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----- Original Message ----- From: portsideMod at netscape.net To: portside at yahoogroups.com Sent: Wednesday, September 17, 2003 8:19 AM Subject: Readers' Responses to Michael Moore on General Clark
Readers' Responses to Michael Moore on General Clark
[Note: Moore's endorsement of General Wesley Clark elicited a vehement and international response from readers. Here is a sample. -Eds]
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I just sent this to Michael Moore, wonder if I'll get a reply.
Mike
There is just one problem with your support of Wesley Clark. I am a bit perplexed about why you would gloss over the fact that he is considered by many to be a war criminal for his actions as a commander in Serbia and Yugoslavia. He authorized use of cluster bombs, and bombing civilian sites which are illegal in international law. He was also in charge of our "actions" in Panama and Latin America.
I think this informatiuon should be described in your messages of interest and support for this guy. And, to pick up on a thread you yourself started in "Bowling", while Clark and Clinton were bombing Serbia, using cluster bombs, killing civilians, guess what happened on the worst day of that slaughter? Columbine! So, since you tie Lockheed to Columbine, why not Clark too?
Peace
Dr Dan Jordan
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1) Clark bombed Yugoslavia for eighty days when there wasn't a thing in the world that country could do to the American people. The Nuremberg trials long since established that "I was just following orders" is no excuse. What Clinton wanted was a) to advance the process, still going on, of moving American military might as close as possible to Russia from all directions; b) to clear the way for an Albanian terminus for a pipeline to carry Caucasus oil, long since developed by the Soviet Union, across the Balkans from a port in Bulgaria, to which tankers would take it across the Black Sea. Oil money has NEVER gone to one party only. Albania demanded that Kosovo be taken from Yugoslavia (where Yugoslavia was historically born, although by 1999 its population was majority Albanian, and today it is "pure") as its price for agreeing to the pipeline. 2) Clark had absolute control of the skies. There was nothing to disturb the technological pinpoint accuracy of the bombings. He bombed the Chinese Embassy, killing occupants, to tell China we didn't like its opposition to the Yugoslav War. 3) Clark didn't give a hoot about the welfare of the countries that have always made massive use of the Danube for trade, including Germany, Austria, and the downstream countries like Hungary, Rumania, Bulgaria. He bombed the Danube bridges, preventing every conceivable kind of bulk commodity, from grain and coal on and up, from moving in either direction, causing all those countries great losses, plus hunger, cold, and electricity shortages in the poorer ones. 4) Clark personally ordered the commander of the British forces under him to drive the Russians from the Pristina airport, to which the Englishman replied (he has since made this public): "I am not going to start World War III to satisfy your ego." I see Dean as, in many ways, an FDR. Neither had an ideology. Both were/are aristocrats with specific purposes. (Dean is the son of the extremely wealthy Dean of Dean, Witter). FDR was out to save American capitalism, and made any and all political alliances a) to get elected, b) to get his legislation passed, and c) to stay in office (replacing Henry Wallace with Harry Truman as vice-president for his last term). He did not know have a theory about how to save capitalism, but simply made concessions to those segments of the population that had to be mollified to keep them from giving up on this system, and handled it so it looked like it came from the president. Dean's purpose is to reverse the policy, which he deems hopeless, and harmful to us, of U.S. efforts to rule the world single-handed. Everything else: alliances, tactics, measures, promises, will be secondary to that end. If Dean gets Clark as v.p. candidate, I'll vote for him, and hope he survives his two terms. Of course Kucinich is the man I want, but he's running a steady one per cent. William Mandel
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Gen. Wesley Clark -- War Criminal, Don't Be Fooled
Gen. Wesley Clark is a major war criminal. Please don't be fooled by the current well-orchestrated push to nominate Clark as Democratic Party nominee for president, at trap which Michael Moore has apparently fallen into as well as a number of other well-meaning peace people.
Gen. Wesley Clark was in charge of refugee camps in the 1980s and 1990s where Haitian refugees who were fleeing first Baby Doc Duvalier (and later the new regime installed by the US following the overthrowal of the elected Aristide government in the early 1990s), were packed, under appalling conditions condemned by the Center for Constitutional Rights, among many others. In the 1980s, many Haitian male refugees incarcerated at Krome (in Miami), and Fort Allen (in Puerto Rico) reported a strange condition called gyneacomastia, a situation in which they developed full female breasts. Ira Kurzban, attorney for the Haitian Refugee Center, managed to pry free government documents via a lawsuit on behalf of the refugees. These contained the startling information that prison officials had ordered the refugees sprayed repeatedly with highly toxic chemicals never designed for such generic use. The officer in charge of the refugee camp? None other than Gen. Wesley Clark, chief of operations at the US Navy internment camp at Guantanamo, and later head of NATO forces bombing Yugoslavia. The documents go on to say that lengthy exposure to the particular chemicals can cause hormonal changes that induce development of female breasts. Medical studies of female Haitian refugees in New York revealed that they had a much higher rate of cervical cancer than the rest of the female population.
Half a decade later, Gen Welsey Clark was supreme NATO commander in Yugoslavia. He presided over the massive use of depeleted uranium weapons there which poisoned Yugoslavia's water supply and agriculture, leading to an extremely high rate of miscarriages and childhood cancers.
Clark was in charge of NATO's "spin" in the Yugoslavia bombardment. Clark called the destruction of a Yugoslav train filled with civilians by a NATO missile "an uncanny accident." He said the same each time that NATO bombed civilian targets, which happened frequently.
Paul Watson reported in the San Francisco Chronicle that "NATO bombers scored several direct hits here in Kosovo's capital yesterday — including a graveyard, a bus station, and a children's basketball court." (April 14) A Spanish pilot flying missions for NATO, Capt. Martin de la Hoz, stated that on a number of occasions his supervising colonel protested to NATO about their bombing of non-military, civilian targets. "Once there was a coded order from the North American military that we should drop anti-personnel bombs over Pristina and Nis. All of the missions that we flew, all and each one, were planned in detail, including attacking planes, targets and type of ammunition, by US high-ranking military authorities. ... They are destroying the country," the Spanish F-18 pilot continued, "bombing it with novel weapons, toxic nerve gasses, surface mines dropped by parachute, bombs containing uranium, black napalm, sterilization chemicals, sprayings to poison crops, and weapons of which even we still know nothing about." (quoted in "Articulo 20," a Spanish weekly newspaper, June 14, 1999)
Clark defended all of these bombings, and was an integral part of the Clinton team's "spin" operation in Yugoslavia.
- Mitchel Cohen
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Dear Portsiders in the US,
I'm forwarding the following articles as an appeal for US progressives to take into account when voting in the 2004 Presidential elections, b/c current trends and some of the traffic on 'progressive' lists in the US is giving many of us in the anti-globalization and anti- imperialist movement in the rest of the world cause for concern.
I was astounded, for instance, to see Michael Moore recently back Wesley Clark's candidacy for the presidency. Surely Clark's record in Colombia and Yugoslavia - outlined below in the first two items I could find that seemed relevant (although they are by no means the definative statements on Clark's record) - should already give 'progressive' people in the US enough cause to pause and consider seriously what they are standing behind if they choose to back Clark's candidacy.
Clark represents the continuation of Clinton's own brand of militarism - his anouncement to run for the Presidency was made in Little Rock afterall - an administration that set the stage for the current bellicosity of the Bush administration (i.e. during his second term in office Clinton initiated Plan Colombia, launched several aggressive bombing campaigns against Afghanistan, Sudan, Iraq and Yugoslavia without UN authorization, scuppered Kyoto, stalled the ICC, scrapped the ABM treaty, backed the genocidal aggression against, and plunder of the DR Congo etc., etc., etc.).
Interestingly, George Soros' Open Society Institute is funding a new alliance called "American's Coming Together (ACT)" that is designed to boot Bush from power (a good thing). However, ACT's campaign is likely to throw its support behind Clark, as Soros and Clark have a long-history of collaboration in dismantling socialism in Eastern Europe and the Balkans and imposing NATO's neoliberal hegemony over the region (a very bad thing). Despite appearances, ACT has nothing to do with progressive politics, but will try to infiltrate and enlist the progressive opposition to Bush in order to forward its own agenda of finding a more 'respectable' candidate to head the Empire (with perhaps a potentially broader interventionist agenda, as Soros is itching for the overthrow of Mugabe, Ghaddafi, Chavez and others, who aren't current US priorities (and who anyways backed regime change in all the countries that the Bush admin has made a priority)).
Remember that 'anti-(Iraq)-war' candidates are not the same as consistent anti-imperialists (Dean constantly reminds crowds he supported the mass-slaughter of Iraqis during the first Gulf War and cheered on the US military as it rained destruction of Afghan civiilians), and pro- peace doesn't always mean pro-justice. Now that candidates like Clark, who were reared in the institutions of US militarism and whose track record in oppressing Southern peoples is nothing short of formidable, are running for the Presidency under the slogans of the anti-war movement, its worth pausing for a moment to consider how the left will react.
The world is looking to the US Left to fulfill its important role in the global struggle against the advancing Empire of global capital under US hegemony. By falling for the demagogic and opportunistic 'anti-war' rhetoric of current Democratic party candidates - with perhaps the exception of Kuchinich, whose anti- imperialist politics have been consistent, although I personally am no big fan of his analysis of things - the US left may be setting itself up to legitimate yet another round of imperial slaughter and war-crimes directed from Washington. To the American friends on this list - please make it a policy to not vote for proven or would be war criminals.
Regards,
Konstantin Kilibarda Editor, Information Warfare Monitor http://www.intstudies.cam.ac.uk/research/infowar/ http://www.infowar-monitor.net Collaborative MA in International Relations and Political Science University of Toronto Office - (416) 535-3786 Email - Kilibarda78 at aol.com
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Thank you for this information.
I think it is necessary to be clear that the differences wrenching the ruling class at this time do not fall into pro-war and anti-war camps. Rather, they fall around the line that separates unilateralists from multilateralists. Even Dean shows no inclination to give up the goal of world domination. The differences are over how to dominate, not whether to do so.
If progressives don't understand and accept that this is where we are at this time, we'll make some big mistakes. Every "viable" candidate will disappoint us, and the situation will be gloomy, indeed. The overriding issue for humanity, right now, is the defeat of the Bush Cabal. This will leave all the unfinished business of peace and justice in the world still to be done. But at least it gives us a chance to do it.
Ted Pearson