I'm pleased to hear that you don't, as I've always admired your work for FAIR very much and highly recommended it to local activists whenever I got a chance. I hope that others in (A) will also come forward and say that they don't actually agree with Rumsfeld that all or most resistance fighters are "dead enders." I don't think that you and John Lacny said _all_ resistance fighters (as opposed to probably the majority or at least many of them) are "Ba'athist or Jihadist criminals," but if Dwayne got an impression that "most" here (and "many on the left") have decided that they are, I'd have to say that he did capture the main message of (A) that resistance fighters are most probably mostly bad, that their actions are, on the whole, terribly harmful to all other Iraqis and the rest of the world, that what they are doing shouldn't be compared with anti-colonial revolts in the past at all, etc., even if he overstated the case a bit for a rhetorical effect.
An important task for us, as Dwayne emphasizes, is to "learn what is actually happening in Iraq" (at <http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/pipermail/lbo-talk/Week-of-Mon-20040209/003387.html>), and it's a very good idea to support fact-finding missions such as Occupation Watch <http://www.occupationwatch.org/>, Voices in the Wilderness <http://www.vitw.org/>, etc. and to bring Iraqi trade unionists and other activists from Iraq on US-speaking tours, introducing them to trade unions, religious congregations, newspaper editors, etc.
In addition, though, we'll have to continue to debate amongst ourselves (by ourselves I mean anti-war activist coalitions, organizations, and individuals) what our main short-term demands (in demonstrations, mass-lobbying actions, press conferences, etc.) with regard to the occupation are and will be. Are we saying that Washington should Bring the Troops Home Now and End the Occupation and Pay Reparations for War Damages or continue the occupation of Iraq under the UN aegis _until order is restored_? The idea that all or most resistance fighters are "Ba'athist or Jihadist criminals" from whom other Iraqis must be protected suggests that American and other soldiers should stay in Iraq _at least until they defeat them_ -- nay, _more_ troops (be they Americans or others or both) should be sent to Iraq, as it is evident that the current level of troop deployment does not suffice for a decisive counter-insurgency victory.
You know my opinion has been that Bush is a goner and a Democrat will win the presidential election. Even the _Columbus Dispatch_, a local monopoly newspaper which has not endorsed a Democrat for President since the 1916 Woodrow "He-Kept-Us-Out-of-War" Wilson campaign, is likely to come down on the Democratic side soon (among other things, _Dispatch_ editorials have recently said that the Bush administration is "TOTALLY RECKLESS," that "Having misled the nation on the drug benefit and Iraq, the president now asks the nation to believe that he is sincere about reducing the massive deficits he has run up. . . .It is becoming increasingly difficult to have any confidence in the fiscal policy of this administration," and that "The public needs to know why the scenario put out by Bush a year ago was so far off base. The matter of whether White House officials overstated the threat or simply were misled by inaccurate information should be known before the voters select their next president," qtd. in Dan Williamson, "Dispatch Dumps Dubya: For the First Time in 88 Years, the Big D Is Poised to Endorse a Democrat for President," _The Other Paper_ February 12-18, 2004, pp. 1 and 3). Once narrowly re-elected, Wilson did not keep America out of war, despite his campaign slogan: "On April 2, 1917, he asked Congress for a declaration of war on Germany to make the world 'safe for democracy'" (at <http://www.whitehousehistory.org/05/subs/05_a13.html>). In the case of John Kerry, he has not only not promised to bring the troops home -- he has taken a even more hawkish stance than Bush on the occupation of Iraq:
***** Kerry warns of 'cut and run' in Iraq Democrat assails Bush policy; aide keeps open possibility of sending more U.S. troops Democratic presidential hopeful John Kerry speaking on the campaign trail in Dover, N.H., last month. By Tom Curry National affairs writer MSNBC
WASHINGTON, Dec. 3 - In a major national security address Wednesday Democratic presidential contender John Kerry was sounding an alarm about premature U.S. withdrawal from Iraq. "I fear that in the run-up to the 2004 election the administration is considering what is tantamount to a cut-and-run strategy," Kerry said in remarks prepared for delivery to the Council on Foreign Relations.
advertisement The Massachusetts senator accused Bush and his aides of a "sudden embrace of accelerated Iraqification and American troop withdrawal without adequate stability," which he called "an invitation to failure."
He contended that it would be "a disaster and a disgraceful betrayal of principle" to accelerate the transfer of authority to Iraqis so as to allow "a politically expedient withdrawal of American troops."
Send more troops?
Kerry foreign policy advisor Rand Beers told reporters Kerry "would not rule out the possibility" of sending additional U.S. troops to Iraq.
"It is very clear the number of troops is inadequate" in Iraq, Beers told reporters in a telephone conference call previewing the speech.
Kerry's first preference, he said, would be to persuade foreign governments to deploy more troops to help share the burden with Americans.
But by not foreclosing the possibility of dispatching more U.S. troops to Iraq, Kerry seems to have changed his position and to have repositioned himself as a more hawkish alternative to Democratic presidential front-runner Howard Dean. . . .
<http://msnbc.msn.com/id/3660748/> *****
Whether Bush or Kerry gets elected, counter-insurgency warfare will continue. If anything, Kerry is likely to escalate it, sending more American or other or both troops to Iraq.
Those who think that Iraqi resistance fighters must be destroyed because they kill not only Americans but also Iraqis will have little reason to disagree with Kerry when he gets around to sending more troops to Iraq. Washington doesn't have many more troops to spare, but a Democratic president can better persuade some foreign governments to "share the burden" by cutting more economic deals with them than a unilateralist Republican has. A Democratic president with a dual record of being a "war hero" and an "anti-war activist" might even accomplish the currently impossible: reinstate the draft under the guise of "national service" with a populist rhetoric of "shared sacrifice":
***** For Immediate Release: Wednesday, January 8, 2003 Contact: Andy Davis (202) 224-6654
Hollings Sponsors Bill to Reinstate Military Draft Senator cites current heavy use of reserves and national guard, need for shared sacrifice
WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Sen. Fritz Hollings last night introduced the Universal National Service Act of 2003, a bill to reinstate the military draft and mandate either military or civilian service for all Americans, aged 18-26. The Hollings legislation is the Senate companion to a bill recently introduced in the House of Representatives by Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) and Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.).
Specifically, the bill mandates a national service obligation for every U.S. citizen and permanent resident, aged 18-26. To that end, the legislation authorizes the President to establish both the number of people to be selected for military service and the means of selection. Additionally, the measure requires those not selected specifically for military service to perform their national service obligation in a civilian capacity for at least two years. Under the bill, deferments for education will be permitted only through high school graduation. . . .
<http://hollings.senate.gov/~hollings/press/2003108C06.html> *****
We ought to think ahead about future ramifications, too, before we make up our minds about resistance fighters in Iraq. -- Yoshie
* Bring Them Home Now! <http://www.bringthemhomenow.org/> * Calendars of Events in Columbus: <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/calendar.html>, <http://www.freepress.org/calendar.php>, & <http://www.cpanews.org/> * Student International Forum: <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/> * Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osudivest.org/> * Al-Awda-Ohio: <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio> * Solidarity: <http://www.solidarity-us.org/>