percentage of billionaires at a time of sharp cuts in social spending puts the lie to its claim to be a ‘social democracy’ in the midst of Arab ‘sheikhdoms.’ As a matter of record, Israel has twice as many billionaires (16) as Saudi Arabia (8) and more super-rich than the entire Gulf countries (13). The fact that Israel has more billionaires per capita than any other country has not prevented its Zionist supporters in the US from pressing for an additional 20 billion in aid over the next decade. Unlike the past, today Israel’s wealth concentration has less to do with its being the biggest recipient of foreign aid. Israel’s receiving of handouts is a political issue: Zionist power over the Congressional purse. Given the total wealth of Israel’s billionaires, a five percent tax would more than compensate for any cut off of US foreign aid. But that is not about to happen simply because Zionist power in America dictates that the US taxpayers subsidize Israel’s plutocrats by paying for their offensive weaponry.

Conclusion

The “economic crises” of 2008-2009 inflicted only temporary losses to some (US-EU) billionaires and not others (Asian). Thanks to trillion dollar/Euro/yen bailouts, the billionaires class has recovered and expanded, even as wages in the US and Europe stagnate and ‘living standards’ are slashed by massive cutbacks in health, education, employment and public services.

What is striking about the recovery, growth, and expansion of the world’s billionaires is how dependent their accumulation of wealth is based on pillage of state resources; how much of their fortunes were based on neo-liberal policies which led to the takeover at bargain prices of privatized public enterprises; how state deregulation allows for plunder of the environment to extract resources at the highest rate of return; how the state promoted the expansion of speculative activity in real estate, finance and hedge funds, while encouraging the growth of monopolies, oligopolies and conglomerates which captured “super profits” – rates above the ‘historical level’. Billionaires in BRIC and in the older imperial centers (Europe, US, and Japan) have been the primary tax beneficiaries of reductions and elimination of social programs and labor rights.

What is absolutely clear is that the state, not the market, plays an essential role in facilitating the greatest concentration and centralization of wealth in world history, whether in facilitating the plundering of the treasury and the environment or in heightening the direct and indirect exploitation of labor .

The variations in the paths to ‘billionaire’ status are striking: in the US and UK, the parasitical-speculative sector predominates over the productive; among the BRIC — with the exception of Russia — diverse sectors incorporating manufacturers, software, finance and agro-mineral billionaires predominate. In China the abysmal economic gap between the billionaires and the working class, between real estate speculators and dispossessed household is leading to increasing class conflict and challenges, forcing significant increases in wages (over 20% the past 3 years) and demands for increased public spending on education, health and housing. Nothing comparable is occurring in the US, EU, or elsewhere in BRIC.

The sources of billionaire wealth are, at best, only partially due to ‘entrepreneurial innovations’. Their wealth may have begun, at an earlier phase, from producing useful goods and services, but as the capitalist economies ‘mature’ and shift toward finance, overseas markets and the search for higher profits by imposing neo-liberal policies, the economic profile of the billionaire class shifts toward the parasitical model of the established imperial centers.

The billionaires in BRIC, Turkey, and Israel contrast sharply from the Middle East oil billionaires who are rentiers living off ‘rents’ from exploiting oil and gas and overseas investments especially in the FIRE sector. Among the BRIC, only the Russian billionaire oligarchs resemble the rentiers of the Gulf. The rest, especially Chinese, Indian, Brazilian and Turkish billionaires have taken advantage of state promoted industrial policies to concentrate wealth under the rhetoric of ‘national champions’, promoting their own ‘interests’ in the name of a “successful emerging economy”. But the basic class questions remains: “growth for whom and who benefits?” So far the historical record shows that growth of billionaires has been based on a highly polarized economy in which the state serves the new class of billionaires, whether parasitical speculators as in the US, rentier pillagers of the state and environment such as Russia and the Gulf states or exploiters of labor such as in BRIC.

Post Script

The Arab revolt can be seen in part as an effort to overthrow ‘rentier capitalist clans’. Western intervention in the revolts and support of the ‘opposition’ military and political elites is an effort to substitute a ‘neo-liberal’ capitalist ruling class.This ‘new class’ would be based on the exploitation of labor and dispossession of current crony-clan-kin owners of resources Major enterprises would be transferred to multi-nationals and local capitalists. Much more promising are the internal working struggles in China and to lesser degree in Brazil and the rural based Maoist peasant and tribal movements in India which oppose rentier and capitalist exploitation and dispossession.

What has taken place so far can be explained by a bit of out-of- the-box thinking. The following analogy could help. If conditions are right for a devastating wildfire, and in your judgment the danger is almost certain, you have a better chance of surviving the inferno, or minimizing the potential damage, if you become pro-active. You get ahead of the game by starting a controlled burning. This would allow you to set the tempo for the fire. It will also give you some control: you can direct the path of the fire; you can even lower the intensity and temperature of the fire around the areas you want to protect.

Controlled Uprising

The view that some form of controlled uprising was at work in the overthrow of Mubarak merits consideration. Mubarak was a widely resented figure in Egypt, and the fire of mass revolts against him and his U.S.-Israeli backed regime had been smoldering beneath the surface for a long time. Moreover, there was a high likelihood that the fire could start on its own at any moment, and develop into uncontrollable and devastating flames. Knowing this, the Empire’s fire marshals have been preparing for a controlled burning since 2007, if not much earlier.

The Empire made the decision to get ahead of the game and write its rules rather than sticking with Mubarak at all costs. By appearing to be on the side of the people when it could no longer keep Mubarak in power, the Empire also put itself in an excellent position to launch its new strategic plan for the Middle East.

There are reasons to believe that the youth uprising on January 25 and the ensuing few days were prepared and organized by individuals some of whom had received “democracy training” by the “democracy industry” in the U.S., in particular by Freedom House. This uprising started the mass revolt that led to Mubarak’s downfall. Its demands, slogans, and tempo in the first few days framed the scope and defined the parameters of the uprising. What was quite strange about the demonstrations was the absence of anti-Israeli, anti-U.S., and pro-Palestinian slogans and sentiments.

To suggest that the recent mass revolt in Egypt involved some form of uprising engineering is not to say that the Empire wanted to overthrow Mubarak. Rather, if it could no longer keep him in power, it wanted to ensure that the leadership of the uprising that would end up overthrowing him would not fall into the hands of groups or individuals with agendas inimical to the Empire’s interests. And if this could be managed successfully, the structures of dictatorship that protect the Empire’s interests (transnational economic elites and the military-commercial complex of the army) would not be threatened or smashed.

Moreover, this suggestion does not deny that Mubarak was overthrown by a mass uprising. Nor does it minimize the importance of the Egyptian people’s monumental achievement. It only makes the point that, by the time the workers and masses of ordinary Egyptians joined the uprising and thronged Tahrir Square, the scope, intensity, and parameters of the uprising had already been set in the first few days: the goal of uprising had been narrowed down to the overthrow of Mubarak; voices calling for a genuine revolution had been lost or sidelined; and the army had emerged as the savior of the country. The upshot was that the structures of dictatorship survived. This kept the Empire’s base of power intact, hence enabling it to launch its new strategic plan (plan B, if you will).

The New Imperial Plan for the Middle East

In the age of the Internet and satellite TV, it is becoming increasingly hard for the Empire to rely on old-style dictatorship systems in developing countries to protect its interests.

The Westernized, modern, and educated middle-classes around the world—especially the youth and those fluent in English—dominate blogs and the social media. In developing countries with old-style dictatorships (especially in the Middle East), these classes are particularly vociferous and have a constant presence on the social media and blogs. They constantly rant against old-style dictators in their respective countries, and cry out for freedom, democracy, and economic opportunities.

Thanks to the new media, modern middle-classes in developing countries have acquired a taste and envy for the consumer life styles of their counterparts in the West (especially in the U.S.). Moreover, they have attained consciousness of their class interests as a global class, which by and large, serves the interests of the transnational capitalist class. Through the social media, these classes are transforming themselves into a transnational class of their own.

In many respects, the present generation of the educated modern middle-classes in the developing countries is very different from earlier generations of the 1950s-1980s. Generally speaking, unlike their predecessors in previous decades who had a sense of affinity and solidarity with their indigenous working classes and the poor, the new generation seems to be apathetic, even hostile, to the plight and interests of the downtrodden in their countries.

The left-leaning middle-class intellectuals of the previous decades who sided with the poor, worked to preserve their indigenous cultures, and advocated anti-colonialism/anti-imperialism, have been replaced by a new breed of middle-class intellectuals who, in general, are decidedly right-wing and show no shame in flaunting their pro-imperialist views. Some of them despise the poor openly. The only thing that infuriates this new breed about dictatorships in their countries is the absence of individual freedoms and Western consumer life-styles, which they regard as their entitlements.

Advocacy of social justice and independence by the modern middle-class intellectuals in the developing countries is by and large a thing of past. The new generation, in general, lacks a revolutionary or progressive conscience, and eagerly longs to serve the transnational capitalist class in the hope of attaining Western consumer life-styles as compensation for their services.

Moreover, the new generation, especially the youth and those fluent in English, have mostly bought into the ideology of the American Dream, and more often than not, see the world through the prism of American interests. Not Lumumba or Che Guevara, nor Sartre, but Obama, Clinton, and Donald Trump are their idols. They love to live, study, or work in the West, especially in the U.S., and would use any opportunity to make it happen. Quite aware of the situation, the American “democracy industry” NGOs recruit the most vociferous and media-savvy among them to do the Empire’s bidding. Often, they are recruited as “civil society activists,” “human rights advocates,” “democracy activists,” and sometimes as “reporters without borders.”

A good example here is Freedom House’s “New Generation of Advocates” program which seeks “young civil society activists who are working for democracy, human rights and peaceful political change in the Middle East and North Africa”, and brings them to the U.S. for “professional training”. The recruits are brought to the U.S., or sometimes sent to Western Europe, through exchange programs that are either funded directly by the U.S. government (e.g., U.S. State Department, USAID, and USIA), or are offered by the globalist “democracy industry” NGOs, which in effect are front organizations for the Empire (e.g., the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), Freedom House, the International Republican Institute, and George Soros’ Open Society Institute.)

The new imperial plan for the Middle East capitalizes on the willingness of the modern middle-classes of the region to enthusiastically serve the international class of super-rich. They would gladly cooperate if they get some semblance of political power and some of what they think they are entitled to: individual rights and freedoms, and some opportunities in the neo-liberal economic environment to fulfill their consumerist dreams.

The plan seems to work in three stages. First, it fans the grievances of these classes and gives them moral support. It also recruits some of the most vociferous and media-savvy elements in these classes, and provides material resources and training to help them propagate their views. (This is the primary stage of the plan for countries with “rogue” or “unfriendly” regimes: Iran and Syria. This stage also applies to China, Venezuela, Belarus, and North Korea.) Second, it goads the recruits to use their training and propaganda power to narrow down the scope of the opposition’s democratic demands to a few simple points that are in-sync with the Empire’s global strategy: human rights, “free” elections, and a reformed (i.e., privatized) economy. The intention here is to drown out or marginalize the voices of those forces in the opposition which promote genuinely democratic and anti-globalist agendas. (This is the main focus of the plan in countries with dictators “friendly” to the Empire who are facing popular revolts: Egypt, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, etc.) Third, once the dictator is toppled, the plan utilizes the services of these classes to produce “friendly” regimes, and to cast an aura of democracy and legitimacy on them.

Now that Mubarak is gone, the plan in Egypt has entered its third stage. It is now focused on manipulating the current social-political milieu and engineering the upcoming elections, in order to ensure that pro-Western middle-class technocrats rise to positions of power. Integral to the plan are some insidious strategies and tactics that are designed to fragment, sideline, confound, co-opt, and corrupt organizations and individuals which/who represent the interests of working people. Stirring up inner-fighting, sectarian divisions, and religious tensions are also in the plan. This “peaceful transfer of power” would leave the real power in the hands of the Egyptian army and the transnational super-rich who control the wealth, while giving a piece of the pie and a stake in the system to the modern middle-classes.

If the plan ends up working as the Empire wishes, the lower middle-classes, the poor, and working people (constituting up to 90% of the population) would be left voiceless. They would become politically disheartened and disillusioned, and their lives would be reduced to constant struggles to get by—a scenario that would be very similar to the post-Soviet Eastern European countries, including Russia.

Will the Empire Succeed?

The Empire faces two problems in the way of executing its plan in Egypt: political Islam and labor unions with class-conscious rank and file members. Both of these obstacles were absent in “revolutions” of Eastern Europe, and this is why the plan succeeded there.

Whether the labor unions will manage to transform themselves into a strong political force and their platforms take up the interests of the working people, or be bought off and corrupted in the service of the Empire’s plan, remains to be seen. What is generally not known is that the Empire has already positioned itself to control Egyptian labor unions. The U.S. “democracy industry” NGOs such as the National Endowment for Democracy, AFL-CIO’s American Center for International Labor Solidarity, and the Center for International Private Enterprise are busy training and co-opting the Egyptian labor activists.

As far as political Islam is concerned, the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) is presenting itself as the Islamic state par excellence. Even though Egyptian middle-class intellectuals and some in the Muslim Brotherhood have repeatedly stated that they are not interested in the Iranian model, the largest majority of the Egyptian masses seem to think otherwise. The IRI does not take orders from Washington, and is vehemently anti-Israel and pro-Palestinian, both of which resonate with the overwhelming majority of the Egyptian people.

Moreover, notwithstanding its serious shortcomings in areas of social freedoms and individual rights, the IRI has managed to develop the country somewhat successfully, and has built a social-economic welfare system that provides assistance and services to the working people and the poor. And it has done all of this despite the Empire’s military encirclement, economic sanctions, and constant military threats. These successes make the IRI look even more attractive to the Egyptian masses. The propaganda machine of the Empire and its super-rich and middle-class allies are hard at work to sway Egyptians away from the Iranian option.

Much rides on whether the Empire will succeed in its continuing efforts to topple IRI or severely debilitate it. The Iranian modern middle-classes, though have legitimate grievances against the regime, in their efforts to call international attention to their grievances, in effect, are doing the Empire’s bidding. In this respect, they are no different than their counterparts in Egypt.

The chances of success for the Empire’s plan do not look very good. If all goes well for the Empire, Egypt and other Arab countries currently facing revolts might end up looking like caricatures of Turkey: pseudo-democracies embellished with some Islamic features, and islands of small prosperous middle classes floating in the ocean of impoverished populations. However, even if the plan works, these societies would end up having unstable regimes. Under the pressure from their populations, they might refuse to take orders from Washington now and then, and could gravitate toward the IRI, hence denying the Empire and Israel the reliable puppets they badly need.

If the plan fails, we can expect one or both of the following outcomes. In some countries, people might get hold of political power, and produce governments with popular agendas that would break free from the American-Israeli Bloc in the region, and go the way of Iran, even though not necessarily becoming Islamic republics. In others, we might see countries looking more like Iraq and Pakistan, even like Afghanistan. Both of these outcomes would have disastrous consequences for the Empire. In the first case, the so-called “Resistance Bloc” would grow beyond Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, and Hamas. In the second case, the Empire might deem it necessary to intervene with its NATO partners, and end up facing armed resistance, worldwide condemnation, and a massive drain on its resources. (There are indications that Libya is currently being set up for a possible military intervention.)

In the case of Iran, if the Empire succeeds in overthrowing or destabilizing the IRI—which seems unlikely at this point— we might witness a civil war between Westernized middle-classes and their pro-Empire supporters, on the one side, and the surviving IRI structures and elements united mostly with the working-class and the poor, on the other side. The greater danger for Iran would be the territorial disintegration of the country along its ethnic-regional lines. This could turn into a humanitarian tragedy far more devastating than the one the world witnessed in Yugoslavia in the1990s. Though the Empire has long dreamed of destroying the IRI, the coming true of its dream at this particular conjuncture could turn into a nightmare. The resulting instability in Iran could spread to Pakistan, Iraq, Turkey, the Republic of Azerbaijan, and the central Asian countries.

Lastly, if the IRI survives, the chances of success for the Empire’s plan would diminish considerably. The IRI is already positioning itself strategically to take advantage of the falling and failing regimes in the U.S.-Israeli Bloc. If the IRI survives, this would strengthen the Empire’s resolve to bomb it, an undertaking which would most likely backfire. The future in the Middle East looks grim for the Empire and Israel, and dangerous for the peoples of the region.

This article first appeared at Intifada: Voice of Palestine.

In early September 2010, a small band of Mongolian citizens armed with hunting rifles opened fire on gold mining equipment owned by two foreign mining firms operating illegally in northern Mongolia. One of the four armed activists was Tsetsegee Munkhbayar, a 2007 winner of the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize — the ‘Green Nobel’ — awarded annually to pivotal environmentalists taking a stand around the globe.

“With unwavering passion,” reads the National Geographic Emerging Explorers profile of Tsetsegee Munkhbayar, “he inspired thousands of local villagers, held press conferences, organized town hall meetings, lobbied legislators, and led protest marches — mobilizing an unprecedented level of grassroots participation among citizens who previously felt they had no power to shape government policy.”²

Three years after winning the award — and a whole lot more illegal mining and pollution later — Munkhbayar’s little gang of four and their militant actions against the capitalist invasion remain in complete media whiteout in the western press: it’s as if the early September shootings never happened. While the civic activists face possible prosecution and extended jail terms — if not sudden unexplained death — rapacious mining companies further plunder and pollute the land.

The gang of four — Tsetsegee Munkhbayar, G. Bayaraa, D. Tumurbaatar and O. Sambuu-Yondon — are environmentalists from the United Movement of Mongolian Rivers and Lakes (UMMRL), a consortium of Mongolian groups organized to fight foreign extractive industries that have invaded the fledgling ‘democracy’. UMMRL was formed in June 4, 2009 after its predecessor, the Mongolian Nature Protection Coalition (MNPC), dissolved in the spring of 2008. Tsetsegee Munkhbayar — and many collaborators he works with — was pivotal to the creation of both MNPC and UMMRL.

Behind the story of Tsetsegee Munkhbayar is a story of greed, private profit, deception, betrayal, stealth and heartbreak. Just three years after becoming a global hero, Tsetsegee Munkhbayar is today shunned by the people who lobbied to make him a Goldman Award winner, and they have even branded him and his colleagues as terrorists.

“The shooters sent a powerful message,” reported EurasiaNet, the only foreign media outlet to report on the recent shooting action. Puraam, a Chinese firm, and Centerra Gold, a Canadian-operated company, “aren’t welcome in the area, one of Mongolia’s only forested regions.”³ Centerra is also operating in Kyrgyzstan, a former Russian republic where paramilitary government forces repressed public protests and shot hundreds of unarmed protesters in 2010.⁴

Centerra Gold and Puraam Mining are operating on 168 hectares of land and contaminating the headwaters of the Selenge, Mongolia’s largest river, and the source for Lake Baikal, the world’s largest freshwater lake. The Gatsuur deposit, currently exploited by Centerra Gold, contains an estimated 1.3 million ounces of gold valued at tens of billions of dollars. Centerra’s Boroo gold mine began production in 2004 and yields an average of 180,000 ounces of gold annually.

The locals see very little from the gold taken from their lands. At least 70% of the population lives in absolute poverty. Alcoholism is a national epidemic. The social fabric is unraveling. Human trafficking is a big business. Everything is for sale, or already sold.

“[People] see the 1990s privatization rush and years of harsh weather as a kind of economic one-two punch. Twenty years after Mongolia peacefully threw off 70 years of communism, one-third of Mongolia’s 2.9 million people live below the poverty level of less than $2 a day; even white-collar workers like doctors and teachers can earn as little as $300 a month.”⁵

Mining operations devastate the sensitive Mongolian environment. Photo credit: unknown.

The mining companies arrived in Mongolia hand-in-hand with the international NGOs — euphemistically called ‘non-government’ organizations — and they promote the western imposed ideal of ‘privatization’. The unstated assumptions that came along with this are that freedom-loving westerners are uniquely qualified to teach Mongolians about democracy, human rights, good government and environmental stewardship. Tsetsegee Munkhbayar was patronized and promoted by this framework of foreign intervention.

“According to the promoters,” writes Dr. Joan Roelofs, “the precondition for such benefits is a ‘free market’ economy, or the adoption of ‘neoliberalism’, which entails the privatization of most government functions, deregulation of business, abolition of subsidies and welfare, and availability of all assets (land, TV stations, national newspapers, etc.) for purchase by any corporation, regardless of nationality. Freedom also means that foreigners can start any business anywhere…”⁶

A Hero’s Welcome

“Tsetsegee Munkhbayar spent his childhood herding yaks on the banks of the Onggi, one of Mongolia’s largest rivers,” wrote National Geographic in their Emerging Explorers profile.⁷ “About 60,000 people and one million head of livestock depended on the powerful waterway. But in the early 1990s the essential life source began shrinking, grew contaminated, and by 2001 water that had coursed through his village for centuries had vanished — leaving a rocky riverbed, thirsty herds, and devastated families.”⁷

“The dramatic dry-up was the result of unregulated hydraulic mining that used high-pressure water systems to extract gold and other minerals,” the National Geographic continues. “With more than half the nation’s land granted to mining, the effects were rapid and enormous — 1,500 rivers and creeks were cut off and 300 lakes were emptied. Desperate for drinking water, Munkhbayar’s family and neighbors dug wells. But groundwater was so contaminated that dozens [sic] of local children suffered serious liver damage. Munkhbayar’s son was taken ill, and his mother lost her life.”⁷

As a child, Tsetsegee Munkhbayar dreamed of his hero, Chinggis Khan, the great horseman of the Mongolian steppes, and of becoming a respected herder in the long nomadic tradition of his family. After the heartbreak of seeing his native Onggi River run dry due to unregulated foreign mining, and seeing his people and their herds dying from toxic pollution related diseases, Tsetsegee Munkhbayar took action, organized people, challenged corporations and government.

“The Onggi River Movement he co-founded convinced government officials to expand and enforce mining regulations, pass new legislation, establish citizen oversight for the entire mining process, and start environmental restoration work. As a result, 35 of the 37 mining operations in the Onggi river basin stopped destructive operations, the worst offender shut down, and for the first time in years the river flows again. Munkhbayar went on to unite 11 river movements, creating the Mongolian Nature Protection Coalition, one of the nation’s most influential civic and environmental organizations.”⁷

It wasn’t long before Tsetsegee Munkhbayar was noticed by the experts at the The Asia Foundation, a San Francisco-based ‘think tank’ and ‘advocacy’ organization that meddles, quite deeply, it turns out, in the foreign affairs of ‘repressive’ nations (e.g. China), little island protectorates involved in ‘counter-insurgencies’ (e.g. Philippines), former Soviet Republics (e.g. Kyrgyzstan) and so-called ‘failed states’ where the United States just happens to be prosecuting all out war (e.g. Afghanistan & Iraq).

“On Monday, April 23, 2007, Tsetsegee Munkhbayar of Mongolia, founder of a mass citizen’s movement to protect Mongolia’s national waterways, won a 2007 Goldman Environmental Prize — the largest accolade in the world for grassroots environmentalists,” wrote TAF’s director at the time, Bill Foerderer Infante. “Often referred to as the ‘Green Nobel,’ the $125,000 annual award was established in 1990 by San Francisco civic leader and philanthropist Richard N. Goldman⁸ and his late wife, Rhoda H. Goldman, to recognize outstanding individuals who are combating pressing environmental challenges, and was created to allow these people to continue their important work.”

“The only Asian recipient of the award this year,” Bill Infante continued, “Mr. Munkhbayar, 40 [at the time], was recognized for having successfully pressured 35 of 37 mining operations working in Mongolia’s Onggi river basin — a precious drinking water supply for rural Mongolians — to permanently stop harmful, ruinous mining and exploration activities. Beginning in 2001, and with a volunteer staff of more than 2,000 people, Mr. Munkhbayar’s Onggi River Movement organized multi-province roundtable discussions and launched high-profile radio and television campaigns to build public awareness.”

After winning the Goldman Environmental prize in 2007, activist Tsetsegee Munkhbayar was widely celebrated by western institutions and the English-speaking press for his peaceful and collaborative achievements in uniting nomads and organizing civil society to protect Mongolia’s environment. Tsetsegee Munkhbayar was not just an environmentalist, he was a national hero, standing up for ordinary people and basic human rights, a former herder turned national spokesman who rose out of the backward and repressive social milieu of communism in collapse. Tsetsegee Munkhbayar was rewarded for speaking up — an action unheard of in Mongolian society — in the former Soviet-run communist republic turned ‘emerging democracy’ of Mongolia.

Home, Home on the Range

I found Tsetsegee Munkhbayar and other key river movement activists from around the country at the offices of the Onggi River Movement in Mongolia’s capital city, Ulaanbaatar.⁹ Tsetsegee Munkhbayar is every bit a man deserving of awards.

“In Mongolia it is nonsense to speak about ‘pollution’ when the entire water source has disappeared,” Tsetsegee Munkhbayar told me. “Because of climate differences — it is not like the United States — we have to completely prohibit the use of water in Mongolia.”

The year 2000 saw massive livestock die-offs in Mongolia due to a regional climate (drought) condition called ghang — meaning that water resources in Mongolia were always scarce to begin with — exacerbated by global climate instability. On the great Mongol steppe, killing droughts come with the ghang, where summer sunshine scorches grasslands, and the qara zhud, a snowless winter in a waterless desert. Torrential rains bring floods. The caghan zhud is a blizzard of frozen snowy starvation and the tugharai-yin zhud defines another kind of hunger: too many cattle or horses, thousands of hooves ripping apart the land; too many sheep or goats, devouring every last grass. Winter plunges the mercury to minus 35 or minus 40º or colder — minus 70º in recent years — the killing temperatures. Whole herds vanish overnight, and with them the livelihoods of whole families. Hardest hit were small-scale Mongolian herders. Ghang struck again in the winter of 2010, killing some 8 million (17%) of the country’s livestock.

However, ghang and zhud have now also become big businesses in Mongolia: absent the appropriate land management policies, or the enforcement of laws, in a system rife with corruption, the effects of climate mayhem have been exacerbated by government officials with over-sized herds who capitalize on ordinary people’s losses and monopolize government subsidies, capitalize on western donors’ support, and dominate the best grazing land.

A landlocked nation of steppes and desert, Mongolia is known mostly for its nomadic herders and heroic former leader Chinggis Khaan.¹⁰ With an estimated $1.3 trillion worth of untapped mineral assets, according to Eurasia Capital, a predatory Hong Kong-based investment bank, “the investment world is eagerly eyeing opportunities in Mongolia”.

Capitalism arrived in Mongolia circa 1990 and the people saw more than 60 years of communist propaganda dissolve into capitalist propaganda overnight. Suddenly, everything that was bad was good, and everything that was good was bad. Now they are seeing the reality of capitalism.

The rapid expansion of rapacious profit-driven ecotourism is destroying Mongolia’s culture, people and land: Mongolia is the new wild, wild west, the last frontier. Tourist camps and lodges run by ‘entrepreneurs’ wielding the power of private-profit have sprouted up in pristine wilderness where only herders once roamed. More and more herders are landless and herd-less.

Big mining companies have forced more and more nomads into the sprawling poverty of ger cities.¹¹ Communities of herders that have stood up, peacefully and unarmed, for their environmental and human rights — clean air, clean water, clean pastures — for more than a decade. Mining and logging have dried up or poisoned whole rivers. Increasingly aggressive responses from increasingly desperate communities have been met with paramilitary violence and illegal western-style ‘legal’ actions in the elite-controlled courts.

The poverty in cities takes many forms: homelessness, over-crowding, squatting, slave labor. The urban poor — increasingly desperate and disillusioned — have robbed Ulaanbaatar’s graves of sacred artifacts that were long ago buried with the ancestors: pried open and ransacked, skulls and skeletons spill out of crumbling wood caskets.

Hundreds of street children were living in Ulaanbaatar’s underground sewer systems in the dead of the Mongolian winter: temperatures have plummeted to minus 40º Fahrenheit in cities and minus 70º F in rural areas in recent years. One Mongolian researcher who was involved in a street children study in Mongolia reports that according to the national statistics the number of homeless children in Mongolia reached about 2000 at its highest in the early 1990s, but the number hovered steadily around 1000-1400 annually, depending on the season (in winters some kids returned home). However, the numbers suddenly dropped since around 2006: people explain the drop by the trafficking of homeless children to China to use their body parts (kidneys, livers, hearts) for transplants.

Hundreds of people work each day picking through garbage in the city dumps; many of them live there: western charity and aid groups have preyed on them, promising all kinds of changes, using images of them in fancy brochures to win new grants, but providing no substantive relief.

Preying on the country’s 2.9 million people and polluting the vastly unpopulated land, transnational corporations backed by foreign governments and the western intelligence apparatus are plundering what some call ‘the Saudi Arabia of Central Asia’. The same companies are plundering Mongolia as Congo and Canada, for example, and Western mining works in league with NGOs claiming to be working for Mongolia’s conservation and development and freedom. The ‘intelligence apparatus’ includes the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and National Security Agency (NSA): The CIA has a long history of foreign interventions, tortures, drugs-running and covert operations — as bad as anything ever done by SAVAK (Iran), KGB (Russia), or STASI (East Germany).

Our Mongolian Land

“The government has sold out to mining companies and the government is fully under their control,” said M. Bold, a leader of the civic movement My Mongolian Land.¹² A former military commander, M. Bold’s movement attracted many other military — former soldiers disillusioned and disenfranchised by government. M. Bold has often been propositioned to take a bribe. He is worried about his life. “But someone has to speak out,” he said. “If not me, no one will.”¹³

Formed in 2005, My Mongolian Land organized 29 public protests between 2005 and 2008, averaging 7000-8000 people in each; the biggest was 13,000 people. To protest corrupt government deals that completely sold out to Ivanhoe Mines — one of the most notorious western corporations in Mongolia¹⁴ — the group camped out for weeks on the streets of Ulaanbaatar in April 2006. One of the largest mass gatherings in Mongolia’s history, they even burned an effigy of Ivanhoe’s mining magnate Robert ‘Toxic Bob’ Friedland. M. Bold shows me the minerals map of Mongolia — specked and dotted with deposits all over the land.

“Many top Mongolian military officials are linked to corrupt government officials,” M. Bold told me. “It’s not the ‘Democratic Party’ and ‘Communist Party’ fighting each other in Mongolia, it’s actually mining companies fighting for power and control.”

Western corporate lawyers sent by the mining companies have helped create tax and mining laws favorable to multinational corporations. Since 1991, the most progressive mining laws — hard fought for, hard won — have been reversed at least three times for the benefit of foreign extractive industries. However, most of the mining laws were copied over from Canada in 1997. Also helping to impose favorable mining and other laws are big western NGOS.

“As a newly developing ‘democracy’ we don’t know how to control these NGOs and their projects,” said M. Bold. “The money just cycles back to foreigners — advisers, experts, consultants — and these foreigners live very comfortably in Mongolia. There are so many of them. And we don’t know what they are doing.”

The big NGOs in Mongolia include the Soros Foundation, World Wildlife Fund, Conservation International, The Nature Conservancy and The Asia Foundation — funded by United States Agency for International Development (USAID), Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), Department for International Development (DFID) United Kingdom, Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA), World Bank, Asian Development Bank, and the KEIDANREN.¹⁵ The big conservation and human rights NGOs work to ‘protect the environment’, but only selectively. They protect Mongolian resources from western capitalism’s competitors — from China, Korea and Russia, in Mongolia’s case — and blind the Mongolian people to the truth.

Saruul Avgandoorj is a former school teacher turned green movement activist from Hongor village, next to the mining metropolis of Darkhan — where mining has poisoned the whole village with cyanide. We meet in the ‘Veteran’s Building’ in Ulaanbaatar, where green movement and human rights activists have converged to form an alliance against government corruption and human rights abuses. They are also waging a war of occupation to hold onto the last public meeting space they have.

“Babies have been born with deformities,” Saruul Avgandoorj tells me, “and there have been more than 30 miscarriages. There are many birth defects in cattle too. Around 15 people died — not old people — of the same symptoms.”¹⁶

Problems in this case are caused by the Chinese gold mining company ‘Mich’, partnered with the government of Darkhan and a federal parliamentarian official named Mr. Khayanharvaa. “He poisoned the whole village — the cattle, the humans, the environment, the water,” says Saruul Avgandoorj. “He purchased and manipulated votes [in a recent election]. Now the green movement in Mongolia works in solidarity with human rights groups.”

In early July 2008 thousands of people protested the rigged national elections. Police responded with bullets, massive arrests, tortures, disappearances and secret trials. The western press produced superficial reports, but like most substantive news, the post-elections violence was mostly in whiteout. Saruul Avgandoorj, now the National Green Movement leader, and Arslan Gombosuren, leader of the Mongolian Citizens for Justice Movement, were imprisoned for 14 days in August 2008 for sitting down in a public place with pieces of tape emblazoned with the Mongol word for ‘release’ taped over their mouths.¹⁷

The Asia Foundation (TAF) provided ‘election observers’ — more US government funding — but according to Mongolian civil society organizations the entire show was a farce; even foreign expatriates agreed. Director Bill Infante published TAF reports claiming that the elections were ‘free and fair’ — it’s too bad about the elections-related violence, he said, dismissing it — but a good example of an ‘emerging democracy’ in the making.

“They [TAF] called the elections ‘free and fair’, and they were quoted by all the western newspapers,” said ‘Bayarma Ganbold’, a Mongolian civic activist afraid of being targeted for speaking out, “and they never changed their story, even when it became obvious it wasn’t true. Bill Infante’s wife Bettina started a public relations company with government candidates as her clients. Bill and Bettina created all this propaganda about how wonderful the elections were. But the elections were fixed from the beginning to the end.”¹⁸

In October 2008, some 230 innocent civilians — over 70 teenagers and 130 people aged 19-21 — remained locked in brutal Mongolian jails after police swept the streets in early July arresting 823 people. Mongolian witnesses claim that the post-election ‘riots’ of early July were designed to justify arrests, since they were manufactured by neo-Nazi provocateurs tolerated and promoted by police. More than 72 people disappeared, while official tolls reported only five people killed. Far-right groups in Mongolia are proliferating, and the neo-Nazis allegedly serve as mafia thugs for government parliamentarians and other recipients of western largesse.¹⁹

Nazi memorabilia and statues adorn the walls of a popular bar cafe in downtown Ulaanbataar, speaking to the rise of neo-Nazi factions there.

“The government hid the facts,” said ‘Bayarma Ganbold’, “and The Asia Foundation played along. They were partners in crime. We’ve made the human rights situation known to international human rights organizations — Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International — but they haven’t responded.”

In 2009, Amnesty International published a report blaming the July 2008 violence on ‘riots’: there was no mention of western interests in elections-rigging or neo-Nazi provocateurs who instigated the ‘riots’.²⁰

Those arrested were tortured into signing confessions, denied legal representation, tried in groups in secret government trials, and some were sentenced to 15-20 years in prison. A few people with money were able to buy their way out: one family paid $11,000 to police to release their son, who they quickly packed off to South Korea for safety.

Saruul Avgandoorj described how the George Soros Foundation funds a lot of police projects in Mongolia, projects like the ‘Police and Community Cooperation’ and ‘Achievement of a New Level’. “But we don’t know what they do,” she said. “Many [foreign] NGOs and organizations are working as agents for [corrupt] politicians. No one realizes the catastrophe that is unfolding here.”

Non-Government Euphemism

In the beginning, Tsetsegee Munkhbayar had a very positive understanding about The Asia Foundation (TAF), which had been working in Mongolia since (at least) 1990. One of the local Mongolia partners for the World Bank, TAF helped build the Mongolian Nature Protection Coalition (MNPC), an alliance of eleven domestic civil society conservation NGOs created through the organizational skills and respectful dialog of Tsetsegee Munkhbayar and his colleagues.

TAF financed a variety of Onggi River Movement projects with some $10,000 over four years, 2004-2008. In 2007, the first year of the MNPC, TAF donated $US 120,000 to be shared amongst eleven groups of the coalition; TAF gave $60,000 in 2008.

While pitching a few thousand dollars to the MNPC, TAF was at the same time filling its coffers and funding its foreign salaried professionals with money earned by leveraging the success story of Tsetsegee Munkhbayar and the Goldman prize TAF won him.

In 2006, for example, TAF used the success story of the Onggi River Movement and MNPC to leverage 2.7 million Euros ($US 3,630,000) from the Dutch government for a TAF project titled ‘To Guarantee the Future’.  It wasn’t long before TAF dropped the Mongolian Nature Protection Coalition altogether and the coalition disbanded. By October 2008, the MNPC hadn’t seen a penny of the Dutch funds.

It was the salaried professionals at TAF who nominated Tsetsegee Munkhbayar for the Goldman Prize, and an investigation into their motivations, their ties to big business and other facts, reveals that their agenda is not as pure as they would like the world to believe. In nominating and awarding Tsetsegee Munkhbayar, the people at TAF also wrote the script for his environmental heroism — not out of concerns for the environment, but to guide and shape the environmental movement to suit TAF — and the western corporate template for ‘social activism’ in an ‘emerging democracy’. TAF and their partners and sponsors used Tsetsegee Munkhbayar as a tool in their multibillion dollar plans for ‘shaping’ Mongolian civil society in the interests of western penetration and control.

While pumping money into domestic civic organizations, subversive neocolonial entities like TAF also impose limitations on grant recipients. NGOs affiliated with the MNPC began to notice ‘donor preferences’ — where funds were channeled to the NGOs that remained more silent and acquiescent about government policies, and especially those that did not protest against mining companies. Mongolian NGOs were expected to defer to TAF when dealing with the media, and they were compelled to sign contracts forbidding them from publicly protesting against mining companies or government policies. TAF also worked to determine and control the members of the boards overseeing the environmental coalitions that received TAF funds. Ultimately, river coalition members found they had no control over their own groups: TAF tried to maintain all control.²¹

Indigenous activists like Tsetsegee Munkhbayar are encouraged to ‘cooperate’ and subordinate themselves to powerful foreign NGO entities in a multitude of ways — much like self- and other forms of censorship in the western press model. That they will not cross a certain invisible but tangible line is expected of them. When members of domestic organizations like Tsetsegee Munkhbayar “make ‘noises’ in society they draw[s] public attention to issues which either are not known or were not able to be known previously due to a lack of access to information, secrecy and distance from the areas where issues exist.”²¹

Pictures Worth a Thousand Herds

Due to the influence and subterfuge of western interests, and their lack of accountability or transparency, Mongolian nationals sometimes harbor distorted perceptions. For example, one MNPC activist claimed that “TAF paid one photographer $90,000 to do some pictures in Mongolia. Meanwhile all eleven MNPC organizations, with $120,000 to split between them in the first year [2007], were tasked with buying computers and other equipment and establishing an environmental protection network across all Mongolia.”

Ted Wood claims that the MNPC activist was incorrect (they have not responded to my clarification inquiry of February 2011). “This is complete fiction,” Ted Wood responded [February 2011]. “The only fee I received from TAF for photography was $900 for a 3-day shoot in eastern Mongolia for their ‘Books for Asia’ program.”

Ted Wood would not answer questions about how much money he received from TAF for other projects or purposes. According to his own biography, Ted Wood is a Boulder, Colorado (USA)-based freelance photographer and author “who specializes in natural history and environmental images. He has photographed for Vanity Fair, Los Angeles Times Magazine, New York Times, National Wildlife, and Outside,” and his images are copyrighted, marketed and sold through the photo agencies Aurora Photos and Getty Images.

Ted Wood’s photographs from Mongolia were used in part for books peddled by TAF as part of their effort to penetrate Mongolian culture with ‘educational’ materials infused with western values and norms about private profit, individualism, and ‘free-market’ competition. However, not one of the elite US magazines that Ted Wood shoots for have published anything substantive about the western mining, human rights atrocities, or other foreign meddling in Mongolia. Both Ted Wood and TAF capitalize on their relationship: on their ‘Power of a Book: Books for Asia’ web page, TAF promotes Ted Wood; his biography is also listed on a TAF web page. Sponsors for TAF’s international “Books for Asia” program include Chevron Oil and USAID.

“The conclusions you are drawing here are wrong,” Ted Wood wrote me [February 2011], protesting my characterizations of his work. “I donated a couple images to TAF guides concerning citizen rights as they pertained to mining and the environment. I have no control over the editorial content of magazines that license my photos, as you should know. I’ve proposed many mining stories, but mining stories in Mongolia are not at the top of magazines’ lists I’m afraid. The connection you’re making here between my work and the absence of magazine stories is truly unfair.”

In fact, Ted Wood and his journalism colleague Jeremy Schmidt also formed an NGO in the United States called Conservation Ink whose self-advertised mission “is to support conservation and environmental awareness in natural and cultural areas through the production and distribution of educational materials.” The financial sponsors of Conservation Ink include the National Geographic Society, USAID, The Nature Conservancy, Wildlife Conservation Society, The Asia Foundation and — no small surprise — the Ivanhoe [Mines] Community Development Fund.²²

“Many corporations have funds or foundations,” Ted Wood replied [letter of complaint, February 2011]. “Ford, Microsoft, etc. Shell even supports Frontline and PBS, even when the story is anti-oil. The Ivanhoe Fund gave us money to translate our educational materials on Gobi Gurvansaikan National Park for use in Mongolian schools.”

“I suggest you contact Ivanhoe,” said Jeremy Schmidt, co-founder of Conservation Ink, responding to questions about their grant from Ivanhoe Mines, for the original publication of this story. “Alyson Croft was our contact with the Fund at the time of the grant we received. It was 2004 or 2005, a small grant to translate our Gobi map-guide into Mongolian for free local distribution.”²³

Alyson Croft is the wife of Layton Croft, the former Mongolia country director for The Asia Foundation and, as we will shortly see, he was one of Tsetsegee Munkhbayar’s primary advocates with the Goldman Foundation.

National Geographic has used some of Ted Wood’s images. In a single on-line story they did which talks in any detail about mining in Mongolia — a story where they cite Tsetsegee Munkhbayar — National Geographic blamed Mongolia’s mining woes on Chinese and Russian firms (who are certainly doing their share of plundering and poising the land) and on small-scale Mongolian miners — mom-and-pop herder families struggling to eke a living out of the harsh, cruel world that wiped out their herds — and the only hint of any western mining involvement was in a quote they inserted by Ivanhoe Mines spokesman Layton Croft.

Mining companies are always downplaying the size of mineral reserves, and western mining companies are not to blame for anything, they say, since they have hardly arrived in Mongolia and haven’t even begun to exploit the resources. Anyways, big things are in store for the lucky communities nearby, they promise.

“Mining to date has been relatively small-scale,” said Layton Croft, an executive with Ivanhoe Mines, a Canadian company with a massive copper and gold mine development project in southern Mongolia. The boom really hasn’t yet started. The prospect of mining is what’s on everyone’s mind.”²⁴

The statement was both true and false at once. More interesting, however, is how the western invaders quote each other, slap each other’s backs and butter each other’s bread, how the western media uses these select experts to give voice to select ideas, and how the money cycles back and forth between them — perpetuating the propaganda and private profits of predatory capitalism.

Follow the Money

Substantial efforts (2005-2006) by Layton Croft, TAF’s former Mongolia Country Director, and William Foerderer Infante, his successor, to lobby the Goldman Fund paid off when Tsetsegee Munkhbayar traveled to San Francisco, California (USA) to receive the $125,000 cash prize (2007).

Robert Redford introduces Tsetsegee Munkhbayar and the other 2007 Goldman Prize winners in the moving Goldman Foundation video.²⁵ The video applauds Tsetsegee Munkhbayar for his organizational skills and peaceful, collaborative approach. One mining company public relations executive –  Mongolian giving mining a Mongolian face — talks about restoration done by their mining company, suggesting a progressive mining climate in Mongolia, where companies comply with environmental stewardship, perform due diligence and work with communities. The video paints a happy and collaborative picture over the brutal realities attendant to the clash of civilizations.

And then, at minute 4:18 in the Goldman Fund 2007 video we meet Mr. Layton Croft, who left TAF in 2005 to become Vice-President, Corporate Affairs & Social Responsibility, for Ivanhoe Mines.

“The key to [Tsetsegee] Munkhbayar’s success as a leader for responsible mining in Mongolia,” says Layton Croft, in the Goldman Prize video, “is that he’s had the courage to acknowledge that mining could be good for Mongolia, as long as it’s done in a very open and participatory way.”

Layton Croft began his career as a Peace Corps volunteer in Mongolia (1994-1997). He later joined the Mongolian office of the big US government and intelligence organization PACT,²⁶ where he was the Program Director for Information Systems for their Gobi Regional Economic Growth Initiative/Mongolia (1999-2002), working for PACT-Mongolia in an alliance with Mercy Corps and USAID.

Mercy Corps has a very euphemistic name suggesting that they are merciful, caring, dedicated to helping — a.k.a. we are supposed to perceive them, as many of their workers perceive themselves, as selfless and charitable and serving a higher moral purpose: to alleviate suffering. However, the Merc Corps partners include at least one multinational weapons manufacturer whose business depends on the proliferation and actuation of war (The Boeing Company).  They are also affiliated with sweatshop companies (NIKE), predatory international banking (International Finance Corporation), and one of the US corporations (ITT) that directly supported the 1970 coup d’etat against Chilean president Salvador Allende and the rise of the brutal dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet.

One of Layton Croft’s USAID-backed projects with PACT involved bringing National Public Radio founder Bill Siemering and NPR personality Corey Flintoff to Mongolia to promote the USAID-funded fiction of ‘free and independent’ media.²⁷ Another PACT project Croft was involved with created and broadcast a TV sit-com “where marginalized herder and non-herder business operators are learning new skills to manage their diversified businesses for higher returns via a 26-episode educational TV soap opera broadcast on Mongolian National TV.” The show had more than 400,000 viewers.²⁸

One of PACT’s nationally broadcast TV dramas was called Endless Labyrinth, described by PACT as “a 26 part drama, focused on a family that had lost its entire herd through natural disaster. Destitute, and in need of income, the family moves to the provincial center in search of employment opportunities. The show addressed issues such as urban migration, and helped to unravel the tangles of life in a modern market economy.”

However, we can be sure that the show did not challenge the basic beliefs and tenants of predatory capitalism, or international finance (George Soros made his billions by currency speculation that facilitated the collapse of former communist countries), or the nature of western propaganda, or the predation that comes side-by-side with the “humanitarian” business sector (with all their attendant human rights and environmental atrocities and their undermining of labor and health standards) or the spread of disease that comes with the penetration of multinational pharmaceutical corporations (dumping outdated or forbidden products or testing untested medicines) and agribusiness (spreading genetically modified seeds) and multinational food corporations (laced with poisons like monosodium glutamate or aspartame).

The urban migration of Mongolian nomads is in PACT’s interest — getting the pesky people out of the way and freeing up the land for exploitation by mining, petroleum or other extractive industries. Meanwhile, the urban migrants can be more easily targeted by corporations peddling western commodities and serving the interests of companies like Nike and Wal-Mart, who also to be PACT partners.

In short, while the scourge of western capitalism penetrates further and further into the Mongolian hinterland, the scourge of western propaganda penetrates deeper and deeper into the psyche of the average Mongolian citizen (who is daily tuned in to these soap operas and herder dramas). The icing on the cake of indoctrination is the advertising that is infused between the segments of the episodes, filing up the airwaves and the minds of anxious listeners with ideas of consumption, the politics of desire, and the pathological western worship of individuality (and hostility to community, a.k.a., socialism).

Such foreign created and controlled propaganda is not purely entertainment: like the ‘educational’ books peddled by TAF and the TV sit-coms created by PACT, these programs rely on ‘behavior change communications’ — analyzing and changing local content to change attitudes and eventually change behaviors; creating desire, opening up new markets for western commodities, and selling advertising.²⁹

Layton Croft’s next career step was TAF, 2003-2005, where he lobbied the Goldman Foundation to recognize Tsetsegee Munkhbayar.

Layton Croft’s experience working with and for the big NGOs — Soros Foundation, Mercy Corps, PACT, USAID, TAF — certainly enhanced his next career move. Since 2005, Layton Croft has been the Executive Vice-President for Corporate Affairs and Community Relations at South Gobi Resources, an Ivanhoe Mines/Rio Tinto megaproject, and he is an “advisor for investor relations in Asia and corporate social responsibility” for Ivanhoe Mines. Alison Croft, his wife, works in ‘community relations’ with Ivanhoe Mines.

As the newly hired public relations executive for Ivanhoe Mines, Layton Croft wasted no time in accusing Mongolian civil society groups — including some of his former allies when he worked at TAF — of betraying the public. One of his first major public relations whitewash came in April 2006, when the effigy of ‘Toxic Bob’ Friedland was burned by My Mongolian Land, the Green Movement, and other civic groups.

“We also overturned Ivanhoe cars in 2007 protests,” M. Bold from My Mongolian Land told me. “Ivanhoe wanted to get a contract like the government had with the Canadian company Boroo Gold. They [Boroo] were robbing us for more than ten years (1997-2007). In one year of operations they used 800 tons of [toxic] chemicals,³⁰ so they were also destroying the place: it’s not useable for centuries. The company produced the only reports about water, for example, and what a wonderful job they were doing.”¹³

“The [Ivanhoe] company deeply regrets the fact that civic movements are misleading the Mongolian public by misrepresenting the real facts in order to further their own political interests,” said Layton Croft, Executive Vice President for Corporate Affairs for Ivanhoe Mines. “As a public company listed and traded on the New York and Toronto stock exchanges, Ivanhoe Mines respects the independence and sovereignty of the countries where it operates. To this end, Ivanhoe has not and will not interfere in internal Mongolian political affairs,” Croft said.³¹

In 2007, Ivanhoe mines came very close to physically changing the direction of the Kherlan River, but it was the intervention of the Mongolian Nature Protection Coalition (MNPC) that stopped it. Tsetsegee Munkhbayar and Clayton Croft engaged in a heated argument about this at a public meeting.

“Ivanhoe Mines had their own people already elected to Parliament,” said M. Bold of My Mongolian Land. “We don’t want Mongolia to be a playground for these criminals and their corruption. Our country is in grave danger.”³²

Shunned by Sponsors

On May 30, 2005 members of the Onggi River Movement traveled to Arkhangai aimag³³ to organize an MNPC training workshop for local herders facing critical water stoppages on the Nariin Hamar River in Tsenkher soum.³⁴ During the training an excited herder on horseback arrived to alert them that a new mining company was commencing operations at a new site on the river at that very moment. The workshop drew 128 people, and all of them moved quickly to the new site where a Mongolian company called Mongol Gazar was setting up a new ger camp.

Blocked from the site by armed security guards, the herders were attacked after they told the company personnel to immediately leave their land. The security guards tear-gassed the angry herders, beat them and shot into the air. A professional cameraman from Mongolian National Broadcast TV who was attending the rivers movement training was attacked, his equipment destroyed, along with all evidence of the attacks of violence by security guards. Herders were arrested and threatened by the company, who warned that Mongolian law protected all mining companies from protest.

For Tsetsegee Munkhbayar, this incident signaled his evolving awareness of how far mining companies would go — and how ruthless — to protect their stolen interests. Barely one year after Tsetsegee Munkhbayar was awarded the Goldman Prize he and his colleagues asserted their independence even further — much to the disapproval of the people at TAF — and they began to suffer for it immediately.

On May 16, 2008, at another protest in Selenge aimag, herders of the Khuder River Movement — another MNPC member organization — faced similar violence from armed guards with the Erdes Group, an iron and gold company. Erdes guards had guns and batons and they intimidated the river movement herders into keeping their distance.

A Mongolian front company with Chinese investors behind it, Erdes Group is allegedly partnered with Mr. O. Chuluunbat, ex-president of Mongol Bank and the Communist Party parliament member from Selenge aimag. The company clear-cut the local forests, but they left a wall of trees intact at the front of the clear-cut to disguise the devastation behind.³⁵ Similarly, Erdes Group publicly championed ‘restoration’ that never happened. Due to the protest, the company halted mining for two months, bribed everyone they could, and started up again. Bulldozing everything in sight, they turned the forest into mud and chopsticks — processed at their nearby factory, exported to China.⁹

By the spring of 2008, Tsetsegee Munkhbayar finally began to understand that TAF was acting against the interests of Mongolia and protecting the mining companies. When the Onggi River Movement demonstrated its independence, really taking on mining companies aggressively, TAF at first lobbied the Onggi River Movement to soften its approach, and then they attacked them.

Meanwhile, the mining companies had become increasingly violent in response to the successes of the conservationists in organizing civil society against illegal mining, privatization of natural resources, corruption in government, and the overuse and degradation of the commons. More and more, companies deployed armed security guards. Across the country there was a rise in attacks on herders and conservationists who protested the illegal land grab and environmental destruction of mining operations.

Tsetsegee Munkhbayar and his colleagues saw clearly that the government was not enforcing the environmental protections brought into law in previous years. It was the duty of the Mongolian government to regulate companies, they said, but the government was not doing so. There were no protections of citizen’s basic human rights and the environment. More and more herders and their herds were suffering due to mining and whenever the Onggi River Movement organized a protest in the countryside they were met by armed thugs.

Then on May 26, 2008, six of the member organizations of the Mongolian Nature Protection Coalition (MNPC) organized a press conference announcing their intentions to defend themselves and their lands with rifles — promising to meet intimidation and violence with a show of armed self-defense. Leading the charge was Tsetsegee Munkhbayar.

Given the MNPC’s commitment to defend their basic rights and sovereignty, on May 30, 2008, TAF dropped the Onggi River Movement and the five coalition partners who had pledged to defend themselves. TAF immediately began smearing and discrediting Tsetsegee Munkhbayar and the other environmentalists by issuing a letter expressing TAF’s ‘disappointment’ that they ‘threatened violence and the use of weapons’. The letter was reportedly picked up by the Mongolian newspapers — the state propaganda apparatus — and stories appeared that discredited and divided the MNPC.³⁶ Soon Tsetsegee Munkhbayar and the six MNPC members who stood firm began hearing stories portraying them as terrorists.

TAF director Bill Infante slammed Tsetsegee Munkhbayar and the others publicly and privately. While Bill Infante and TAF apparently circulated their statement about the MNPC,³⁷ TAF never took a similar stance against the armed violence or plunder of resources by foreign or domestic mining companies.

“Since May 30 [2008] Bill Infante has repeatedly called the six environmental groups terrorist organizations,” MNPC activists told me. “He said this personally, when they met face-to-face.”³⁸

In a meeting with the MNPC just after May 30, 2008, Bill Infante stated that The Asia Foundation activities are based on U.S. laws: TAF doesn’t follow Mongolian laws. TAF then directed its might at further dividing and co-opting the leaders of MNPC member organizations that did not adopt the stance of direct action and armed self-defense. With the defamation by TAF and the bad publicity that followed — and with TAF’s purchasing power buying the silence of groups and individuals — the Mongolian Nature Protection Coalition (MNPC) collapsed.

Tsetsegee Munkhbayar, photo by William Infante, The Asia Foundation.

“The [public] letter is in English, and it does accuse them,” said Tracey Naughton, country director for PACT-Mongolia, yet another ‘non-government’ organization — funded by the US State Department — whose mission is to bring about the US system of ‘democracy’ by and for the corporations and the corporate elites. “He [Bill Infante] does use strong language and it does say ‘terrorism’. Bill is very competitive and unpleasant and he slams other NGOs in front of donors. The real people who are running Mongolia are the ‘Infantes’ of the world: they’re in all the spaces.”³⁹

The Asia Foundation also undermined the MNPC by creating petty jealousies and leadership struggles within the Mongolia river organizations; they pitted the Onggi River Movement and Tsetsegee Munkhbayar against the other members of the MNPC.

On October 28, 2008, Tsetsegee Munkhbayar and five of the eleven member organizations of the defunct MNPC filed a lawsuit in federal court against The Asia Foundation. The coalition sought $1,000,000 compensation for the damages caused by TAF publicly branding the five organizations ‘terrorists’. TAF filed a counter suit, and the Mongolian courts demonstrated their bias in favor of western interests by rejecting both lawsuits as ‘unjustified’. But the damage was already done.

“The MNPC disintegrated,” said Tsetsegee Munkhbayar, “due to conflict created with and by The Asia Foundation. The main interest of The Asia Foundation is to assist mining companies in Mongolia. All events are showing that The Asia Foundation is behind the mining interests.”

Capitalism’s Trojan Horses

Through the Goldman Prize, TAF created an image of Tsetsegee Munkhbayar as a peaceful and cooperative Mongolian citizen organizing public awareness and politely challenging international mining companies to ‘do the right thing’. According to the TAF video, Tsetsegee Munkhbayar is a local champion of conservation, a proponent of democratic values and the hopeful image of the ‘win-win’ scenario falsely advanced by the mining industry, by NGOs like TAF, and by their agents like Layton Croft and Bill Infante.

But the real mission of TAF is to mold and manipulate domestic challenger groups into positions of cooperative acquiescence and competitive participation with the western plunder of Mongolia — to shape societies, in the interests of predatory capitalism, through cash-driven interventions that divide and conquer domestic groups and create strong constituencies that will serve the interests of the external organizations. It was a condescending relationship from the start, but TAF used Tsetsegee Munkhbayar to enhance their image and advance their interests in the game of international influence-peddling and transnational control.

“The Asia Foundation has really got some slick people.” Conservation expert ‘Jane Smith’ asked that her name be changed to protect her from retaliation. “Using my name and my organizations’ name would jeopardize our lives and years of work here. No one will touch us again. The government and big [international] donors would pounce on us.”

With years of experience in Mongolia, Jane Smith has seen the daily changes. She describes a government with no regulations, a black economy, trading in thugs and violence, where anyone bold enough to take something — those who have the allies and influence — can just take it.

“These big organizations like The Asia Foundation, The Nature Conservancy, WWF [World Wildlife Fund], WCS [Wildlife Conservation Society] and GTZ [German Technical Corporation],” said Jane Smith, “they all came to smaller NGOs like ours and they wanted to learn how to do things — things it took us years to learn — over lunch. They didn’t have any funding for us, and they never took up the ideas that we felt were most important. They have their glossy brochures and they make a show of being interested in the programs that really need to be done, but they don’t really do anything. They are the new wave of colonialists.”⁴⁰

“The Nature Conservancy is one of the richest conservation organizations in the world.” Jane Smith provided examples. “Yet they couldn’t fund their [Mongolian branch] offices here — it took four years to develop the office and it has to fund itself. The ‘sustainable mining’ idea came from The Asia Foundation: they know all the buzz words and jargon. They are really good at throwing around and adapting terminology. It looks good in their presentations and their brochures and government reports, and international donors accept it because they don’t know, or they don’t care.”

“One woman from World Wildlife Fund-Mongolia [WWF],” Jane Smith explained, “Yoko Watanabe, from Japan.⁴¹ She had this long, pedigreed career background. She stood up and gave a beautiful presentation in Ulaanbaatar, for foreign donors, about what WWF was doing across the country. She was talking about all these things WWF supported, like this [redacted project] in [redacted location]. I worked in [redacted] for years, and I thought to myself, ‘Where is this [redacted project]?’ My driver was from the soum center where this [redacted project] was and he cracked up [laughing]. We drove down there and there was this one guy with a shovel…”

“But this [Watanabe] woman was typical of the problem: a young, inexperienced person being hired on and elevated quickly to postions of responsibility, and making decisions on things they know little about, and then they move on to bigger and better things. They are usually removed from, and unaware of, the consequences of those decisions on the ground. They are well-educated, intelligent, not very curious, but they know who butters their bread, and they know exactly what to say and how to say it.”

“I know everyone, they are all nice people,” said Jane Smith. “The head of The Asia Foundation, Bill Infante, he’s really removed from reality and really removed from the local people.⁴² There’s no interest in long term development in the country, it’s all about long term development of their careers. They have to spend money — their careers are based on how many projects they can get going and all the assessments and reports they can show to donors.”

“The Asia Foundation helped bring the rivers movement together as a coalition,” Jane Smith continued. “They [TAF] lobbied very hard — especially Bill Infante — for [Tsetsegee] Munkhbayar to get the Goldman Prize. It makes them look very good, but it had the effect of weakening the river movement, which is counter to what TAF claims they are doing, which is strengthening. They brought the heads of the rural organizations and key figures to Ulaanbaatar, gave them nice offices.”

“They basically cut off the heads of the rural organizations. Rather than fighting the mining companies and protecting the rivers they [leaders] were fighting over offices and who would get the best computers. We worked with movements all over Mongolia, and we cautioned against removing the [movement] heads. We had a lot of experience in community development and organizing so that local people could take advantage of the new system under ‘democracy’. Instead of bringing all these river movements together to unite against the mining companies — and say ‘hey, you guys are killing us’ — The Asia Foundation just dropped them.”

Doublespeak and Gobbledygook

Interview after interview with Mongolian leaders in Ulaanbaatar confirmed the wall that lower level government officials slam up against when trying to enforce environmental regulations. Environment and human rights activists outlined rapacious logging — including logging in ‘strictly protected’ areas — for the building boom in Ulaanbaatar and they pointed to western mining companies who can do anything they want, anywhere, companies bent on destroying the pristine Lake Hovsgol ecosystem, for example, just as they are destroying the rest of the world.

These corporations are fueling an unprecedented disaster in Mongolia. They begin by corrupting officials and paying bribes in the capital city, and then they show up in rural areas where the local people know nothing about their plans, their methods, or their histories of terrorism and environmental destruction. They peddle human rights and democracy, and then they block off whole valleys, divert and drain vast rivers, throw herders off communal lands, and then arm themselves with thugs. They have their economic hit men and their propaganda experts.

My interviews with the foreign ‘experts’ at the big western NGOs were almost identical. They all threw around the language of sustainable development, democracy, and conservation; they knew exactly what to say and how to say it — if they would meet with me at all. They had fancy brochures announcing all their fancy projects, and when it came to answering the hard questions they became mute, squirmed in their chairs, and suddenly had another meeting to attend. They also threw volumes of information at me, demonstrating — in their eyes — their efficacy and indispensable presence.

I met with Rebecca Darling at TAF headquarters in Ulaanbaatar.⁴³ As TAF’s Director of Natural Resources and Development/Securing our Future Program, here was a perfect example of a nice, well-educated, salaried, career-track, western NGO professional who knew what to say and when to say it, and whose tune changed depending on her audience.

“We try to get information into the hands of the policy makers,” Rebecca Darling told me. “The past four years saw a lot of nothing happening. In the next four years some very serious decisions will be made about natural resource use. The environment is still in a pretty good state but headed for a world of hurt. Mining companies here are all frustrated because things have been stalled for four years. Mongolia is on the cusp of major changes.”⁴⁴

“They have transparency in mining Canada,” Rebecca Darling continued. Flags went off in my mind when she expressed sympathy for the mining companies, and now she was defending Canada’s mining policies. “Every piece of paper goes [public] there. Here it’s all behind closed doors, and there are no checks and balances. Western companies, Chinese and Russian companies, Mongolian companies — none of them are doing the right thing.”

She admitted that companies are so far out in the Mongolian bush that they can do anything and get away with it. However, she cited the effectiveness of TAF experts, like her, in formulating policy with government officials. She also acknowledged TAF’s involvement in revisions of mineral laws. “Government officials are under-resourced, undereducated, and understaffed,” she added, underscoring her faith in western expertise.

“For example, there’s a Canadian mining company that has a mining site out in Dornod,” Rebecca Darling says. “They have asked The Asia Foundation to come out and deliver community engagement seminars for them, as one of their goals is to have community engagement. We won’t go out to talk to the people about uranium, we go to talk to them about how to talk to the mining company, teaching them where their rights are, what legal avenues they have. We try to build transparency. We are trying to get them to engage.”

“Some citizens engage in unproductive and illegal ways.” Now Rebecca Darling is responding to my questions about civil society protests against mining operations. “They show up at the gates of companies and threaten violence. There are six organizations that threatened violence — all part of a coalition [MNPC] of 13 organizations from across the country. They are still threatening to take up arms, since April [2008]. Now they are threatening to hurt themselves — civil disobedience and stuff like that.”⁴⁴

“Their leader’s name is Munkhbayar, from the Onggi River Movement. We had to cease and desist all support of the [MNPC] coalition. We are not working with these six groups in any way because they broke the law and they advocate breaking the law. Most of them I have a tremendous amount of respect for, they are civic activists, and it’s true that there have already been environmental problems.”

Rebecca Darling holds up Canada as a model of transparency, good governance, and responsible mining and environmental policy. She maintained her storyline even after I provided evidence that Canada-based mining companies perpetuate poverty, human rights atrocities, terrorism and genocide around the world — even in Canada, where First Nations have recently made news, again, for blockading mining.⁴⁵ ,⁴⁶

“Can you do me a favor?” Rebecca Darling asked me at the end of a long interview where my questions were open and my role as a journalist was understood. “Please don’t quote me on anything that’s going to get my ass in a sling without checking with me.”

I’m quoting Rebecca Darling (above) because her private remarks don’t square with her public advocacy in favor of mining and the private profits to be had by TAF and others, against the people. In one commentary she authored, also published on the PACT web site, she extolled the virtues of mining and of NGOs like The Asia Foundation.

“A paradigm shift is underway in Mongolia,” Rebecca Darling wrote in April 2009. “The integration of ‘responsible mining’ and ecological protection in government policy papers, public speeches by elected officials, and platforms of political parties, reflects Mongolia’s growing environmental awareness and commitment to developing the minerals sector in ways that will protect natural resources and benefit all Mongolians. This is the result of significant advocacy efforts on behalf of a committed group of representatives from industry, government, and civil society.”⁴⁷

“Since 2006, The Asia Foundation in Mongolia has convened a Multi-Stakeholder Forum that brings together representatives from civil society, government, industry and academia,” the Rebecca Darling article continued. “After a year of regular meetings, a definition of responsible mining was developed and the Forum defined eight guiding principles. The Forum later elected a smaller group of 15 leaders, representing different sectors, to form a local non-governmental organization, named the Responsible Mining Initiative (RMI) that spearheads advocacy efforts.”

“No, I don’t agree with this rosy article,” Jane Smith countered. “The prime minister recently issued Government resolution 86, which states the intent to allow minerals (gold) exploration in protected areas, and Government ordinance 26, which forms a working group to discuss the possibility of mining in protected areas and to create a new law to allow this. This effectively undermines the Law on Special Protected Areas… The intent is to open up protected areas for anything they want, anywhere, any time… Some of the article may be true, but it’s not the rosy picture Rebecca [Darling] paints. A new law to undermine the protected areas to allow mining is not responsible, and will only degrade, if not dissolve the whole system.”⁴⁸

Blame the Victims

Who are the real terrorists? Big industry responsible for terrorism has a long history of attacking indigenous people and/or organizations fighting for their rights and labeling them terrorists. The private profit based western media and its clone institutions — domestic media aligned with corrupt elites and often funded by NGOs like TAF and NED — perpetuate this blame-the-victims inversion of reality and protect the mining interests that fund their rag sheets. Marlon Santi, President of the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador, is another heroic indigenous leader recently labeled as a terrorist for taking a stand against murderous and rapacious western extractive industries.⁴⁹

When I first contacted the Goldman Environmental Fund’s media relations office in early November 2010, I was surprised to find that they’d heard nothing about their past prizewinner’s armed protest two months earlier. “Technically, we don’t support winners with any more dollars, but we do step in if something is dire,” said one spokesperson. “The Goldman Foundation has some clout, here in the US, and we do work with the State Department. We don’t know how people will behave after they receive the award. In some cases we just let them slip off into obscurity.”⁵⁰

“The Goldman Environmental Prize has recently become aware of 2007 recipient T. Munkhbayar’s armed protest actions in Mongolia,” the Goldman media office wrote, when pressed, in a formal public statement on November 29, 2010. “The Prize does not condone armed protest of any kind. The Prize honored Mr. Munkhbayar for his leadership in Mongolia’s grassroots movement against mining pollution in the region’s waterways and is concerned about the recent developments. We are working to learn more about the situation as we have heard conflicting reports about his involvement and subsequent actions.”⁵¹

“Does the Goldman Fund condone armed paramilitary forces defending illegal mining companies?” I followed up. “Does the Fund agree with The Asia Foundation labeling Tsetsegee Munkhbayar a terrorist?”

“The Fund does not condone or support violent or armed actions of any kind by anyone,” they replied. “We find it hard to believe that they [TAF] would say this [about Tsetsegee Munkhbayar]. However, we really don’t have enough information from Mongolia to know what’s going on and our questions have not been answered. But no, the Goldman Environmental Fund does not agree with the definition of [Tsetsegee Munkhbayar] being a ‘terrorist’.⁵¹

I contacted The Asia Foundation offices in San Francisco in November 2010. After receiving my questions, they informed me that the people I needed to speak with were busy traveling but would get back to me when they could.⁵²

Invading Western Hordes

Since the early 1990′s, consortiums involving Centerra Gold (Canada/USA), Purram Mining (China), BHP-Billeton (USA), Rio Tinto⁵³ (Australia/UK/Canada), Itochu (Japan), Barrick Gold⁵⁴ (Canada/USA), Hunnu Coal (Australia), Xanadu (Australia), Cold Gold Mongolia (New Zealand), and many more, have snatched up mining and petroleum concessions. Many of these corporations are synonymous with environmental destruction and human rights atrocities all over the world.

QGX Corporation is a Canadian-based company that has been exploring for minerals in Mongolia since 1994.⁵⁵ By 2003, QGX held over 30,000 square kilometers in exploration rights in Mongolia, and was also partnered with Ivanhoe Mines in the South Gobi. QGX had ‘acquired’ 131 concession licenses by 2008. AngloGold Ashanti — who is partnered with De Beers and Barrick Gold elsewhere — has ‘acquired’ exploration ‘rights’ to 1.7 million hectares in northern Mongolia.

Canadian and US companies mining uranium in Mongolia include World Wide Minerals Ltd., Uranium 308 Corp., WM Mining Company, and Khan Resources Inc. WM Mining executive Wallace M. Mays is also tied to other companies in Mongolia, and his mining company IKH TOKHOIROL XXK received a $10,000,000 loan from the US government-controlled Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) in 2009. Uranium mining causes epidemics of cancer and birth defects in workers and surrounding communities. The desert steppes of Mongolia will soon be transformed into vast radiotoxic wastelands — as has happened elsewhere — but the windstorms of the high desert steppes will carry radioactivity and contaminate distant lands.

Toxic mercury is another pitfall of mining and has caused epidemics of disease around Mongolia.

Canada’s infamous Ivanhoe Mines is now in control of more than 90,000 sq. kilometers of copper, gold and coal concessions in Mongolia. Ivanhoe and its subsidiaries are run and owned by Robert Friedland — Toxic Bob⁵⁶ — a known associate of William Jefferson Clinton. Beyond his legacy of toxic cyanide poisoning in Colorado (USA), Friedland achieved notoriety in the 1990′s when his Sierra Leone subsidiary Diamondworks was linked to mercenary companies Executive Outcomes, Sandline International and Branch Energy, and to Colonel Tim Spicer and Tony Buckingham, mercenaries deeply involved in war and plunder in Iraq, Yemen, Uganda and Congo.⁵⁷

Oyu Tolgoi has been known for centuries by the local people as ‘turquoise mountain’ for the visible copper ores. This is the largest copper-gold mine in the world, located near Khobogd village in South Gobi province of southern Mongolia. Oyu Tolgoi LLC is the Mongolian subsidiary for a strategic partnership between the Government of Mongolia (34% stake), Ivanhoe Mines (66%) and Rio Tinto. It is scheduled to begin commercial production in 2013.

According to the Oyu Tolgoi public relations site: “Rio Tinto, which is the third largest mining company in the world, became a strategic partner of Ivanhoe in 2006 after buying 20% of Ivanhoe shares. Rio Tinto has over 150 years of experience in mining, in 30 countries. In recent years Rio Tinto has put a lot of emphasis on social relations and social planning. Oyu Tolgoi has adopted the high standards of social relations and planning set by Rio Tinto.”

“Once the mining begins, the Khobogd site will have a population of 20,000 within a few years and approximately 80,000 when the smelter is finished, potentially making the site the second largest city in Mongolia,” Peter Morrow, the American CEO of Mongolia’s Khan Bank [at the time], was quoted to say.⁵⁸

The article also quotes TAF’s Rebecca Darling. The local Gobi communities are in favor of the project, Darling says, because it will support them economically. There is no mention of any opposition. “Darling said that Ivanhoe and Rio Tinto have participated for three years in The Asia Foundation’s responsible mining project,” the UB Post reported. “‘As far as we’re concerned, they’re models in this country for responsible mining,’ she said.”⁵⁸

Delivering the equivalent of trinkets to the local people — scholarships for a handful of doctors, a few cars and trucks here and there, a few paved roads, token hospitals and token schools — the companies and their ‘responsible civil society partners’ work to shut people up and co-opt them into betraying the greater needs of the communities, and of the country as a whole, just as it is done with predatory extractive industries that are plundering and depopulating the Congo. The token schools and hospitals provided by the mining companies are used to silence the communities that are being mined. Roads are often constructed, or dirt tracks are paved, because it is in mining companies interest to do so: they want to drive their trucks on the roads! Its the same with railways: they want to ship their raw materials out to China or — as in the case of Science Solutions Incorporated, a San Diego (USA) company mining tungsten (wolfram) in Bayan Olgy — by rail to China and by boat to the United States. If the fair value of the natural resources was paid, every village would have a school with an extensive library full of the best books in the world, and every child in that school would have a brand new top-of-the-line computer. Most likely these schools will be little more than cement shells with tin roofs and chalkboards and wooden desks. That is not the American or Canadian standard for a school — at least not the kind of elite private school (in the USA or Europe) that these mining company executives send their children to or the kind that their Mongolian agents, the MPs they have bought, are sending their children to (also in the USA or Europe).

What the Mongolian people deserve as fair compensation are entire universities — with the assurance that every Mongolian who wants can have access to high quality higher education. Sometimes the mining companies even staff the hospitals with their own co-opted doctors — ‘professionals’ paid to conclude that the patients disease was NOT caused by the mercury or cyanide from the company mine. In the end, however, the mining company can say: We made a deal! Your leaders signed and agreed on our terms! We gave you schools and hospitals! The epidemics of tuberculosis and cancers are not our problems! Send your people to the hospital (we gave you)! Your (Mongolian) community leaders are responsible for these problems! Anyways, when all is said and done the foreign mining company executives jet out of the country waving a little American or Canadian or Swedish flag that says “Bye. Bye. See You!” The profits are expatriated. It’s always the same old story: promises, promises in the beginning; poverty, violence, pollution and disease in the end.

For another simple example of how the propaganda and plunder system works, with parallels between Congo and Mongolia, consider again the US-based photojournalists Ted Wood and Jeremy Schmidt. In the spring of 1998 the two journalists were dispatched to Central Africa by the elite US conservation [sic] magazine International Wildlife to report on mountain gorillas. The article appeared in January 1999, and the contexts of the US- and corporate-backed war and bloodshed in Congo/Zaire, or Rwanda, were completely absent. Instead we found only a couple quotes from Wildlife Conservation Society’s expert [sic] Amy Vedder and the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund Europe (DFGFE) expert [sic] Greg Cummings. [This writer has done an extensive series on how Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International, DFGFE (now The Gorilla Organization) and Wildlife Conservation Society profit from the plunder and bloodshed in Congo -- and I have delineated the hidden interests of these organizations and these particular individuals.⁵⁹ ] The International Wildlife story was just fluff — which is all fine, as long as we are honest and admit how we (westerners) participate in, and profit from, the exploitation. International Wildlife is nothing more than the propaganda mouthpiece for big zoo interests and the industries of academic research (zoology, biology, primatology, oceanography), and such stories serve to indoctrinate and immunize the western world and its western readers, rendering western interests invisible and inculcating innocence and arrogance, a.k.a. white superiority.

Back in Mongolia, communities and a coalition of NGOs⁶⁰ have protested the Oyu Tolgoi project — located in the fragile ecosystem of the South Gobi Desert — and hunger strikers have been arrested and jailed. On April 1, 2010, the Mongolian NGOs, assisted by MiningWatch Canada and Rights and Accountability in Development (UK), filed complaints in the UK and Canada against Rio Tinto and Ivanhoe Mines Ltd for alleged breaches of the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Companies.⁶¹

Economic Hit Men

Transnational capitalism also achieves its aims in Mongolia by controlling the banks. Mongolia’s Trade Development Bank is 34% owned by Americans but the 66% controlling interest is hidden — people suspect the previous president, Enkhbayar, who privatized it, circa 2005, when he was prime minister. Other people’s collectives, like the Ard Bank, were also privatized.

Mongolia’s Khan Bank was privatized (2000-2004) under the direction of Development Alternatives Inc. (DAI), a Washington DC intelligence and defense outfit, packed with CIA types, that directly links USAID with the Pentagon (amongst other things, DAI conducts special operations trainings for the Pentagon’s Special Operations Command Europe). Khan Bank is now 52% owned by Sawada Holdings of Japan, with DAI, the International Finance Corporation (World Bank), and Khan Bank CEO Simon Morris (UK) and former CEO and present adviser Peter Morrow (USA). The Khan Bank shareholder Tavan Bogd Group is their Mongolian front company partner. DAI provided the two senior managers of the bank: J. Peter Morrow and Ben Turnbull, Deputy CEO. Establishing a clear link between global capital and military force, DAI’s Vice-President for Global Security is Colonel (Ret.) Barry Shapiro, who spent most of his career conducting U.S. Army Special Forces special operations missions throughout Southeast and Central Asia. DAI director Ann Hudock is a former Country Representative for The Asia Foundation. TAF is teamed with Khan Bank for their ‘Books for Asia’ program in Mongolia, and Khan Bank is funding all kinds of public relations initiatives — green-washing campaigns meant to sanitize their corporate image and blind the public about their true impact on the people and land.

Herders in Mongolia have been hard hit by Khan Bank. Strapped for cash but rich in livestock, slammed by the economic onslaught of capitalism and abandoned by the once-helpful Mongolian state, herders have taken out loans to feed, clothe and educate children, to purchase vehicles and gers and regular supplies. With some 98% of all herders in the country under debt with Khan Bank, almost every herder owes Khan Bank a minimum of 5 million tugriks (US$ 4000). Parliament member D. Baldan-Ochir reported in April 2010 that herders who took out loans using their herds as collateral owed Khan Bank some 63 billion tugriks (US$ 50.5 million), and he advised herders whose herds were wiped out by zhud “to get a good lawyer” and not pay Khan Bank. In 2010, Khan Bank took some 3000 herds from herders in Duut soum in Khovd aimag. In 2008, one herder from Chandmani soum in Khovd aimag who was indebted to Khan Bank lost his herds (zhud) and was unable to repay the loan: he committed suicide. “I can’t live any longer,” he wrote in a note to his family, “because I owe so much to the bank. Please help my wife and children. I am afraid that if I stay alive, I will go to jail.”

The transnational financial plunder of Mongolia is also facilitated through the most secretive multinational corporations on earth: the tax and auditing consultancies Arthur Andersen, Coopers & Lybrand, Deloitte  & Touche and Ernst & Young. These firms exploit taxation loopholes, manipulate profit and loss balance sheets, and help them utilize ‘offshore’ tax havens and subsidiary and front companies to maximize predatory exploitation. Extractive industries (mining, petroleum, logging) will exploit customs and evade tax duties through such illegal practices as ‘transfer-pricing’, over-invoicing, mis-declaration of ores or species (wood), under-measuring and under-reporting, and the practice of declaring maximum ‘losses’ for years — even when maximizing profits. Many of these practices cannot be achieved without the corruption of domestic (Mongolian) agents at all levels of the bureaucracy.  The international consulting and auditing firms put their stamps of approval on the corruption, while taking hundreds of millions of dollars profits, annually, from their global operations. Finally, a near-government organization (NGO) like The Asia Foundation closes the circle by producing reports on ‘good governance’ and ‘accountability’ and they do this, for example, through their multi-stakeholder Responsible Mining Initiatives — involving Mongolian NGOs like the MNPC or UMMRL.

In 2004, OPIC established a $50 million credit fund for US investments in Mongolia, and since then has funded three projects, including a $61,596 insurance loan to The Asia Foundation in 2007. TAF receives millions of dollars annually from OPIC for its other Asia operations.⁶²

American real estate scalper and investment banker Lee Cashell, who operates through his Hong Kong firm, Asia Pacific Investment Partners Corp, received a $250,000 OPIC loan in 2002 for a luxury tourist resort destined for the Mongolian hinterland. Lee Cashell is the founder of The Mongolian Institute for Sustainable Economic Development, he runs Mongolia’s first real estate agency, and he has been scalping properties in Mongolia’s ‘privatization rush’. Lee Cashell is also behind Belgravia Mining, a molybdenum firm with seven exploration licenses in Mongolia.

In 2003, Newsweek lauded American business penetration into ‘democratic’ Mongolia in a typical neoliberal whitewash of reality that applauded, for example, the ‘free-market’ acquisition of ‘low rent’ properties. “The reason: Washington sees strategic gain in supporting a free and democratic Mongolia, sandwiched between Russia and China in a region rife with dictators and swelling Islamic fervor.”⁶³

“Property prices have doubled in the last one and a half years alone,” American Express journalist Ron Gluckman (USA) quoted an excited Lee Cashell to say. “Rents are skyrocketing. Rental yields are the highest in Asia, by far…There are no big-name multinationals here, [just] a lot of guys making $150,000, one dollar at a time.”⁶³

“One day at a time,” said ‘Bayarma Ganbold’, the human rights activist and mother of three who took me around Ulaanbaatar, “these criminals are taking everything that we love: every public space, every publicly owned building, every public park, every river. The Selbe River runs through the city, but it’s quite dead already. We used to play by the water when I was a child. The Tol River is also drying up: Coca Cola has a bottling plant using water from the Tol for the past 5 years.⁶⁴ All the school playgrounds have been chopped up or destroyed.”

“I used to play in the children’s park, it was green and beautiful.” ‘Bayarma Ganbold’ is tearful. “There were carousels, swan boats, merry-go-rounds, people jogging, children laughing, birds flying all around, people kissing each other. There were skating rinks all over the city. It was all free. The Russian wife of President Tsedenbal⁶⁵ did so many things for women and children: she set up social welfare systems, she set up health systems; she built schools, children’s libraries — she built this children’s park. Like everywhere else, the land was bought for almost nothing by ‘private investors’ connected to the government. The park is dead.”⁶⁶

“No one knew what was ‘democracy’ or what was ‘privatization’,” said Tumur, a coal miner who previously worked for the state mining company in Nalaikh city, just west of Ulaanbaatar, for 8 years. “The first four years of democracy were hell. It was chaos and confusion and the mafias stole property and ‘privatized’ it. By now everything is being ripped apart.”⁶⁷

Pimping for Transnational Corporations

The situation in Mongolia is not unique. The very same NGOs involved in Mongolia are involved in the war-torn Democratic Republic of Congo. Barrick Gold moved into Congo with Rwandan and Uganda forces in the US-backed invasion of 1996-1998. AngloGold Ashanti is another corporation behind war, genocide and plunder in Congo.⁶⁸

DeBeers will plunder Mongolia’s kimberlite pipes — read: diamonds — just as they have plundered Congo, Sierra Leone, Angola, Botswana, C.A.R., South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe, and Canada: De Beers is also partnered with AngloGold Ashanti in Mongolia.⁶⁹

PACT-Congo has worked to support western mining corporations even while purporting to challenge them. One PACT official is Donald Easum, a US national security operative who was bad news in every country he worked — programs often coordinated with the Africa-America Institute and USAID, two more CIA fronts.⁷⁰ Similarly, Wildlife Conservation Society is tied to mining and petroleum companies exploiting Congo, and Hans Hoffman, a GTZ director in Mongolia until recently, was formerly working for GTZ in the Congo, where GTZ protects German interests involved in the warfare, genocide and plunder of minerals.⁷¹

TAF, WWF, The Nature Conservancy, GTZ and Wildlife Conservation Society are working to ‘conserve’ and ‘protect’ the Mongolian environment from Chinese, Russian and Mongolian companies, but when US, Canadian or European companies are involved — often tied to these NGOs’ boards of directors and donors — such NGOs are silent, acquiescent to mining interests and private profit plunder. There are plenty of western ties to Chinese and Russian banking and mining mafias, in any case.

It’s the same with the ‘human rights’ and ‘humanitarian’ NGOs: corporate entities like Save the Children, Mercy Corps, UNICEF and UNDP leverage and protect western corporate interests while co-opting domestic civil society and neutralizing opposition. Powerful US government intelligence and national security front groups — including TAF, the George Soros Foundation (Open Society Institute) — have been engineering elections, engineering laws, and channeling civil society to achieve and ensure political control and access for transnational capitalism in Mongolia. Most prominent amongst these groups is the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and its core affiliates, Center for Private Enterprise (CIPE), International Republican Institute (IRI) and National Democratic Institute (NDI).⁷² ,⁷³

In 1983, the Pentagon, USAID, US State Department, and the CIA were all involved in the creation and implementation of ‘Project Democracy’ — National Security Decision Directive 77 (NSDD 77) — and this led to the creation of the National Endowment for Democracy. After that, many foreign covert interventions were shifted away from the CIA and onto the NED.⁷⁴] NED’s involvement with covert operations and foreign interventions are well-established.⁷⁵ ,⁷⁶ ,⁷⁷ ,⁷⁸

The Asia Foundation (formerly the Committee for Free Asia) was created by the Central Intelligence Agency in 1951 and served as the CIA’s main front group for covert operations in Asia for decades.⁷⁹ CIA funding was revealed in 1967 and was reportedly stopped, though TAF continued to operate as a secretive instrument of US foreign policy.⁸⁰ Primarily funded by USAID, US Department of State, US embassies, US Department of Labor, and the US Congress, The Asia Foundation uses the ‘non-government’ euphemism as part of its strategy of camouflage as a US government front group that is part of an extended US state apparatus for intervention.

TAF directors and trustees include national security, defense and intelligence operatives with long careers serving elite US corporate interests. TAF trustee J. Stapleton Roy, also one of TAF’s ‘Benefactor ($5,000-9,999)’ donors, was Assistant Secretary of State for Intelligence and Research under Madeleine Albright, 1999-2000, and he has worked for the secretive entities Kissinger Associates and Kissinger Institute. He is a director of Conoco Phillips and Freeport McMoRan Copper & Gold — both known for human rights atrocities around the world.⁸¹ ,⁸²

TAF trustee Karl Inderfurth was a high ranking US official at the United Nations (1993-1997) during the war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocides in Rwanda, Congo and the Balkans; a ‘national security council expert’ with ABC News and has served on the Senate Intelligence and Foreign Relations Committees and the National Security Council.

TAF trustee Ellen Laipson, also a former TAF president and CEO, was vice-chairman of the US National Intelligence Council under William Jefferson Clinton (1997-2002); director of the US National Security Council (1993-1995); and US national intelligence officer for Asia. In December 2009, President Barrack Obama appointed Ellen Laipson to the President’s Intelligence Advisory Board.⁸³

The Asia Foundation works as a conduit for ‘phantom aid’: official funds channeled to ‘pass-through’ organizations that then launder these funds and divert them for covert interventions such as elections rigging, intelligence gathering, and — most relevant to the Mongolian example — surveillance and infiltration of domestic organizations, psychological operations, and dissemination of propaganda. Mathew Nasuti, a former US military official involved in accountability investigations and budgets oversight with the US Department of Defense, claims that TAF operations in Afghanistan have diverted US State Department ‘aid’ funds for unknown operations.⁸⁴ TAF has one of their largest budgets and operations in US and NATO-occupied Afghanistan.⁸⁵

TAF also receives funding from some of the worst multinational corporations on earth, including big oil, banking, mining and defense contractors: Chevron, American International Group, Coca Cola, GE, Walt Disney, Halliburton, Boeing, HSBC, Pfizer, Qualcomm, Raytheon, PepsiCo and Wal-Mart.⁸⁶

Of course, TAF is also funded by the National Geographic Society, by the Goldman Environmental Fund, and by the Richard and Rhoda Goldman Foundation, thus completing the circle involving the socially constructed image of Tsetsegee Munkhbayar, in the public mind, as a model of Mongolian civil society’s acceptable behavior — as long as he was civil and pragmatic — and as an instrument (in this case an unwilling one) of US foreign policy.

Groups like TAF, NED, PACT, USAID, World Vision and the American Center for Mongolian Studies are closely aligned with western elites who benefit from neoliberal transnational capitalism that imposes the ‘Washington Consensus’ on Mongolia.⁸⁷ This is a full-blown operation to subvert democracy, control emerging Mongolian social groups and plunder Mongolia. This involves a campaign of attrition against the masses in Mongolia, working to create a situation where sooner or later the poor majority ‘gives up’ and abandons the struggle for basic human rights, basic dignities, and basic freedoms.

This strategy of attrition is accomplished by exacerbating economic hardships, creating difficulties and deprivations for ordinary people; by exploiting any mistakes made by the Mongolian resistance and preying on the vulnerability of the people. At the same time, the international power elite divide and conquer domestic groups by funding and grooming individuals and organizations that serve their agenda, while marginalizing, discrediting or eliminating those that challenge their agenda. Both international and domestic media — outlets like the UB Post are already sufficiently under elite control — highlight the actions and voices of the groomed individuals who are saying what the external elites want people to hear.

“No longer do citizens need to organize on their own behalf and engage in various forms of opposition, including social movements, rallies, and other forms of dissent,” wrote academic Shelly Feldman, in “NGOs and Civil Society: (Un)Stated Contradictions,” pointing out that the rise of the western NGO sector means that the people — in this case the Mongolian people — are no longer necessary and their voices are no longer heard. “Instead, the NGO sector, legitimized as a controlled, organized arena of public debate with institutional and financial support from the donor community, has come to speak on behalf of the citizenry, particularly those groups that have been targeted among the needy, women and the poor.”⁸⁸

Terrorism in Mongolia

The Asia Foundation is committing treasonable offenses against the people and state of Mongolia — imagine a Mongolian ‘non-government organization’ equivalent to TAF operating similarly in the United States! — and they are rewarded for doing so by Mongolian elites who are partnered with transnational capitalism and who use the domestic media and paramilitary forces against the people.

TAF and other big NGOs (NED, IRI, NDI, Open Society Institute, etc.) rig elections, fund political sects, bribe ‘citizen’ groups, and divide communities to gain access to natural resources. Behind the western rhetoric of promoting democracy, human rights and environmental protection is the reality that US foreign policy has nothing to do with these ideals: US interests like NED, PACT and TAF are a threat to democracy everywhere and, in Mongolia, violence, homelessness, poverty, desperation and environmental destruction are increasing.⁸⁹

The bottom line is that North American taxpayers are directly funding U.S.-government organized devastation and disaster in Mongolia and — blinded by corporate propaganda in the guise of daily news media — we don’t know enough to ask anything about it.

Many of those who have access to the big money flooding into Mongolia — from ‘independent’ photographer Ted Wood to the big NGOs GTZ, PACT and TAF — also work to sanction and greenwash mining companies. Ivanhoe Mines offers the perfect example: the NGOs are supportive of Ivanhoe’s massive Oyu Tolgoi copper/gold megaproject, deep in the heart of the Gobi, and they support the euphemisms of ‘good community relations’ and ‘herder relocation’ programs.

Of course, the mining companies also create their own NGOs — to promote their interests, leverage policy and buff their image. One of these is World Growth, a Washington-based NGO believed to be the creation of Ivanhoe Mines and/or Rio Tinto. World Growth Mongolia appeared on the scenes in 2008. Its Mongolian board of advisers includes one former president and several former top ministers.

In Central Africa, ‘relocation programs’ have displaced pygmies from national parks where big western NGOs work. In Botswana, diamond, oil and ‘wildlife conservation’ interests have backed the forcible ‘relocation’ of San bushmen. In Borneo, the nomadic Penan people have been dispossessed of land and resources and ‘relocated’ with only cursory notice by National Geographic or big conservation NGOs. Results are the same in each case: genocide.

The leaders I interviewed from Mongolian conservation, human rights and civil society were sincere, committed, frustrated and undervalued. They work hard, with little or no resources, challenging the roots of problems they know from the inside out. They know what is wrong, on the small scale, and with the big picture, but they have little awareness of the international machinery they are up against. Many have come from rural areas where they knew extreme poverty and hardship of the herders’ way of life, and so they know what would best serve the people and the land. They are Mongolians, they know Mongolia; we don’t and we never will.

They’ve seen rivers dry up and rivers completely diverted. They’ve seen whole villages with epidemics of mining-related diseases — silicosis and bronchitis, cancer, miscarriages and birth defects. They see Mongolian elites using (mostly Chinese) undocumented immigrants for slave labor. They know that young girls and boys are being trafficked in and out of Mongolia, and that prostitution and survival sex are on the rise. They’ve seen people beaten and arrested, others shot.

“People are afraid now to let their children out freely,” says ‘Bayarma Ganbold’, “afraid they will be kidnapped, afraid they will be run over. The Asia Foundation has a huge project dealing with trafficking: they produce fancy reports but they haven’t done anything: after five years not one person has been found — or arrested! — for human trafficking. Mongolian journalists have raised many questions about street children who have disappeared that have never been answered. And Mongolian girls are beautiful — it’s a big mine here: pretty young girls from urban and rural areas. They promise them a great ‘job’ abroad, luring and enticing them, buying them — even drugging them. The girls have no passports and no way to escape afterwards.”⁹⁰

Undocumented Chinese immigrants work for under slave conditions for the Mongolian power elite and for mining and construction companies.

“Chinese bring in at least 40 or 50 illegal workers for these labor camps,” said Tumur, the coal miner in Nalaikh, “and every night they bring 20 to 30 young girls, 17 to 18 years old, from poor districts. They have 20 or 30 girls having sex in these open barracks without caring about privacy. Once girls do this they are ostracized by Mongolian culture. We can’t protect our girls because the government sends in security and police, at the least sign of trouble, to protect the companies. There’s a law that every Mongolian has a right to own seven acres of land, but one morning you wake up and thousands of hectares are owned by foreigners.”⁶⁷

By October 2008 the civil society movements were feeling cornered, their backs against the wall, from the growing western influence-peddling, corruption, bribery, intimidation, and the massive propaganda apparatus backing up the multinational corporations, with government complicity. Since then the situation has only gotten worse. Worst of all, they see salaried western ‘experts’ rolling around in $60,000 4×4 Toyota Landcruisers, living in the best homes, eating at the best restaurants, doling out advice and producing policy papers with an intolerable hubris and righteousness, accountable to no one.

“People are afraid of being seen or photographed. People are being threatened and followed by security agents for organizing,” said Baasan Geleg, an economics teacher and the leader of Mongolia’s iSenior Citizen’s Federationi. After organizing a country-wide registration of all mining in Mongolia, and after informing the public, Baasan Geleg became a public target: she was arrested four times in 2007 and 2008, and held in isolation for up to 20 days. “More and more civic leaders and activists are becoming apathetic, discouraged and disheartened, and thinking nothing will change. So they turn toward the money — the NGOs — and then they are dead.”⁹¹

The Struggle Continues

After the iMongolia Nature Protection Coalitioni dissolved, thanks to The Asia Foundation, river coalition activists formed the United Movement for Mongolian Rivers and Lakes. Goldman Prize winner Tsetsegee Munkhbayar is one of the key organizers, but nothing would happen without the other pivotal activists he works with.

Now, three years after the movement faltered, the United Movement for Mongolian Rivers and Lakes (UMMRL) has worked hard to create, pass and strengthen Mongolian laws to protect communities and the environment. According to UMMRL, the directors and other officials of Puraam Mining and Centerra Gold — the two companies Tsetsegee Munkhbayar’s gang of four shot at — have committed crimes specified in Articles 202, 204, 205, 206, 207, 208, 214 of the Mongolian Criminal law.

“Actions of both companies are illegal,” notes UMMRL, “as they are violating Mongolian laws on the prohibition of mining operations at headwaters of rivers, protected zones of water reservoirs and forest areas. Because of these mining companies, local citizens, herders and livestock animals experienced environmental damages including skin irritation and formation of lumps; eye diseases and intoxication of internal organs of humans and livestock animals… in Selenge province. These companies are operating in the headwaters of Gachuurt and Budanch Rivers and have reduced the flows of these rivers. Local people and livestock animals have no access to drinking water sources.”⁹²

On March 10, 2010, the UMMRL established a student chapter named ‘Fresh Water’. Its main goal is to involve Mongolian young people and students in the protection of the environment and natural resources. In May, 2010, the UMMRL and Mongolian Water Agency were working to delineate boundaries to prohibit mining operations in 350 soums and 21 aimags. Another draft law advanced by UMMRL would enable local people and civic organizations to sue mining companies for compensation against environmental destruction and emotional damages.

On July 16, 2010, the Mongolian Parliament authorized a law imposing restrictions on exploration and mining near water resources and empowering local officials to adjudicate mining issues. The UMMRL began a process of petitioning government to enforce laws that have been passed and put some teeth behind their paper proclamations.

On August 24-28, 2010, some 60 participants from Russia, Germany and Mongolia — including Tsetsegee Munkhbayar and other members of UMMRL — participated in a conference to address the past decade of collaboration and future needs to protect the ecology and natural resources in the Lake Baikal and Selenge River basin, from northern Mongolia to southern Siberia.

Protests and conflicts between herder communities and mining companies escalated all summer long, and occurred all over Mongolia. “These clashes occurred because of illegal mining operations,” reported UMMRL, “local residents and herders are facing a lack of drinking water and livestock pastures.”⁹³

On September 2, 2010, UMMRL announced that they will implement the law by force of local citizens if the Mongolian government does not. When the government did not respond, Tsetsegee Munkhbayar, leader of the Onggi River Movement, and G. Bayarra, leader of the Khuder River Movement, and D. Tumurbaatar and O. Sambuu-Yondon from UMMRL, opened fire on the two foreign mining companies. They had previously written to the mining companies, well in advance, but there were no replies.

The Mongolian press reported the September 2nd action, noting that the gang of four Mongolian activists shot at bulldozer blades and other heavy equipment. There were no clashes with security guards and no arrests, though Tsetsegee Munhkbayar was summoned to police offices in Selenge aimag and questioned. (The English translations of the original Mongolian story were very bad and greatly distorted the facts.).

Civil society protests involving thousands of people have continued in Mongolia: more than 10,000 people were reported to have protested government policies against the people in April 2010. However, it remains to be seen whether Mongolia’s civil society leaders can endure and prevail against the big money and power of western mining and their NGO vanguard. Some mining companies use the argument that pollution is the fault of companies that preceded them on the site that is polluted. Companies also argue that any canceled mining licenses or revolved permits must be compensated, in the millions of dollars, no matter that they were stolen in the first place, and no matter that companies have already expatriated hundreds of millions of dollars that Mongolians will never see.

On a visit to Centerra’s ‘Boroo Mine’ site in June, 2010 Mr. John Kazakov, director of Centerra’s Boroo Gold personally warned UMMRL partners that the mining association and mining corporations were working to pass a new law to neutralize the 2009 law that prohibits mineral exploration at the headwaters of rivers, protected zones or water reservoirs and forested areas. “We have a lobby group in the Parliament,” he promised, “and hope that law will be passed very soon.”

On October 21, 2010 the UMMRL filed a lawsuit against Puraam Mining and Centerra Gold for environmental damages and violations of Mongolian environmental protection laws. “We targeted these companies because they are mining illegally in a historically important place,” responds Tsetsegee Munkhbayar, “right next to the headwaters of two crucial rivers in a healthy forest region in defiance of existing laws. They need to be shut down.”

“People have criticized our choice [to take up arms] but, tell me,” said J. Nyamdavaa, head of the NGO Protect the Security of Mongolia, an Onggi River Movement partner, “what could we hope to achieve through peaceful means like meetings and demonstrations in streets?”⁹⁴

In February, 2011, Mongolian news agencies reported that that six members of parliament MPs J. Batsuuri, Y. Batsuuri, O. Chuluunbat, D. Batbayar, A. Tleikhan, and B. Choijilsuren) are fiercely lobbying parliament to change the laws to allow Centerra Gold and other companies to continue plundering and polluting the land, and the six MPs have drafted a new law favorable to mining. Meanwhile, mining MP D. Zorigt issued at least 170 new licenses for exploration and extraction (one Mongolian M.P. claims he issues 192 new licenses) on land protected by current laws.

Not every western policy or idea should be rejected, and not every westerner in Mongolia is there to exploit: some of the most dedicated and honest conservationists and human rights people — like ‘Jane Smith’ who was afraid to go on the record here — can be found in some of the small foreign, reputable NGOs, and there are even a few good people working for some of the rotten NGOs. The former types give their entire lives to doing what is right, while the latter deceive themselves, while always collecting their paycheck, into thinking they can make a difference from the inside. What we are talking about here is dishonesty and deception, and many of the Anglo-Americans or Europeans working in Mongolia harbor deeply racist ideas about Mongolians being barbarians who do not wash and cannot think and could never runs things. Most tourists don’t give a damn, for sure; they are driven by self-interests and become another kind of ‘innocent’ visitor who exploits the people and the land. The mining corporations are determined to get what they want, one way or another, they always have, and they always do. In the Congo they kill the people to get what they want; in Mongolia it has not yet come to that.

1. Mongol: The Rise of Genghis Khan, Andreevsky Flag Film Company, 2007, was distributed by Universal Studios Home Entertainment and Picturehouse Studios, making a Hollywood blockbuster entertainment extravaganza. That is, it made a lot of money.
2. “Tsetsegee Munkhbayar,” Emerging Explorers, National Geographic.
3. Unsigned, “Eco-warriors call attention to Mongolia’s development dilemma,” EurasiaNet, October 26, 2010.
4. Liezel Hill, “Centerra’s Kumtor mine not affected by Kyrgyz violence,” Mining Weekly, April 7, 2010.
5. Daisy Sindelar, “Mongolian Democracy: ‘Unless Your Life Improves, What’s the Point of a Market Economy?’” December 12, 2009.
6. Joan Roelofs, Foundations and Public Policy: The Mask of Pluralism, SUNY Press, 2003: p. 161.
7. “Tsetsegee Munkhbayar,” Emerging Explorers, National Geographic.
8. Richard N. Goldman (90) died on November 29, 2010.
9. Private interviews with members of the Mongolian Nature Protection Coalition, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, October 2008: (1) Tsetsegee Munkhbayar, Onggi River Movement; (2) Tserenkhand Yadanbatar, Angir Nuden Mondoohei; (3) J. Tudevdoorj, Salkhin Sardag; (4) Enkhtur Duvchigdamba, Toson Zaamar Tuul Gol; (5) Chimgee Ganbold, Onggi River Movement; (6) Dashdemberul Ganbold, Onggi River Movement.
10. Chinggis Khan is known to the western world as Genghis Khan.
11. Mongolian nomads live in gers: tent-like structures similar to yurts.
12. ‘My Mongolian Land’ is translated from the Mongolian: Minii Mongolyn Gazar Shoroo.
13. Private interview, M. Bold, founder and director, My Mongolian Land: Minii Mongolyn Gazar Shoroo, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, October 2008.
14. On Ivanhoe Mines history of human rights abuses and environmental destruction elsewhere see, e.g.: Roger Moody, Grave Diggers: A Report on Mining in Burma, Mining Watch Canada, January 5, 2001, http://www.minesandcommunities.org/article.php?a=1739; and Thomas Maung Shwe, “Canada urged to probe Ivanhoe over ‘arms-for-copper’ deal,” Mizzima, June 30, 2010.
15. The Keidanren is the coalition of the most powerful Japanese trading houses (Soga Shosa), corporations like Marubeni, Mitsubishi, C. Itoh, Hitochi and Sumitomo.
16. Private interview, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, October 2008.
17. “Leader of Mongolian Green Movement Arrested during Peaceful Protest,” Global Greens, August 12, 2008.
18. Private interview and tour with ‘Bayarma Ganbold’, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, October 21, 2010.
19. Chris Hogg, “Discontent fuels Mongolia’s far-right groups,” BBC News, September 5, 2010.
20. See: Amnesty International, “Where should I go from here?” The Legacy of the 1 July 2008 Riot in Mongolia, 2009.
21. Danaasuren Vandangombo, NGOs as Accountability Promoters: in the Mongolian Case, PhD. candidate paper, School of Accounting and Commercial Law, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand.
22. Conservation Ink.
23. Private communication with Jeremy Schmidt, co-founder of Conservation Ink, November 21, 2010.
24. Stefan Lovgren, “Mongolia Gold Rush Destroying Rivers, Nomadic Lives,” National Geographic News, October 17, 2008.
25. Tsetsegee Munkhbayar, Goldman Foundation.
26. Private Agencies Collaborating Together (PACT).
27. Layton Croft, “Public Radio Veterans Support Independent Mongolian Radio,” EurasiaNet, October 4, 2002.
28. PACT, Annual Report, 2005.
29. See, e.g., Joan Roelofs, Foundations and Public Policy: the Mask of Pluralism, SUNY Press, 2003.
30. Gold mining typically uses cyanide leaching processes and involves sulfuric acid and arsenic, creating vast expanses of toxic wasteland and poisonous aquifers around heap leeching, processing plants, and open pit mines.
31. Ch. Sumiya, “Opening of spring Parliament session marked by protest,” from UB Post, date unknown, republished on OREADS Daily on April 6, 2006.
32. Private interview, M. Bold, founder and director, My Mongolian Land, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, October 2008.
33. ‘Aimag’ is the biggest administrative unit in Mongolia. It is similar to a province. There are 24 aimags in Mongolia.
34. ‘Soum’ — similar to a district — is an administrative unit after aimag (province); Mongolia has more than 300 soums.
35. Exactly like western logging companies Maxaam, Weyerhauser and Champion International have disguised clear-cuts in North America with thin barriers of intact forest in front.
36. These stories have not been seen by this writer.
37. From 2001 to 2004, William Foerderer Infante was director of USAID’s Economic Policy and Finance Office and acting mission director in Belgrade, Serbia, then Mongolia Country Director for The Asia Foundation from 2006 until 2009, when he left to work for UNDP in the Balkans.
38. Private interviews, Onggi Rivers Movement offices, Ulaanbaatar, October 28, 2008.
39. Private interview, Tracey Naughton, PACT-Mongolia, Ulaanbaatar, October 2008.
40. Private interview, Ulaanbaatar, October 2008.
41. Yoko Watanabe left WWF-Mongolia and at the time of this publication she was working for the Global Environment Facility (GEF). See bio.
42. In 2009, William Foerderer Infante quit The Asia Foundation for a position with UNDP in the Balkans.
43. Rebecca Darling left The Asia Foundation in 2009.
44. Interview with Rebecca Darling, The Asia Foundation, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, October 23, 2008.
45. Canada is the corporate home for over 75 per cent of the world’s mining companies. The mining and minerals manufacturing sector added $35 billion to Canadian GDP in 2009, according to the Mining Association of Canada, and in the same year the sector was reporting over $56 billion invested overseas. Canadian taxpayers and pension recipients contribute to these impressive numbers for the mining sector. Canada’s National Post recently reported that the taxpayer, mainly through Export Development Canada, supports Canadian mining companies to the tune of $20 billion annually through subsidized financing and insurance. See: Tom Sandborn, “Canadian Mining Firm Accused of Complicity in Congo Killings: Lawsuit highlights need for firmer hand in Ottawa, say human rights groups. Anvil Mining denies culpability,” www.TheTyee.ca, November 26, 2010.
46. For a tiny representative sampling of the criminal and terrorist operations of Canada-based mining companies and the protests or claims against them see: Chris Albin-Lackey, “Canada: Monitoring of Mining Companies Long Overdue,” Human Rights Watch in Toronto Star, October 27, 2010; Jeffery R. Webber, “Indigenous Struggle, Ecology, and Capitalist Resource Extraction in Ecuador: An Interview with Marlon Santi,” The Bullet, e-bulletin #391, July 13, 2010; Dylan Penner, “Canadian Civil Society Demands Canadian Mining Companies Be Held Accountable for Overseas Abuses,” Council of Canadians, November 22, 2010; “Development Protest: Goro delayed by blockade,” Daily News, April 9, 2006; Fernando Sanchez, “Violent protest in Barrick Gold’s Dominican mine injures at least 17,” Dominican Today, November 17, 2010; Nak’azdli Keyoh Huwunline, “Nak’azdli blockade enters second day: Mt Milligan mining project proponent threatens legal action,” Vancouver Media Co-op, November 16, 2010; Tom Sandborn, “Canadian Mining Firm Accused of Complicity in Congo Killings: Lawsuit highlights need for firmer hand in Ottawa, say human rights groups. Anvil Mining denies culpability,” www.TheTyee.ca, November 26, 2010; James Rodriguez, “GOLDCORP: No More Mining Terrorism,” MIMUNDO.org, May 2, 2007.
47. Rebecca Darling, “From Mongolia: A New Paradigm in responsible Mining is Taking Shape,” PACT, April 15, 2009 (blog content updated April 28, 2009).
48. Private communication, ‘Jane Smith’, conservationist with small NGO in Mongolia, May 5, 2009.
49. Jeffery R. Webber, “Indigenous Struggle, Ecology, and Capitalist Resource Extraction in Ecuador: An Interview with Marlon Santi,” The Bullet, e-bulletin #391, July 13, 2010.
50. Private communication, Goldman Foundation media relations, November 4, 2010.
51. Private communication, Goldman Foundation, November 29, 2010.
52. Private communication with The Asia Foundation November 2010.
53. For example, on Rio Tinto’s human rights and environmental atrocities in Papua New Guinea see: Gwen Kinkead, “Battling a Toxic Billionaire,” Men’s Journal, Dec. 1, 2009.
54. Barrick Gold Corporation is also partnered with Anglo-American, and AngloGold Ashanti. Barrick directors have included/include Brian Mulroney, former prime minister of Canada, Howard Baker, former US Senator, and international advisers George Herbert Walker Bush and Vernon Jordon.
55. Barrick Gold Corporation has a 9.5% stake in QGX, mining in Mongolia in a joint venture with Ivanhoe Mines.
56. See Robert Friedland on Sourcewatch.
57. On Robert Friedland, Tony Buckingham and Tim Spicer, see, e.g., Wayne Madsen, Genocide and Covert Operations in Africa, 1993-1999, Mellen Press, 1999; Stan Correy, “Robert Friedland: The King of the Canadian Juniors,” Radio National, April 6, 1997; keith harmon snow & Rick Hines, “Blood Diamond: Doublethink & Deception Over Those Worthless Little Rocks of Desire,” Global Research.
58. Danielle Mario, “OT Agreement Passes Parliamentary Committees,” UB Post, July 17, 2009.
59. See Keith Harmon Snow's "KING KONG" series.
60. The members of the NGO coalition include Oyu Tolgoi (OT) Watch, Center for Citizen’s Alliance, Centre for Human Rights and Development, Steps without Border, Drastic Change Movement and National Soyombo Movement.
61. “Mongolian NGOs Appeal to the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Business and Human Rights to resolve Oyu Tolgoi Mine Dispute,” Press Release, Center for Human Rights and Development (Mongolia), OT Watch (Mongolia), MiningWatch (Canada), Rights and Accountability in Development (UK), April 23, 2010.
62. For example: The Asia Foundation received OPIC funding: 2007: $378,516 South Korea operations; 2007: $168,502 East Timor; 2007: $458,293 Bangladesh; 2007: $562,707 Afghanistan; 2007: $281,441 Thailand; 2007: $764,390 Indonesia. Source: OPIC web site.
63. Ron Gluckman, “Believe it or Not A mini-Boom in Mongolia,” Newsweek, September 2003.
64. In Northampton MA (USA), the local Coca Cola bottling plant uses over 1,000,000 gallons of fresh city water annually, and this is the people’s water.
65. President Yumjaagiyn Tsendenbal was president of Mongolia from 1952 to 1974.
66. Private interview and private tour with ‘Bayarma Ganbold’ in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, October 22, 2010.
67. Private interview, Tumur, Naliakh coal mines, October 30, 2008.
68. See e.g. “The Curse of Gold: Democratic Republic of Congo,” Human Rights Watch, June 1, 2005, or the many DRC related publications of keith harmon snow.
69. See, e.g., Janine Roberts, Glitter and Greed: The Secret World of the Diamond Cartel,” Disinformation Press, 2003; or keith harmon snow and Rick Hines, “Blood Diamonds: Doublethink and Deception over those Worthless Little Rocks of Desire,” Z Magazine, July-August, 2007.
70. See: Elizabeth Liagin, “Background to the Recent Nigerian Elections: General Obasandjo more than just a ‘Friend’ of the Americans,” World Socialist Web Site, March 17, 1999.
71. See, for example, keith harmon snow, “Congo: Three Cheers for Eve Ensler?” Toward Freedom, December 24, 2007.
72. On NED funding in Mongolia see NED Annual Report 2009: http://www.ned.org/where-we-work/asia/mongolia; IRI’s 2009 NED funding was $250,000 and NDI’s 2009 NED funding was $240,000. See NED.
73. In 2008 NED granted $137,977 to CIPE “[t]o establish more effective communication between the public and private sectors in Mongolia. CIPE will provide advisory support lending its expertise on policy advocacy and policy reform to its local partner, who will develop and submit official proposals for draft laws and policy recommendations to the government, organize training seminars, and create a monthly television program for educational purposes.” See NED.
74. William I. Robinson, Promoting Polyarchy: Globalization, US Intervention and Hegemony, Cambridge University Press, 1996: p. 86-116.
75. Joan Roelofs, Foundations and Public Policy: The Mask of Pluralism, SUNY Press, 2003.
76. See: Jonah Gindin, “Interview with William I. Robinson: The Battle for Global Civil Society,” International Endowment for Democracy, June 13, 2005. See also: NED’s funding of groups in China, for example, which is considered an anti-democratic challenger state and ideology to the US.
77. See: William Blum, “Trojan Horse: The National Endowment for Democracy,” International Endowment for Democracy.
78. William I. Robinson, Promoting Polyarchy: Globalization, US Intervention and Hegemony, Cambridge University Press, 1996: pp. 86-116.
79. E.g., Joan Roelofs, Foundations and Public Policy: The Mask of Pluralism, SUNY Press, 2003: p. 162; and, on TAF involvement in Afghanistan, see, e.g., William Blum, Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions since World War II, Common Courage, 2004: p. 343.
80. Victor Marchetti and John D. Marks, The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence, Knopf, New York, 1974.
81. See, e.g., Freeport McMoRan’s criminal operations in Papua New Guinea, in league with terrorizing Indonesian security forces: John M. Miller, West Papua Report December 2010, East Timor and Indonesia Action Network, December 2010.
82. Both Conoco Philips and Freeport McMoRan have long histories of devastating interventions, human rights violations and environmental crimes in Latin America, Asia and Africa; Freeport McMoRan is also in Congo.
83. “President Obama Announces Members of the President’s Intelligence Advisory Board,” The White House, December 23, 2009.
84. Mathew Nasuti, “Afghan AID Funds Diverted to The Asia Foundation,” Atlantic Free Press, January 31, 2010.
85. On TAF involvement in Afghanistan, see, e.g., William Blum, Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions since World War II, Common Courage, 2004: p. 343.
86. QUALCOMM is deeply involved in US government classified ‘top secret’ programs, and is probably, if not certainly, one of the big recipients of funding for ‘black’ programs.
87. James Baker traveled to Mongolia in the early 1990′s to press the ‘Washington Consensus’ as Mongolia’s savior and model for a successful transformation to democracy and free market capitalism.
88. Shelly Feldman, “NGOs and Civil Society: (Un)stated Contradictions,” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 554, 1997: p. 44-66, cited in Joan Roelofs, Foundations and Public Policy: The Mask of Pluralism, SUNY Press, 2003: p. 168.
89. See: Jonah Gindin, “Interview with William I. Robinson: The Battle for Global Civil Society,” International Endowment for Democracy, June 13, 2005.
90. Private interview and tour with ‘Bayarma Ganbold’, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, October 22, 2010.
91. Private interview with Baasan Geleg, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, October 2008.
92. United Movement for Mongolian Rivers and Lakes, “Brief Update on UMMRL, Mongolia,” October, 2010.
93. United Movement for Mongolian Rivers and Lakes, “Brief Update on UMMRL, Mongolia,” September 9, 2010.
94. “Interview by Mongolian NGO: Our struggle is to protect our environment and land,” www.news.mn, September 16, 2010.

As Republicans and Democrats propose cuts in programs that actually benefit their increasingly impoverished constituents, though, they agree there’s one area of the budget that’s not to be touched: the annual $3 billion subsidy U.S. taxpayers provide to the Israeli military.

One of the biggest defenders of the handout is House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairwoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. “There will be no cuts to security assistance to the Jewish State of Israel,” her chief of staff declared in a recent letter to House Republicans. The rest of the U.S. foreign aid budget, including assistance for Iraqi refugees and food aid to the world’s poorest people, is fair game. But the Florida congresswoman insists we must help Israel maintain its “Qualitative Military Edge.”

And congressional Democrats have her back.

Illinois Democrat Jan Schakowsky, for instance – a leading member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus – has drafted a letter, cosigned by California Democrat Anna Eshoo, warning that the revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia “have the potential to add to the very real security challenges faced by Israel.” Reducing or “otherwise endangering aid to our ally” would be “unproductive,” she adds, encouraging her colleagues to tell Obama they “strongly support … providing $3.075 billion in assistance to Israel.” (For those shivering at home, that’s more assistance than Obama is proposing to offer Americans trying to keep their houses warm.)

This liberal appeal for Israeli military aid, meanwhile, is being sent out under the auspices of J Street, a group that positions itself as a left-leaning answer to AIPAC. But J Street staff we spoke with at their recent conference were hard-pressed to explain why U.S. taxpayers should fund a right-wing Israeli government that continues to build settlements and maintains an inhumane siege of Gaza.

So it’s left to folks like libertarian Congressman Ron Paul and his son, Kentucky Senator and Tea Party favorite Rand Paul, to call for ending aid to Israel. In a February 4 interview with ABC News, Rand Paul said of Israel, “I think that their per capita income is greater than probably three-fourths of the rest of the world. Should we be giving free money or welfare to a wealthy nation? I don’t think so.”

Indeed, Israel has the 24th largest economy in the world, and ranks 15th among 169 nations on the UN Human Development Index, which makes it a “very highly developed” nation.

Yet what thanks did Senator Paul get for his call to save the U.S. taxpayers billions of dollars? A torrent of criticism, even from J Street, which called on Republicans – and their donors – “to repudiate his comments and ensure American leadership around the world is not threatened by this irresponsible proposal.”

Paul’s fellow Tea Partiers aren’t any better. Of the 87 freshmen House Republicans elected on platforms of cut-baby-cut, at least three-fourths have now signed a letter declaring that, “As Israel faces threats from escalating instability in Egypt” – where have we heard that line of argument before? – “security assistance to Israel … has never been more important.” Subsidies are for militaries, you see, not poor people.

But even without U.S. funding, Israel would still spend $11 billion-plus on its military, more than all but 20 other nations in the world spend on their armed forces – and hundreds of millions of dollars more than the Islamic Republic of Iran, despite having just 1/10th the population. Throw in a couple – as in couple hundred – little things called nuclear weapons, and, for better or worse, the Jewish state’s “Qualitative Military Advantage” isn’t going anywhere.

But you wouldn’t know that listening to the folks at J Street or to liberals like Jan Schakowsky, who hysterically cite the specter of Arab democracy to advocate billions in subsidies for a government that openly flouts international law. So much for their concern about human rights. And so much for being progressive. Indeed, with liberals like these, the Netanyahu government and its allies at AIPAC are likely asking themselves: who needs the Tea Party?

During my years of writing and speaking about the harm and injustice inflicted upon the world by unending United States interventions, I’ve often been met with resentment from those who accuse me of chronicling only the negative side of US foreign policy and ignoring the many positive sides. When I ask the person to give me some examples of what s/he thinks show the virtuous face of America’s dealings with the world in modern times, one of the things mentioned — almost without exception — is The Marshall Plan. This is usually described along the lines of: “After World War II, the United States unselfishly built up Europe economically, including our wartime enemies, and allowed them to compete with us.” Even those today who are very cynical about US foreign policy, who are quick to question the White House’s motives in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere, have little problem in accepting this picture of an altruistic America of the period 1948-1952. But let’s have a look at the Marshall Plan outside the official and popular versions.

After World War II, the United States, triumphant abroad and undamaged at home, saw a door wide open for world supremacy. Only the thing called “communism” stood in the way, politically, militarily, and ideologically. The entire US foreign policy establishment was mobilized to confront this “enemy”, and the Marshall Plan was an integral part of this campaign. How could it be otherwise? Anti-communism had been the principal pillar of US foreign policy from the Russian Revolution up to World War II, pausing for the war until the closing months of the Pacific campaign, when Washington put challenging communism ahead of fighting the Japanese. This return to anti-communism included the dropping of the atom bomb on Japan as a warning to the Soviets.¹

After the war, anti-communism continued as the leitmotif of American foreign policy as naturally as if World War II and the alliance with the Soviet Union had not happened. Along with the CIA, the Rockefeller and Ford Foundations, the Council on Foreign Relations, certain corporations, and a few other private institutions, the Marshall Plan was one more arrow in the quiver of those striving to remake Europe to suit Washington’s desires: 

 

1. Spreading the capitalist gospel — to counter strong postwar tendencies towards socialism.
2. Opening markets to provide new customers for US corporations — a major reason for helping to rebuild the European economies; e.g., a billion dollars of tobacco at today’s prices, spurred by US tobacco interests.
3. Pushing for the creation of the Common Market and NATO as integral parts of the West European bulwark against the alleged Soviet threat.
4. Suppressing the left all over Western Europe, most notably sabotaging the Communist Parties in France and Italy in their bids for legal, non-violent, electoral victory. Marshall Plan funds were secretly siphoned off to finance this endeavor, and the promise of aid to a country, or the threat of its cutoff, was used as a bullying club; indeed, France and Italy would certainly have been exempted from receiving aid if they had not gone along with the plots to exclude the communists from any kind of influential role.

The CIA also skimmed large amounts of Marshall Plan funds to covertly maintain cultural institutions, journalists, and publishers, at home and abroad, for the heated and omnipresent propaganda of the Cold War; the selling of the Marshall Plan to the American public and elsewhere was entwined with fighting “the red menace”. Moreover, in its covert operations, CIA personnel at times used the Marshall Plan as cover, and one of the Plan’s chief architects, Richard Bissell, then moved to the CIA, stopping off briefly at the Ford Foundation, a long time conduit for CIA covert funds. One big happy family.

The Marshall Plan imposed all kinds of restrictions on the recipient countries, all manner of economic and fiscal criteria which had to be met, designed for a wide open return to free enterprise. The US had the right to control not only how Marshall Plan dollars were spent, but also to approve the expenditure of an equivalent amount of the local currency, giving Washington substantial power over the internal plans and programs of the European states; welfare programs for the needy survivors of the war were looked upon with disfavor by the United States; even rationing smelled too much like socialism and had to go or be scaled down; nationalization of industry was even more vehemently opposed by Washington. The great bulk of Marshall Plan funds returned to the United States, or never left, to purchase American goods, making American corporations among the chief beneficiaries.

The program could be seen as more a joint business operation between governments than an American “handout”; often it was a business arrangement between American and European ruling classes, many of the latter fresh from their service to the Third Reich, some of the former as well; or it was an arrangement between Congressmen and their favorite corporations to export certain commodities, including a lot of military goods. Thus did the Marshall Plan help lay the foundation for the military industrial complex as a permanent feature of American life.

It is very difficult to find, or put together, a clear, credible description of how the Marshall Plan played a pivotal or indispensable role in the recovery in each of the 16 recipient nations. The opposing view, at least as clear, is that the Europeans — highly educated, skilled and experienced — could have recovered from the war on their own without an extensive master plan and aid program from abroad, and indeed had already made significant strides in this direction before the Plan’s funds began flowing. Marshall Plan funds were not directed primarily toward the urgently needed feeding of individuals or rebuilding their homes, schools, or factories, but at strengthening the economic superstructure, particularly the iron, steel and power industries. The period was in fact marked by deflationary policies, unemployment and recession. The one unambiguous outcome was the full restoration of the propertied class.²

The rising up of the people … and the conservative mind

James Baker served as the Chief of Staff in President Ronald Reagan’s first administration and in the final year of the administration of President George H.W. Bush. He was also Secretary of the Treasury under Reagan and Secretary of State under Bush. Thus, by establishment standards and values, inside marble-columned institutions, Baker is a man to be taken seriously when it comes to affairs of state. Here he is on February 3, during an interview by our favorite TV station, our very own shining beacon of truth, Fox News:

“We want to see the people in the Middle East have a chance at democracy and free markets … I’m sorry, democracy and human rights.”³

Baker has a record of speaking his mind, whether Freudian-slip-like or not. When he was Secretary of State, on an occasion when the Middle East was being discussed at a government meeting, and Jewish-American influence was mentioned, Baker was reported to have said “Fuck the Jews! They don’t vote for us anyway.”⁴

They couldn’t resist, could they?

News flash: “Judge Mustafa Abdel Jallil, the Libyan justice minister who resigned last week in protest over the use of force against unarmed civilians, said he has proof that Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi ordered the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland on Dec. 21, 1988. He would not disclose details of the alleged evidence.”⁵

Hmmm, let me guess now why he wouldn’t disclose details of the alleged evidence … hmmm … Ah, I know — because it doesn’t exist! How could Gadhafi’s many enemies in Libya resist kicking him like this when he’s down? Or perhaps the honorable judge is simply protecting himself from a future international criminal tribunal for his years of service to the Libyan state? If you read any more of such nonsense — and you will — reach for some of the antidote I’ve been providing for more than 20 years.⁶

The empire’s deep dark secret

“In my opinion, any future defense secretary who advises the president to again send a big American land army into Asia or into the Middle East or Africa should have his head examined,” declared US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates on February 25.

Remarkable. Every one of the many wars the United States has engaged in since the end of World War II has been presented to the American people, explicitly or implicitly, as a war of necessity, not a war of choice; a war urgently needed to protect American citizens, American allies, vital American “interests”, freedom, or democracy. Here is President Obama speaking of Afghanistan: “But we must never forget this is not a war of choice. This is a war of necessity.”⁷

This being the case, how can a future administration say it will not go to war if any of these noble causes is seriously threatened? The answer is that these noble causes are irrelevant. The United States goes to war where and when it wants, and if a noble cause is not self-evident, the government, with indispensable help from the American media, will manufacture it. Secretary Gates is now admitting that there is choice involved. Well, Bob, thanks for telling us. You were Bush’s Secretary of Defense as well, and before that 26 years in the CIA and the National Security Council. You sure know how to keep a secret.

Items of interest from a journal I’ve kept for 40 years, part II

• In its more than 50 years of revolution Cuba has never reciprocated the US aggression against it; no military or terrorist assaults have emanated from Havana in spite of the many hundreds of CIA aerial bombings, ground attacks, acts of sabotage, and assassination attempts. Oh, did I mention all the chemical and biological warfare? Oddly, the State Department’s list of “State sponsors of terrorism” includes Cuba, but not the United States. The little nation of Cuba has defied all rational odds against its socialist survival.
• The wit and wisdom of Mr. Barack Obama: “To ensure prosperity here at home and peace abroad, we all share the belief we have to maintain the strongest military on the planet.” (December 1, 2008, Agence France Presse) How true. All Americans share that belief, as they rejoice in the strongest military on the planet and a veritable overflowing of prosperity at home and peace abroad.
• Steven Bradbury, Department of Justice lawyer under George W. Bush, testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee, which was discussing the legal status of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay: “The president is always right.”⁸
• “There are 3 billion people in the world and we have only 200 million of them. We are outnumbered 15 to 1. If might did make right they would sweep over the United States and take what we have. We have what they want.” – President Lyndon Johnson, 1966.
• As the George W. Bush administration was entering office in 2000, Donald Rumsfeld exuberantly expressed grandiose ambitions for Middle East domination, telling the National Security Council: “Imagine what the region would look like without Saddam and with a regime that’s aligned with US interests. It would change everything in the region and beyond.” A few weeks later, Bush speechwriter David Frum declared to the New York Times Magazine: “An American-led overthrow of Saddam Hussein, and the replacement of the radical Baathist dictatorship with a new government more closely aligned with the United States, would put America more wholly in charge of the region than any power since the Ottomans, or maybe even the Romans.”
• Shortly after Salvador Allende became president of Chile in 1970, Nixon’s National Security Advisor, Henry Kissinger, recorded a conversation in which Secretary of State William Rogers agreed that “we ought, as you say, to cold-bloodedly decide what to do and then do it,” but warned it should be done “discreetly so that it doesn’t backfire.” Rogers predicted that “after all we have said about elections, if the first time a Communist wins the U.S. tries to prevent the constitutional process from coming into play we will look very bad.”
• “The revulsion against war … will be an almost insuperable obstacle for us to overcome. For that reason, I am convinced that we must begin now to set the machinery in motion for a permanent wartime economy.” Charles E. Wilson, 1944. During World War II he held leading positions overseeing the huge US military production effort; after the war he resumed his position as CEO of General Electric, one of the leading defense corporations.
• Remember Ben Tre? That was the Vietnamese village the Americans destroyed in 1968, saying “It became necessary to destroy the town in order to save it.” Since then the Americans have been saving towns all over the globe, in Cambodia, Laos, Panama, Nicaragua, Sudan, Iraq, Yugoslavia and more. Then on Sept 11, 2001, someone, no doubt overcome with gratitude, decided to save some Americans. – Bev Currie, Canada
• United Nations Resolution 1244, adopted in 1999, reaffirmed the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia to which Serbia was the recognized successor state, and established that Kosovo was to remain part of Serbia. Today, Kosovo is independent, because the United States wants it that way, because Serbia is still being punished for its refusal in the 1990s to act like a proper European state displaying subservience to the United States, the European Union, NATO, and capitalism. Independent Kosovo is perhaps the most genuinely gangster-state in the world. It’s led by Prime Minister Hashim Thaci, whom a Council of Europe investigation recently accused of being the boss of a criminal operation to kidnap people and steal their kidneys.(sic) (Associated Press, December 14 and 15, 2010) He and Washington, naturally, are on the best of terms.
• “Look,” said Russian president Vladimir Putin about NATO in 2001, “this is a military organization. It’s moving towards our border. Why?” He subsequently described NATO as “the stinking corpse of the cold war.” (Associated Press, June 16, 2001; Press Trust of India, December 21, 2007)
• Senator John McCain, re: fighting in Georgia, 2008: “I’m interested in good relations between the United States and Russia. But in the 21st century, nations don’t invade other nations.” (Washington Post, August 14, 2008) One really has to wonder at times about the sanity of neo-conservatives, or at least their IQ.
• Re: “collateral damage” produced by US bombing in many countries: Killing innocent bystanders when targeting someone else has long been considered murder in Western law.
• “It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.” – Voltaire
• “The central aim of the war in Afghanistan — planned well before the attacks of September 11, 2001 — was to take advantage of the power vacuum in Central Asia created by the Soviet Union’s dissolution to assert US domination over a region containing the second largest proven reserves of petroleum and natural gas in the world.” – Bill Van Auken, World Socialist Web Site
• “To me, I confess, [countries] are pieces on a chessboard upon which is being played out a game for dominion of the world.” Lord Curzon, British viceroy of India, speaking about Afghanistan, 1898
• Ricardo Alarcon, President of the Cuban National Assembly, stated in 2008: Cuba allows CNN, AP and Chicago Tribune to maintain offices in Cuba, but the US refuses to allow Cuban journalists to work in the United States.
• Washington’s “Plan Colombia”, launched in 2000, was the militarization of the war on drugs.
• Michael Moore, March 24, 2008: “I see that Frontline on PBS this week has a documentary called ‘Bush’s War’. That’s what I’ve been calling it for a long time. It’s not the ‘Iraq War’. Iraq did nothing. Iraq didn’t plan 9/11. It didn’t have weapons of mass destruction. It DID have movie theaters and bars and women wearing what they wanted and a significant Christian population and one of the few Arab capitals with an open synagogue. But that’s all gone now. Show a movie and you’ll be shot in the head. Over a hundred women have been randomly executed for not wearing a scarf.”
• Michael Collon: “Let’s replace the word ‘democratic’ by ‘with us’ and the word ‘terrorist’ by ‘against us’.”
• The American Century went the way of the Thousand Year Reich.
• Reagan invaded Grenada in October 1983 because he cut and ran from Beirut after the United States lost 241 Marines in the infamous truck bombing. The United States invaded Grenada two days later.
• Noam Chomsky: “The whole debate about the Iranian ‘interference’ in Iraq makes sense only on one assumption; namely, that ‘we own the world’. If we own the world, then the only question that can arise is that someone else is interfering in a country we have invaded and occupied. So if you look over the debate that took place and is still taking place about Iranian interference, no one points out this is insane. How can Iran be interfering in a country that we invaded and occupied? It’s only appropriate on the presupposition that we own the world. Once you have that established in your head, the discussion is perfectly sensible.”
• In late 1997, according to Dana Priest’s book, The Mission, the Bill Clinton White House wanted CENTCOM commander Gen. Anthony Zinni to order his pilots to provoke a military confrontation with Iraq in the no-fly zone by deliberately drawing fire from Iraqi planes.
• Reagan accepted a fateful trade-off when he agreed not to complain about Pakistan’s efforts to acquire a nuclear weapons capability in exchange for Pakistani cooperation in helping the Afghan rebels.
• “The presumption of ‘government incompetence’ is seldom a useful assumption in evaluating the behavior of governments. We only reach such a conclusion if we take their official rhetoric at face value. In terms of ‘achieving democracy’, the official rhetoric, Bush has been ‘incompetent’ in Iraq. But in terms of the real agenda — building permanent bases and controlling the oil — he has in fact been successful. I have found that this is always the pattern: some real agenda is always being achieved by the policies in force, despite the apparent bungling in terms of the official agenda.” – Richard K. Moore
• The 9/11 attacks reflected the anger and rage that US foreign policy had produced in the past and then provided the excuse for US officials to continue such policy in the future.

Upcoming talks by William Blum

Saturday, April 2, 7:00 pm
University of Pittsburgh at Titusville, PA
504 East Main Street
Henne Auditorium
Titusville is about 2 hours by car from Pittsburgh and 2 1/2 hours from Cleveland.
For further information call 888-878-0462
Or email Mary Ann Caton: ude.ttipnull@notac

Thursday, May 19
Paris, France
Conference: “Ethics and US Foreign Policy in the 21st Century”
Université de Paris Ouest-Nanterre-La Défense, Amphi B-2
All day, beginning at 9 am
Email me for full schedule

1. See William Blum’s essay on the use of the atomic bomb.
2. For discussion of various aspects of the Marshall Plan see, for example, Joyce & Gabriel Kolko, The Limits of Power: The World and US Foreign Policy 1945-1954 (1972), chapters 13, 16, 17; Sallie Pisani, The CIA and the Marshall Plan (1991) passim; Frances Stoner Saunders, The Cultural Cold War: The CIA and the world of arts and letters (2000) passim.
3. crisis in Egypt – James A. Baker III on Middle East Political Change.
4. Guardian (London), December 12, 2000; Haaretz (Israel), November 14, 2008.
5. McClatchy Newspapers, February 26, 2011.
6. The Bombing of PanAm Flight 103: Case Not Closed.
7. Veterans of Foreign Wars convention, August 17, 2009.
8. Washington Post, July 12, 2006.