Postmodern Oil War II: Empire Strikes Back Sequel

FACTS versus PROPAGANDA

David Boje, Ph.D. October 16, 2002 New Mexico State University (Revised Feb22 2003)

"All We are Saying --- Is Give Peace A Chance" (John Lennon's hit song on top 100 list for 1969).

In preparation for the Teach-In Speak-Out for Peace in Iraq event scheduled for  October 28th (9AM to 10PM) at New Mexico State University (Corbett Center), I put together some data that noted scholars and activists are using to deconstruct propaganda being disseminated by the War Machine. Propaganda is defined here as the rigging of intelligence analysts and media reporters so as to stack the information deck given to the masses to be supportive of a leader's/country's agenda (Boje, 2003, Deconstructing Sun News editorial). 

President Bush Jr. recently stated his reasons for invading Iraq: (1) Iraq used chemical and biological weapons, (2) Iraq tried to build nuclear weapons, (3) the US tried to bring Iraq into the "family of nations" (said first by Bush Sr.), and (4) Iraq has a long history of lying to the world. The problem is the data not live up to the president's rhetoric claims.

Propaganda exploits our fears and constructs a leader that gives us hope for safe passage (Boje, 2003 Oil War: Propaganda and Root Cause). Corporate media is a major factor in the distribution of Heroic War and Demonizing the Enemy propaganda because it resorts to hype and fear, under reports the Peace Movement.  Compliant corporate media owns the Western press and does not allow reports about the swelling peace movement in the U.S. Rather, the role of the Western corporate-owned media is to make the American-Iraq war appear 'just' and 'essential' to America's homeland 'security.' 

We in the university are complicit when we do not engage in critical thinking about the War Machine. The draft is coming back. Campus police and university administration is being asked to spy on students, turn over information to the Homeland Security and FBI (Boje, 2002, What Students and Faculty Need to Know about the Iraq War).

Forms of U.S. resistance (i.e. carnival of street theatre, the waving of peace signs at motorists in downtown Las Cruces from 4 to 6 PM each Wednesday) to the war do not get media coverage.

 This is done by blocking out coverage of the peace movement and the true human costs of this latest war (See local press coverage). 500,000 in Washington DC gets reported as "thousands" in the the Sun News, in all mainstream news. The U.S. media is part of the war machine and is unwilling engage in facts-based analysis of presidential rhetoric or to depict the human carnage of war.  The carnage is not nearly as pretty as heroic war rhetoric.

Figure 1: Modern War image. (Photo shows victim of depleted uranium tipped munitions, dubbed “Crispy Critters” by Dessert Storm soldiers; Source Desert Storm Think Tank). 

A Crispy Critter struck by depleted uranium munitions of US military arsenal is not heroic. It is is economic; it cost the US $4 Trillion dollars since 1945 to pay corporations to build weapons of mass destruction. There is also benefit: the USA is the biggest arms seller in a one trillion dollar arms market.  The intelligence community is being pressured to provide false data to support the administration's war machine (Boje, 2003 Deconstructing Bu$h). I witnessed this before in the manufacture of body counts and the faking of incidents (e.g. Tonkin Bay), in order to sustain public support for the war machine during Vietnam.  The current need is to turn the propaganda machine into a way to sell the current postmodern war. Gulf, Afghanistan, and Iraq are postmodern wars, media-driven, theatrical, spectacles of corporate and state propaganda to enlist spectator support for war. Postmodern war is defined, by philosophers Best and Kellner (2001), as the implosion of human and machine in cyber and bio technology (Boje, 2002a).  

The Gulf spectacle was “postmodern” in that, first, it was a media event that was experienced as a live occurrence for the whole global village. Second, it managed to blur the distinction between truth and reality in a triumph of the orchestrated image and spectacle. Third, the conflict exhibited a heightened merging of individuals and technology, previewing a new type of cyberwar that featured information technology and “smart” weapons (Best & Kellner, 2001: 73).

Figure 2: Postmodern War image. Source: http://www.cursor.org and http://www.mnftiu.cc

A postmodern war uses hyperreality and interactive simulation cyber technologies to sanitize war into bloodless images I analyzed 9-11 (Afghanistan) as a postmodern war (Boje, 2002a).  The theatrics of  9-11, a postmodern war, makes military confrontation and collateral damage (cruel civilian casualties in Figure 1), mere digital abstractions (such as Figure 2)

Technological innovations in warfare from biotechnology, cyber war, and infotainment have fused with state, military, and corporate capitalism to transform the theatrics of capitalism into a social corporeality more postmodern than Vietnam or WW1 and WWII (Boje, 2002a).

In postmodern war, the line between military combat and entertainment gets blurred in endless graphic-enhanced replay and simulation: The differences between the modern and postmodern theatrics of warfare include current uses of robot drones, satellites, digital battlefields, and other high tech technologies that change both the theatre of operations, the game of war, and its theatric strategy.

During the Gulf War the commentary of military and football analysts -- and the methods deployed to illustrate and explain sports and the war -- became almost indistinguishable. During ABC's broadcast of Super Bowl XXV, an important part of the rhetorical [I’d say theatrical] strategy was to turn the event into much more than a game in order to justify playing the contest. Indeed, the Super Bowl and its viewers became important--even essential--participants in the war effort.[i] [additions in brackets, mine].

The logic of this latest postmodern war, is that Iraq civilian lives must be sacrificed in preemptive invasion in order to protect future American lives. In pre-game (pre-war) analysis, President Bush tells the media corps that the Iraqi regime is in league with al-Qaida. The international media and more critical scholars argue that Bush's claims are misleading the American public, and that war is not justified. The postmodern war theatrics call for building up Saddam as the Super Bowl-type enemy that will be defeated by the red, white and blue team. In an election year, critical analysis and opposition to the war among politicians (even democrats) is few and far between. In postmodern war it becomes difficult to separate fact from propaganda. Nevertheless, the facts are quite sobering. 

Fact: Bush administration has offered no concrete proof of any of the Iraqi al-Qaida connection. Even the recent CIA letter says there is no evidence that Saddam intends to commit terrorism against the United States (Click here for CIA report). 

Fact: The Bush administration (i.e., Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld; Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz) is pressuring the corporate-owned media and its CIA analysts to tailor their assessments of the Iraqi threat to help build the president's case against Saddam Hussein (Click here for Times article on the pressure).  

Below I put some facts to the propaganda of this postmodern war (I also include some dialog I have had with peopel who pose counter-facts):

Here are facts and counter-facts about "Iraq used chemical weapons"

  1. Question: Is there one piece of credible evidence that Iraq has stockpiles of weapons of chemical weapons that it intends to use against the U.S.? 
  2. Allegation: President Bush said about Saddam, "He's used poison gas on his own people." FACT:  US officials, including his Bush Sr. had no qualms about helping Saddam gas Iranians; 
  3. Fact: Donald Rumsfeld traveled to Baghdad in 1985 and met with Saddam Hussein as a private businessman on behalf of the Reagan administration. In the last major battle of the Iran-Iraq war, some 65,000 Iranians were killed, many by gas.
  4. Fact: Iraq did possess and use chemical weapons in the 1980s, but it is the U.S. that helped arm Iraq with military equipment, including chemical weapons, to use against Iran between 1985-1988; "U.S. government manufactures chemical and biological weapons, a fact that was routinely denied and only admitted after the anthrax attacks of 2001" (International Answer). 
  5. Fact: U.S. continued to sell chemical weapons to Iraq until Kuwait invasion in 1989; "These included anthrax, components of mustard gas, botulinum toxins (which causes paralysis of the muscles involving swallowing and is often fatal), histoplasma capsulatum (which may cause pneumonia, enlargement of the liver and spleen, anemia, acute inflammatory skin disease marked by tender red nodules), and a host of other nasty chemicals materials" (Boles, 2002; also S.R.103-900, May 25, 1994, pg. 264); 
  6. Fact: "During the 1991 Gulf War, Iraq did not use chemical or non-conventional weapons, but the U.S. did. It dropped tons of depleted uranium weapons all over Iraq" (International Answer). 
  7. Fact: "U.S. government used chemical weapons in Vietnam, spraying Agent Orange over vast parts of that country. Thousands of U.S. GIs and an unknown number of Vietnamese people died, or live difficult and painful lives from the after-effects"  (International Answer). 
  8. Fact: Mr. Tenet's CIA letter says Iraq Chemical weapons is NOT a threat - "CIA stating that while Saddam Hussein poses little threat to America now, a US invasion could push him into retaliating with chemical or biological weapons"  (Borger, 2002b; more on Tenet letter). 
  9. Question: "Are you familiar with the 1994 Senate Hearings that revealed the U.S. knowingly supplied chemical and biological materials to Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war and as late as 1992- including after the alleged Iraqi gas attack on a Kurdish village?" and "if there were any weapons from 1990-1998 found by UNSCOM Inspectors, they were provided by the US." (Congressman Ron Paul).
  10. Fact: "George Bush [Sr.], operating largely behind the scenes throughout the 1980s, initiated and supported much of the financing, intelligence, and military help that built Saddam's Iraq into the aggressive power that the United States ultimately had to destroy." - Koppel, June, 1990 - as cited in Boles, 2002.
  11. Fact: Iraq has only a shadow of the power it had in 1990; Iraq's military is 1/5th the size it was in 1990, which at that time proved unable to defend anything. 

Here are the facts about Iraq tried to build nuclear weapons; Bush said, "Before being barred from Iraq in 1998, the (U.N.) International Atomic Energy Agency dismantled extensive nuclear weapons-related facilities, including three uranium enrichment sites."

  1. Question: Is there one piece of credible evidence that Iraq has stockpiles of nuclear weapons that it intends to use against the U.S.?
  2. Fact: International Institute for Strategic Studies, based in London, concluded in a report issued last month that "Iraq does not possess facilities to produce fissile material in sufficient amounts for nuclear weapons" and that "it would require several years and extensive foreign assistance to build such fissile material production facilities."
  3. Fact: "U.S. has the largest nuclear arsenal--more than 6,000 nuclear missiles and bombs. It has spent $4 trillion on nuclear weapons since 1945" (International Answer). 
  4. Fact: UNSCOM Chief Inspector, Scott Ritter, says that Iraq is essentially
    disarmed of all weapons of mass destruction.
  5. Fact: Bush statements about Iraq nuclear weapons are directly counter to assessments made by U.S. intelligence agencies. 
  6. Question: How many chemical, biological and nuclear weapons of mass destruction are stored in New Mexico? 

Here are the facts about how US tried to bring Iraq into the "family of nations" (said first by Bush Sr.). 

  1. Question: Is there one piece of credible evidence that the U.S. is trying in any way to bring Iraq into the family of nations?
  2. Fact: "We've bombed Iraq thirty-odd times this year" (Tripp, 2002). Reason U.S. elects to bomb Iraq is they can not retaliate; "'Stop the bombing' - More bombing and war in the case of Iraq will not achieve anything but civilian deaths and misery. All parties should disavow preparations for war and the threat of war" (Voice 4 Change). 
  3. Fact: The continuation of US and UK bombing of Iraq since Dessert Storm in 1991 has not been sanctioned by the UN (Guardian).
  4. Fact: U.S. plays Iran off against Iraq, and vice versa; covert operators of the U.S. armed Iran, at the same time other operative armed Iraq.
  5. Fact: Bush plans to install government in Iraq to exploit oil profit; Faisal Qaragholi, the "petroleum engineer who directs the London office of the Iraqi National Congress (INC), an umbrella organization of opposition groups that is backed by the United States" says that "Our oil policies should be decided by a government in Iraq elected by the people." Ahmed Chalabi, the INC leader, put it more bluntly and sadi that he favored a U.S.-led consortium to develop Iraq's oil fields, which would replace the existing agreements that Iraq has with Russia and France. "American companies will have a big shot at Iraqi oil," Chalabi said (Boles, 2002); Halliburton Co. had interests in Iraqi oil production after the [Gulf ] war."
  6. Fact: this is an oil war: "Why do the oil company executives strongly support this war if oil is not the real reason we plan to take over Iraq?" and "Are we willing to bear the economic burden of a 100 billion dollar war against Iraq, with oil prices expected to skyrocket and further rattle an already shaky American economy? How about an estimated 30 years occupation of Iraq that some have deemed necessary to "build democracy" there?" (Congressman Ron Paul).
  7. Fact: When Iraq Oil War happens, oil prices will go up, oil companies will get rich, and middle-class Americans will pay the higher prices for oil. 
  8. Fact: "Oil, clearly, is the commercial jackpot in this war" (Ridgeway, 2002). This is the black-gold rush for the oil-igarchy. 

Facts about propaganda - by topic and by U.S. presidency

Weapons inspections [William J. Clinton president from 1993-2001 & George W. Bush president from 2001-present]

  1. Question: Is there one piece of credible evidence that Iraq has stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction that it intends to use against the U.S.?
  2. Fact: Between 1991 and December 12, 1998. There were over 9,000 inspections to assess Weapons of Mass Destruction.  The fact is there were very few incidents where there were any delays or challenges to inspections.
  3. Fact: "For the last four years it has been the U.S. government that has worked hard at manipulating the UN so that there would be no inspectors in Iraq"  (International Answer). 
  4. Fact: "United Nations Special Commission--UNSCOM--cited only five "obstructions" to the 423 inspections conducted between Nov. 18-Dec.12, 1998 (a typical inspection period just before Dessert Fox war). All five incidents were trivial and not a justification for all out war:
    1. One was a 45-minute delay before allowing access, while keys were fetched. 
    2. Another was Iraq's rebuff to a demand by a U.S. inspector, Dianne Seamons, that she be able to interview all the undergraduate students in Baghdad University's Science Department.
    3. Inspect a building on a  Friday, a Muslim holy day.
    4. Inspect another building on a Friday, a Muslim holy day 
    5. On December 9, an inspection of a small headquarters of the Baathist political party was challenged;. Inspectors left after they were asked, 'what is the relation between the
      small headquarters of a party and the disarmament mission?' (See International Answer; CIN Just Archives). 
  5. Fact: Scott Ritter, a former UN inspector and Marine Intelligence Officer, says that UNSCOM confirmed that Iraq had destroyed all biological, chemical, missile, and nuclear weapons. (Chicago Tribune, "Cheney's warped perspective," 9/10/02).
  6. Fact: "Less than 48 hours after the inspectors were withdrawn from Iraq, the Pentagon began the massive bombing campaign known as Operation Desert Fox on Dec. 16-19, 1998"  (International Answer). 
  7. Fact: Who are the weapons inspectors? U.S. officials publicly admitted the weapons inspectors were intelligence agents who provided Pentagon bombing planners with bombing coordinates. (New York Times, Jan. 7, 1999)
  8. Question: How to rid the world of U.S. weapons of mass destruction. "Is it not true that those who argue that even with inspections we cannot be sure that Hussein might be hiding weapons, at the same time imply that we can be more sure that weapons exist in the absence of inspections?" (Congressman Ron Paul). 
  9. Options: How about - UN inspectors -- not only in Iraq, but open up US facilities to parallel inspections (Voice 4 Change). 

Global Terrorism [George W. Bush president from 2001-present]

  1. Question: Is there one piece of credible evidence that Iraq has any connection to al-Qaeda, Osama bin Laden, or 9-11 terrorist attacks?
  2. Question: "Is it not true that the intelligence community has been unable to develop a case tying Iraq to global terrorism at all, much less the attacks on the United States last year? Does anyone remember that 15 of the 19 hijackers came from Saudi Arabia and that none came from Iraq?" (Congressman Ron Paul).
  3. Fact: "CIA and FBI investigators -- said that despite allegations of links between Mohamed Atta, the main planner of the terrorist attacks, and an Iraqi intelligence agent, there was no evidence of ties... One of the Palestinians cited by Bush, Abu Nidal, was last active in the 1980s and died in Baghdad in August. Another, Abu Abbas, conducted his last terrorist act in 1990, now renounces violence, and lives in the Gaza Strip with apparent Israeli permission" (Collier, 2002). More on this point from UK intelligence sources.
  4. Fact: "Bob Baer, a former CIA agent who tracked al-Qaida's rise, said that there were contacts between Osama bin Laden and the Iraqi government in Sudan in the early 1990s and in 1998: 'But there is no evidence that a strategic partnership came out of it. I'm unaware of any evidence of Saddam pursuing terrorism against the United States'" (Borger, 2002a).
  5. Fact: Warren Strobel and Jonathan Landay interviewed over a dozen military, intelligence and diplomatic officials on link of Iraq and global terrorism -- "These officials charge that administration hawks have exaggerated evidence of the threat that Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein poses -- including distorting his links to the al-Qaida terrorist network -- have overstated the amount of international support for attacking Iraq and have downplayed the potential repercussions of a new war in the Middle East. They charge that the administration squelches dissenting views and that intelligence analysts are under intense pressure to produce reports supporting the White House's argument that Saddam poses such an immediate threat to the United States that pre-emptive military action is necessary" (Strobel & Landay, 2002). 
  6. Fact: 15 of the 19 participants in the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks were citizens of Saudi Arabia.
  7. A fearful people is easier to rule. 

Vietnam War - 1970s [Lyndon B. Johnson president 1963-69; Richard M. Nixon president 1969-74; Gerald R. Ford president 1974-77]

  1. Fact: 50,000 American lives were lost in Vietnam in an undeclared war. 
  2. Fact: President Lyndon Johnson staged a fake raid on a Navy vessel in Tonkin Gulf incident as legitimacy for U.S. to go to (undeclared) war in Vietnam
  3. Fact: Hitler staged a phony invasion from Poland as legitimacy for Germans to go to war (Lightwear, 2002).

Gulf War  - 1991-1992  [George Bush, President from 1989-93]

  1. Question: "Is it not true that anywhere between 100,000 and 300,000 US soldiers have suffered from Persian Gulf War syndrome from the first Gulf War, and that thousands may have died?" (Congressman Ron Paul).
  2. Fact: How many Iraq civilians died in 1991 Dessert Storm is hard to estimate. Both sides are motivated to under-count. The U.S. estimate is 13,000 Iraqi civilians were killed, while Iraq estimate is only 8,243. Voice $ Change says- A quarter of a million people died in Operation Desert Storm in 1992 (Voice 4 Change). A recent study suggests a civilian casualty cover-up by both sides, where as  many as 300,000 civilians probably died in the conflict (Axelrod, 2002)
  3. Fact: Who supplied? Bush Sr. authorized U.S. corporations to sell of $4.8 million worth of advanced technology products between July 18 and August 1, 1991, right up to the Gulf War. 
  4. Fact: "April Glaspie, U.S. ambassador to Iraq during the first Bush administration, seems to have given Hussein a partial go-ahead to take some border oil wells just before he went farther and seized all of Kuwait in August 1990.
  5. Fact: Bush Senior's 1990-91 liberation of Kuwait from Iraqi occupation depended upon building Hussein into an international ogre. Yet, Hussein was and is a second rate despot, not a world threat" (Phillips, 2002). "Central to [Bush Sr.'s] campaign [for 2nd term in office] was the glorious Desert Storm victory (Axelrod, 2002). 
  6. Fact: When Bush Sr. called off U.S. military when Sadam's days seemed numbered. This outcome fed voters' sense of a Bush failure and caused him the reelection. Bush Jr. in 2002 wants to finish Bush Sr.'s unfinished war, as his legacy.

Iran-Iraq War - 1983-1988 [Ronald W. Reagan president from 1981-89]

  1. Fact: Over one million people died in the Iran-Iraq war of 1983-1988 (Voice 4 Change). 
  2. Fact: U.S supported Iraq during its war with Iran in the 1980s despite their use of chemical weapons (Phillips, 2002); 1984 the U.S. State Department officially, but quietly, confirmed the use of chemical weapons by Iraq.
  3. Fact: Iraq is not all Muslim; there are over three-quarters of a million Christians in Iraq; church in Iraq pre-dates the arrival of Islam there by some six hundred years.
  4. Fact: 1988 Saddam's military began gassing its own Kurdish population; US corporations provided the key products used and US continued to drag its feet in condemning chemical & biological warfare until the oil fields of Kuwait were invaded, and US went into Gulf War in 1991.
  5. Fact: U.S. corporations, says a 1994 Senate subcommittee hearing, were the key suppliers of the toxins and spores Iraq had used to build up its chemical and biological arsenal it then used against Iran.

Operation Dessert Fox war - beginning Dec. 16 1998 [William J. Clinton president from 1993-2001]

  1. Fact: There were no major weapons inspections by Iraq; between Nov 18 and Dec 12, 1998 there were only 5 quite minor violations (e.g. a 45 minute delay before keys were retrieved, two inspections demanded on Muslim holy day, an unreasonable request by an inspector to interview every undergraduate at Baghdad University's Science Department). In addition, President Sadaam Hussein publicly accepted all the U.S. demands, making it difficult for U.S. President Bill Clinton to justify Dessert Fox..
  2. Fact: Under pretext of failure to comply with weapons of mass destruction inspections, the U.S. and UK dropped tons of  missiles and bombs for 100 days; including 400 cruise missiles and 600 precision-guided bombs (15% missed their targets). The biggest part of the raid took place between 17 and 21 December 1998. 
  3. Fact: "The explosions began at 12:49 a.m. Thursday (4:49 p.m. EST Wednesday)" (AP Dec 16 1998).
  4. Fact: "Crude oil prices rose 7% Wednesday before the U.S. air strikes against Iraq and then surged in after-hours trading" (Bloomberg News, Dec 17 1998). The attack on Iraq worked off a global supply glut estimated at 100 million to 150 million barrels (ibid).
  5. Fact: Before the raid, U.S. intelligence agents pretending to be United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) treaty inspectors did target where the bombs and missiles would fall. 
  6. Fact: The timing of Dessert Fox related to Congress/Senate deliberation over Clinton's impeachment; The Impeachment Hearings and the Bombings began on the same day [Bombs fell on evening of Dec 16th]. Therefore, you one can assert that Operation Fox was a diversion strategy by a president under siege by the opposition party. On Dec 17th Congress voted to delay the Impeachment Hearings (AP, Dec 17, 1998). An AP poll said 182 lawmakers would support impeachment, 181 said they would oppose it (ibid, for more see US-Iraq Coverage).
  7. Fact: Cost to US of Dessert Fox - $2.6 billion dollars for ordinance and $20 million to deploy US troops.
  8. Fact: US and UK destroyed every electric utility, every sewage treatment plant, and every water purification facility in Iraq. Few have been rebuilt.
  9. Fact: U.S. dropped 390 tons of radioactive nuclear weapons. This spread radio active particles throughout Southern Iraq. 
  10. Fact: US and UK have continued periodic bombings of Iraq between 1998 and today. Those air strikes left 156 dead and wounded another 371; But this pales in comparison to the 5,300 a month dying from the sanctions in next 12 years.

Iraq Sanctions war [William J. Clinton president from 1993-2001 & George W. Bush president from 2001-present]

  1. Question: Is Oil for Food the answer?
  2. Fact: Over half a million Iraqi children died in the twelve years of the US-led sanctions regime (Unicef statistic; Voice 4 Change; 10 Reasons to End the Sanctions). 
  3. Fact: 5,300 Iraqi children die every month from 12 years of sanctions and continued bombing by US and UK (30 times in 2002) (source Guardian).
  4. Fact: Sanctions is a U.S. strategy to destabilize the Iraq economy. The terms include a prohibition against Iraw feeding itself. For example Iraq had 1.5 million bushels of wheat (a bumber crop) but could not use it to feed anyone, under the OFF program terms. The result?: 
  5. Fact: Aug. 6, 1990, the U.N. Security Council adopted Resolution 661, imposing economic sanctions on Iraq.
  6. Fact: United States has maintained its own sanctions against Iraq since Aug. 2, 1990 
  7. Fact: And, 1 million Iraqi civilians through the quieter, less dramatic weapon known as economic sanctions (International Answer).
  8. "Ramsey Clark offers the sobering reminder that U.S.-led sanctions against Iraq "have now killed more than 750,000 human beings, perhaps twice that many, the great majority, infants, children, older persons and those who suffered serious chronic illnesses." [ii]; In 12 years the sanctions killed $1 million people through mal nutrition, lack of medical supplies, infant mortality, polluted water, prohibitions against Iraqi growing and eating their own food crops.
  9. Question: Is it true "none of the designated president's advisers who advocate a regime change in Iraq have had any experience in the military (even the designated president's military experience in the Texas Air National Guard included one year AWOL) ?" (Keener, 2002).
  10. Point: The real goal of the Iraq sanctions and the new Iraq War is a grab for the 2nd largest oil reserves in the world (10% of the world's total reserves).

Afghanistan war [William J. Clinton president from 1993-2000; George W. Bush president from 2001-present]

  1. Fact: In  August 1998, President Clinton launched cruise missiles at Al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan and at a pharmaceutical plant in Sudan to distract attention from Monica Lewinsky (Phillips, 2002).
  2. Fact: In Afghanistan, U.S. military strategists used cluster bombs and dropped landmines  in populated regions to attack dubious military targets. Estimates are that 3,000 to 3,400 civilians died in the U.S. air war upon Afghanistan (Click here for article by Dr. Herold, 2002).

Iraq War [George W. Bush president from 2001-present]

  1. Fact: Iraq is no threat to the U.S. Iraq has a GNP the size of Kentucky. Iraq's army, after the Gulf war, is 1/5th the size that was no match to U.S. military. 
  2. Fact: This is a Bush family vendetta left over from the unfinished Persian Gulf War. Bush Jr. is fighting daddy's war.
  3. Fact: Iraq war is a way to deflect USA public attention away from a sliding economy in an election year.
  4. Fact: the USA military budget is six times any other nation, and is more than the top military budgets of 27 nations (Boje, 2003 Militarism and Middle School).

Gulf War Syndrome - USA use of Depleted Uranium 

The following facts come form a documentary "Invisible War: depleted Uranium and the politics of radiation" and from presentations by Damacio Lopez (Feb 2, 2003), a resident of Socorro, New Mexico and an expert in USA cover-up of  the death toll to USA service men and women, and to Iraqi civilians. Mr. Lopez is trying to get medical study of deaths and diseases in Socorro he suspects come from open air testing of Depleted Uranium weapons on top of Socorro mountain. He is part of IDUST (International Depleted Uranium Study Team). These weapons are also tested at White Sands Military Reserve (WSMR). The Pentagon tells us that depleted uranium is so safe we would have to swallow pounds of it to be affected, that it is no more toxic than beach sand, that Gulf War vets are suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, not from any effects of USA weapons of depleted uranium. 

  1. Fact: Depleted Uranium effects on Socorro citizens are not being studied. "Since the 1950s weapons containing DU have been tested and developed near communities across the U.S.. One such community is Socorro, New Mexico where DU open air testing began in 1972 and ended in 1993 after pressure from a local citizens group called "Save our Mountain" (International Depleted Uranium Study Team). 
  2. Fact: Depleted Uranium was used in 1991 Gulf War, 1998 Dessert Fox War, as well as Bosnia, Serbia, and Kosovo. In Gulf War I, 230 tons of DU was used in USA arms and another 800 tons of uranium waste for USA nuclear program was dropped onto Iraq.  The 'Highway of Death" in Iraq, is where military vehicle carcasses, riddled with depleted uranium are on exhibit as a permanent health hazard. The Highway of Death has 2,000 vehicles and tens of thousands of charred and dismembered bodies littered the sixty miles of highway. Children play with the spent uranium rounds, civilians breath in the cancerous agents (See  Ramsey Clark report:

    WAR CRIMES
    A Report on United States War Crimes Against Iraq to the Commission of Inquiry for the International War Crimes Tribunal by Ramsey Clark and Others

  3. Fact: U238 (a waste product of the Plutonium used in Nuclear Power plants) has been found in the Depleted Uranium dust and in the vehicles left on the Highway of Death. 
  4. Fact: DU contamination lasts 4.5 billion years.
  5. Fact: Of the 696,778 troops who served during the recognized conflict phase (1990-1991) of the Gulf War, 250,000 USA Gulf War vets have reported to the VA to get treatment for Gulf War Syndrome (code for exposure to USA weapons of Depleted Uranium). See NM Depleted Uranium Study Team analysis for more recent statistics.
  6. Fact: 159,000 USA Gulf War vets are getting VA medical benefits, but little serious treatment for exposure to Depleted UraniumSee NM Depleted Uranium Study Team analysis for more recent statistics.
  7. Fact: As of Feb 2003, 9,600 USA Gulf War vets (1990-1991) have died from Gulf War exposure to USA weapons that fired rounds tipped with Depleted Uranium. They breathed in the dust, they ate the dust, they passed along the effects to their unborn children. See NM Depleted Uranium Study Team analysis for more recent statistics which put it at 10,324 deaths. 
  8. Fact: Instead of science, the Pentagon performs and contracts junk science to cover-up the health hazards of depleted uranium weapons. For example, Lieutenant Col. Eric Daxon and his aide, Bernard Rsstoker, were tasked by USA congress to study the effects of DU in Gulf War upon USA service men and women. Lieutenant Col Dixon (2001 Video "Invisible War) said "the science says it is very unlikely: that anyone would die from exposure to depleted uranium. Medical doctor, Naomi Harvey of NYU Medical School, does contract work for the Pentagon to prove that depleted uranium has no adverse health effects. For example, Dr Harvey reports (1999), "depleted uranium is less radioactive than the natural form and is about half as radioactive as the original natural uranium" (United Nations Panel discussion of Depleted Uranium - October 26, 1999). She concludes, "There are a tremendous number of people that have been followed for years to detect any health effects. There have been industrial exposures that have been quite enormous, from accidents, etc. Nobody has seen a significant health effect to date." Dr. Harvey cites a Rand Study, which is a literature review (See report summary).  On the other side is Mr. Fahey, a national organizer on depleted uranium munitions for the Military Toxics Project, a non-governmental organization. Fahey says, "The RAND Report, I believe, in the future will be largely discredited." Hari Sharma adds "The information gathered so far through the analysis of urine samples convinces us that uranium dioxide produced by the use of uranium weapons finds its way in human lungs through inhalation. Presence of uranium dioxide in lungs in veterans and in the civilian population does put the exposed population to undue risk. It is therefore essential that the use of uranium weapons in warfare must be banned" (United Nations Panel discussion of Depleted Uranium - October 26, 1999).
  9. Fact: 800 tons of Depleted Uranium was dropped onto the population of Iraq, and USA troops breathed the dust, and had it fall onto their skin, and ate it when it fell on their food. Depleted Uranium is dropped in so-called "Dirty Bombs" to spread uranium poison in the battle field. Depleted Uranium is used in Cluster bombs. Depleted Uranium is used in USA produced anti-personnel mines.
  10. Fact: A study, which examined British, Canadian and U.S. veterans, all suffering typical Gulf War Syndrome ailments, found that, "nine years after the war, 14 of 27 veterans studied had DU in their urine" (Johnson, Nov 12 2002 Iraqi cancers, birth defects blamed on U.S. depleted uranium).

Depleted Uranium Sites

 

Cluster Bombs

Why are cluster bombs being used? Cluster bombs are not a surgical air strike; they are weapons of mass destruction. They are loaded with Depleted Uranium, and spread toxic dust on USA troops and the civilian population. Cluster bombs are used to cover a broad area rather than a single specific target. CBU-89 Gators, for example, are 1,000-pound cluster bombs dropped by B-52 and B-1 bombers. Cluster bombs were used extensively in the 78-day bombardment of Yugoslavia two years ago. Each bluster bomb unleashes 147 to 700 bomblets, each firing a plasma-jet able to penetrate armor but having a secondary anti-personnel effect with over 2,000 sharpened pieces cutting into the bomb casing. According to the UN, 30,000 unexploded bomblets remained in Kosovo after the conflict ended. 60 percent of the 531 cluster bombs dropped by the RAF during the conflict in Kosovo missed their intended target (5% and 12% of the bomblets fail to Explode, according to UN estimates). [iii]

Conclusions

The media and the administration's analysts are setting up the next postmodern war, a war staged in the media through sanitized images and football-game-style graphic replays. We are about to see more replays of laser guided missiles with video cameras relaying the action to American TV sets 10,000 miles from the action. The Iraq postmodern war will be one more sanitized, quickie technowar, fought (Nintendo-style) by remote-control, before a national election. As in the Bush Sr. war, the Bush Jr. war will be accompanied by the same uncritical, self-censored media coverage of the conflict which will once again facilitate the slaughter of Iraqis by a superior military superpower. There will be self-censoring of the more gory aspects of the victor’s slaughter, and we will hear claims of acceptable collateral damage. As in the last postmodern war, CNN, Fox, CBS, NBC, and ABC will compete for audience-share by offering better simulations and digital interactive experiences to spectators. Postmodern war is an infotainment commodity in the ratings game. Corporate-media can offer digital experience that is less terrifying, so spectators need not look at 'real' bodies, or the blood and gore of war. 

The purpose of postmodern war is cathartic, not realistic. Aristotle (350 BCE), for example, argues that  “fear and pity may be aroused by the Spectacle,” in the spectator. The fear and pity are what happens to those who disagree with war.  The Bush rhetoric and the spectacle-dispensing media are making critical reflection upon the war a tragic character flaw; to be against the war they say is to be weak-minded, even unpatriotic. The media is quick to critique those who disagree with the war machine, to instruct spectators that reversal of fortune will befall critics of the war.

Postmodern war is corporeal theatre, more real than real. Soon the TV cameras will depict the lines at the gas stations, the higher prices at the pumps, the patriotic citizens giving blood at the blood bank, the nifty surgical strikes, and the street theatre of resistance to the spectacle of military industrial power. Postmodern war is all consuming, all life becomes a stage, even resistance becomes part of the commodity production for mass consumption. The Bush Jr. postmodern war is a sequel to the Bush Sr. postmodern war. I call it "Oil War II, the Sequel: The Empire Strikes Back."  

The US strategy of War in the Middle East is a way to destabilize the economy of the region.  The strategy is exactly what Britain did in its 19th century colonial "small wars."  We like Britain are using higher-tech weapons (smart bombs) to mow down a starving mob of spear-waving tribes at war with each other.  One more massacre is being planned by our Joint Chiefs, and another decade of sanctions that will bring the death toll of Iraqi children to one million. There is no glory in this postmodern war that substitutes sanitized images using digital simulation for the blood cruelty of war. This is no Super Bowl. The US sends the mightiest warriors on the planet to kill children on the oil turf. 

Behind the war rhetoric about fear of the evil one who has amassed weapons of mass destruction, there lies the corporate campaigns and lobbying of the oil industry.  We have surrendered media and government to the oil industry colonization of nations destabilized by perpetual war. The US-based corporations manufacture the lion's share of the nuclear, chemical and biological weapons of mass destruction, sells them to both side  The US left 370,000 tons of unexploded bombs, mines and artillery shells in the Gulf War alone. The radiation particles dusted Southern Iraq. 

References 

Axelrod, Patricia (2002). Clean lies, dirty wars. Reno News Review.

Best, Steve & Douglas Kellner (2001). Postmodern Adventure. London: Guilford Press.

Boje, David M. (2002a). From the book, Theatrics of Capitalism. Scene 11 Post-11. To be released soon I hope, from Hampton Press (San Francisco). 

Boje, David M. (2002b), What Students and Faculty Need to Know about the Iraq War. 

Boje, David M. (2003a) Oil War: Propaganda and Root Cause. Feb 1

Boje, David (2003b) Deconstructing Sun News editorial - Jan 1

Boje, David M. (2003c) Deconstructing Bu$h's State of the Union Theatre, Jan

Boje, David M. (2003) Militarism and Middle School Jan 15

Boles, Elson E. (2002). Helping Iraq Kill with Chemical Weapons: The Relevance of Yesterday's US Hypocrisy Today. Counter Punch. October 10, 2002.

Borger, Julian (2002a). White House 'Exaggerating Iraqi Threat' Bush's Televised Address Attacked by US Intelligence. The Guardian (UK) October 8, 2002.

Borger, Julian (2002b). CIA in blow to Bush attack plans. The Guardian (UK). October 10, 2002

Collier, Robert (2002). Bush's evidence of threat disputed Findings often ambiguous, contradict CIA. San Francisco Chronicle. October 12. 

Herold, Marc W. (2002). A Dossier on Civilian Victims of United States' Aerial Bombing of Afghanistan: A Comprehensive Accounting [revised]. Herold is professor in the Departments of Economics and Women's Studies, Whittemore School of Business & Economics, University of New Hampshire. Accessed http://www.cursor.org/stories/civilian_deaths.htm 

Lightwear, Christos (2002). The psychology behind mass subservience to tyranny and The Consequent Rise of the Fourth Reich. Professors for Peace, Oct. 11.

Phillips, Kevin (2002). Of Politics and Vengeance. LA Times. October 13 2002

Ridgeway, James (2002). The Spoils of War: Be the First on Your Block to Make a Buck off Iraq. Village Voice. October 9 - 15, 2002.

Strobel,Warren and Jonathan Landay (2002). Some administration officials expressing misgivings on Iraq. Houston Chronicle Oct 8.

Tripp, Ben (2002). Let Wag the Dogs of War or No Peace at Any Price. Counter Punch. October 9, 2002

 

Endnotes:

[i] Castonguay, Jim (1997). The Gulf War TV Super Bowl Bad Subjects, Issue # 35, November 1997. Accessed December 15, 2001 http://eserver.org/bs/35/castonguay.html

[ii] Castonguay, ibid.

[iii] Taylor, Richard-Norton (2001) The guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/waronterror/story/0,1361,568278,00.html

 

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