The Tulsa Peace Fellowship's Counter-Recruitment Update/Digest, for July 2011

[Tony Nuspl]

Truth in Recruiting - "Don't Believe the Hype!"
The Tulsa Peace Fellowship's Counter-Recruitment Update/Digest, for July 2011
(  scroll down for details about any story – also see archived version of this digest on our Ning website: http://tulsapeacefellowship.ning.com/forum/categories/truth-in-recr...  )

Lead story from the past month's news:

War in Libya Fought for Oil
--Wasn’t there a big risk in not seeking congressional approval, thus going forward with an illegal war?

related op/ed
In a Pure Coincidence, Gaddafi Impeded U.S. Oil Interests Before the War
--Glenn Greenwald diagnoses the causes of this war

file under: defunding war
Growing Congressional Condemnation of Obama’s Libya War
--Will the U.S. House under Republican control use the power of the purse to reclaim its power over the President?

file under: imperial president over-stepping his bounds
House Leadership: Bill to Defund Libya War Coming Soon
Boehner Slams Obama Claims that Libya War Doesn't Require Congressional Okay

file under: war crimes
NATO Admits the Killing of Civilians in Tripoli Attack
--Claims 'Weapons System Failure' in Attack Which Killed Toddlers, not only Unarmed Civilians

file under: the alternative view
Western Campaign against Libya was Launched to Prevent the Unification of Three Revolutionary Arab States - Egypt, Libya and Tunisia
--Experts Fear Israeli Design to Balkanise Arab States; U.S./NATO doing Israel's bidding in the Arab world

quote:
"The western campaign against Libya wasn't undertaken to protect human rights or foster democracy," said al-Sakhawi. Rather, it was undertaken because "Egypt, Libya and Tunisia together might pose a threat to Israeli regional dominance."

Other stories of note on other U.S. wars, being prosecuted simultaneously:

Army suicides at highest level in a year
--follow up on continuing saga of hopelessness and despair among U.S. military, veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan

statistic:
Suicide attempts among U.S. military per day: 17 (seventeen)

file under: the majority against wars of foreign intervention
U.S. Mayors Pass First Anti-War Resolution Since Vietnam

quote:
"As mayors, we recognize there is an absurdly false choice being put to Americans that we somehow have to pick between all the priorities we care deeply about but can't touch massive spending on the military."
~U.S. Council of Mayors

related petition:

Ask Congress and the President to listen to the public and our cities' mayors now.

file under: vox populi
Poll: Americans Favor Withdrawing Troops Quickly from Afghanistan
--Record numbers favor withdrawing troops from Afghanistan "as quickly as possible"

quote:
"I’m tired of seeing our young people getting killed and getting their arms and legs blown off. What do you say to the mother, father, wife of our military killed there — that we support a corrupt government in a fight we can’t win?’”
~Congressional Representative Walter B. Jones, R-NC, in Feb 2011

TPF Press Release:  In response to President Obama's President's anemic withdrawal plan for U.S. troops stationed in Afghanistan, please see the TPF Media Advisory, 25th June 2011, under the title "Anti-war movement in Tulsa not satisfied with Obama's timeline for Afghanistan Withdrawal
 :  TPF Expected War $$ to Come Home under Obama"
 http://tulsapeacefellowship.ning.com/profiles/blogs/press-release-t...

sidebar:
Afghan President Karzai Accuses NATO of Polluting his Country’s with its Weapons
--A recent spike in civilian deaths in the country has put Afghanistan’s president at odds with coalition forces.

file under:  negotiating, rather than firing weapons
U.S. talking to Taliban, says Afghanistan president
--Karzai's comments are the first official confirmation that U.S. is negotiating with the Taliban to end the war in Afghanistan

related news:
UK in peace talks with the Taliban
--At some point, peace is pragmatic, says UK Foreign Sec'y, Alexander Haig

file under: "Full Spectrum Absurdity"
U.S. congressional delegation sets off political IED in Iraq
--the abysmal stupidity of members of Congress, illustrated

file under: U.S. hypocrisy, or Republican blind points
Iraq asks US congressman Dana Rohrabacker (R-Calif) to leave over 'repay' remark
--U.S. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher said that Iraq should partly repay the United States for money spent since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion

featured editorial
Imperial Hypocrisy: U.S. calls Iraq 'criminal' and seeks reparations
--but U.S. unwilling to let International Criminal Court have the jurisdiction to decide

sidebar:
Basra Council Bars US Troops
--Also demands compensation from U.S. for damages to Iraqis over the course of the war

featured video/film
"The War You Don't See" by John Pilger (Dec 2010)
--broadcast on mainstream media in the U.K., in Jan 2011., it has never be shown to American audiences
--watch entirety of the film on YouTube, in 8 parts: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_SQk9tvHTA 

see this review of the documentary (broadcast date, 19 March 2011, in the UK)
http://www.presstv.com/Program/170877.html
watch on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/presstvglobalnews#p/u/38/h3jtxT9wOo8

excerpt from the film:
During World War I, 10% of all casualties were civilians.
During World War II, the number of civilian deaths rose to 50%.
During the Vietnam War, 70% of all casualties were civilians.
In the war in Iraq, civilians account for up to 90% of all deaths.

"The killing of civilians and willfully causing great suffering is a war crime."
~Fourth Geneva Convention, 1949

backpage stories:

featured song/lyrics
"War Resister" by Jon Brooks
--inspired by conscientious objector in self-imposed exile in Canada
--listen online here:  http://www.jonbrooks.ca/index.php/jb/album/moth_nor_rust/

quote
‘What’s freedom worth if it’s bought with a gun?’

featured editorial
Eisenhower's worst fears came true. We invent enemies to buy the bombs
--Simon Jenkins on British arms industry

quote:
"While big defence exists, glory-hungry politicians will use it. Why do we still go to war? We seem unable to stop."

file under: Milo Minderbender redux
NV man accused of selling stolen US military ammo
– A former defense contractor employee has been indicted related editorial:
There are More Efficient Ways to Stimulate the Economy than So-Called "Military Jobs"
--Ellen Brown on the ludicrous claim that the U.S. military is other than a drain on the U.S. economy

quote:
"The military actually destroys jobs in the civilian economy."

facts & figures;
A 2007 study by Robert Pollin and Heidi Garrett-Peltier of the University of Massachusetts found that government investment in education creates twice as many jobs as investment in the military. Spending on personal consumption, health care, education, mass transit, and construction for home weatherization and infrastructure repair all were found to create more jobs per $1 billon in expenditures than military spending does.

Okinawa row: Japan and US drop Futenma airbase deadline
--Japan and the US have agreed to drop a 2014 deadline to move a controversial US airbase on the island of Okinawa.

OKINAWA TIMELINE
    1945: An estimated 100,000 Okinawan civilians die in Battle of Okinawa; Japan surrenders; US takes control of Okinawa
    1972: Okinawa reverts to Japan; US bases stay
    2014: Planned date for removal of US bases from Okinawa, almost 70 years later; now postponed indefinitely

epitaph for this edition of "Truth in Recruiting"

"Human beings will do anything, anything. I am convinced. That's why when all those beheadings started in Iraq, it didn't bother me. A lot of people here were horrified, "Whaaaa, beheadings! Beheadings!" What, are you fucking surprised? Just one more form of extreme human behavior. Besides, who cares about some mercenary civilian contractor from Oklahoma who gets his head cut off? Fuck 'em. Hey Jack, you don't want to get your head cut off? Stay the fuck in Oklahoma. They ain't cuttin' off heads in Oklahoma, far as I know. But I do know this: you strap on a gun and go struttin' around some other man's country, you'd better be ready for some action, Jack. People are touchy about that sort of thing. And let me ask you this... this is a moral question, not rhetorical, I'm looking for the answer: what is the moral difference between cuttin' off one guy's head, or two, or three, or five, or ten - and dropping a big bomb on a hospital and killing a whole bunch of sick kids? Has anybody in authority given you an explanation of the difference?"
—George Carlin

---

The Tulsa Peace Fellowship's Counter-Recruitment Update/Digest, for July 2011
lead story

War in Libya Fought for Oil

John Glaser
June 11, 2011

Much of the war has actually seemed extremely odd, as if it didn’t match up. There seemed to be many more reasons for the administration not to get involved. Why, Greenwald asks, in the middle of debt crises “and when polls show Americans solidly and increasingly opposed to the war — would the U.S. Government continue to spend huge sums of money to fight this war?” Wasn’t there a big risk in not seeking congressional approval, thus going forward with an illegal war? Why, in an Arab Spring which makes this contradiction so obvious, would we attack Qaddafi for behaving exactly the way we pay other allies to behave? Didn’t Washington see considerable risk in engaging in a third/fourth outright war in against a Muslim country? Wasn’t there some concern, even if only for PR purposes, within the administration that the rebels on whose behalf we would ostensibly fight this war have direct ties to al-Qaeda? Did Obama not calculate a future political vulnerability of engaging in what he knew would be deliberate mission creep, or as Greenwald says, that the real goal of the war was “exactly the one Obama vowed would not be pursued — regime change through the use of military force”?

Last month McClatchy reported on Wikileaks cables which revealed an oil deal emerging in the last few years in Libya that U.S. officials didn’t like. The Italian oil company Eni, the largest corporation in Italy and one in which the Italian government holds a 30 percent stake, was wagering a deal with the Russian oil company Gazprom, with which Vladimir Putin is connected. In the deal, Eni would have given Gazprom access to Libyan oil and helped Gazprom build a pipeline across the Black sea. The leaked cables reveal U.S. officials plotting ways to prevent such a success from a Russian oil giant. War was never mentioned in the cables, but since the start of Obama’s intervention in Libya, the deal has officially been put on hold.

http://www.antiwar.com/blog/2011/06/11/war-in-libya-fought-for-oil/


In a pure coincidence, Gaddafi impeded U.S. oil interests before the war
By Glenn Greenwald
Jun 11, 2011

Is there anything more obvious -- as the world's oil supplies rapidly diminish -- than the fact that our prime objective is to remove Gaddafi and install a regime that is a far more reliable servant to Western oil interests, and that protecting civilians was the justifying pretext for this war, not the purpose?  If (as is quite possible) the new regime turns out to be as oppressive as Gaddafi but far more subservient to Western corporations (like, say, our good Saudi friends), does anyone think we're going to care in the slightest or (at most) do anything other than pay occasional lip service to protesting it?  Does anyone think we're going to care about The Libyan People if they're being oppressed or brutalized by a reliably pro-Western successor to Gaddafi?

[T]o believe that humanitarianism (protection of Libya civilians) was why we went to war in Libya requires a blindness so willful and complete that it's genuinely difficult to describe.

[T]he point here is not that the U.S. invaded Libya in order to steal its oil.  That's not the West's modus operandi.  The point is that what distinguishes Gaddafi and made him a war target is not the claimed humanitarian rationale (he brutalized his own people) ...  Instead, what distinguished Gaddafi and made him a war target was that he had become insufficiently compliant -- an unreliable and unstable servant to the West.

The very idea that the U.S. Government woke up one day and suddenly decided that it can no longer abide a leader who mistreats his own people -- and that's why we went to Libya -- is so ludicrous that it's actually painful to hear that people believe that.  It so obviously confuses pretext with cause.  If Gaddafi had continued to be as compliant as he had been in the past, does anyone really believe we would have invaded his country and spent months trying to kill him and replace him with another regime?

That's not to say that Gaddafi's "resource nationalism" is the only or even overriding motive for the war in Libya.  Wars are typically caused by the interests of multiple factions and rarely have just one motive.  As Jim Webb explained in arguing that the U.S. has no vital interest in Libya, the French and British are far more reliant on Libyan oil than the U.S. is (and this reader offers a rational dissent and alternative explanation for the war).  But the U.S. has long made clear that it will not tolerate hostile or disobedient rulers in countries where it believes it has vital interests, and that's particularly true in oil rich nations (which is one reason for the American obsession with Iran).  It's just hard to believe that any rational person would believe that the war in Libya is unrelated to the fact that Gaddafi has been increasingly obstructionist in allowing Western oil companies access to that nation's oil and that Libya is so rich in oil.

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2011/06/11/libya/...


Growing Congressional Condemnation of Obama’s Libya War
Defunding Vote Looms
by Jason Ditz, June 19, 2011

Though there are a handful of diehard hawks in the Senate for whom any war on any flimsy justification is to be praised, the Republican Party is seeing a major rethink on war, with the unilateral war in Libya.

[T]he House is expected to vote, potentially in a matter of days, on defunding the conflict. Such votes were being fought tooth and nail by House Republican leadership just weeks ago, but now livid at the president’s claims that Congress has no oversight over the war, they are not just allowing the vote but it seems to have a strong chance of passing through the House with plenty of bipartisan support.

Congress has gone from mocking to livid, and the war has gone from controversial in the eyes of many Congressmen to an illegal challenge of Congressional authority. The president could be facing the first real Congressional backlash at unchecked warmaking power in decades, with both lawsuits and the power of the purse being brought to bear against the administration’s claim Congress can’t stop the U.S. from prosecuting a Libyan War.

http://news.antiwar.com/2011/06/19/growing-congressional-condemnati...

TPF comment: The U.S. Constitution states unequivocally that the power to declare war resides with the U.S. Congress, not with the president.


file under: imperial president over-stepping his bounds
House Leadership: Bill to Defund Libya War Coming Soon
Boehner Slams Obama Claims that Libya War Doesn't Require Congressional Support
by Jason Ditz, June 16, 2011

Members of the House Republican leadership announced today their intentions to move forward with a bill to defund the war in Libya, barring a major change of perspective from the Obama Administration, which yesterday claimed the war was immune to the War Powers Act requirement for Congressional support for deploying US troops overseas.

House Speaker John Boehner (R – OH) slammed the claim, insisting that the suggestion does not “pass the straight face test.” Indeed, the letter and spirit of the act, passed during the Vietnam War era, make the administration’s claim extremely difficult to understand.

An amendment barring spending military appropriations bill funding on the conflict already passed with strong bipartisan support.

http://news.antiwar.com/2011/06/16/house-leadership-bill-to-defund-...


NATO Admits Killing Civilians in Tripoli Attack
Claims 'Weapons System Failure' in Attack Which Killed Toddlers
by Jason Ditz, June 19, 2011

NATO has admitted a missile strike hit a civilian home in the Libyan capital of Tripoli today, killing a number of civilians including at least two toddlers. Though far from the first strike to kill civilians in the Libyan War, it is the first that NATO officials have admitted to.

US and French forces began attacking Libya on March 19, ostensibly based on a UN resolution calling for them to “protect civilians” with a no fly zone. Though officials have argued this extended to allowing the continuing air war, it will be difficult to defend the growing number of civilian killings by the NATO forces themselves.

http://news.antiwar.com/2011/06/19/nato-admits-killing-civilians-in...

 

Tulsa Peace Fellowship

who we are:

The Tulsa Peace Fellowship is the activist wing of the peace movement in Eastern Oklahoma, and part of the nationwide Peace, Justice & the Environment (PJ&E) movement.  TPF offers citizens and community groups tools and resources to participate personally in our democracy, to help shape federal budget and policy priorities, and to promote peace, social and economic justice, and human rights.   TPF is a registered non-profit organization and a non-partisan civic-sector organization, loosely affiliated with the Unitarian Universalist Church of the Restoration, north side of Tulsa.

"Waging Peace One Person at a Time".

Through its counter-recruitment task force, TPF is a member of the National Network in Opposition to the Militarization of Youth (NNOMY) representing some 188 counter-recruitment groups in cities and towns across the country. On the web: http://www.nnomy.org/joomla/index.php?option=com_content&task=v... 

Tulsa Peace Fellowship is open to members of third parties, progressives, Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians, Green Party members, etc.  If you have not already done so, please join the new social networking tool for TPF on Ning, in lieu of TPFtalks on yahoogroups, which has fallen into disuse  Thank you!  You can check out our new tool here: http://tulsapeacefellowship.ning.com/ (new for 2011)  Also still going strong:  our announcement list on yahoo!  [e-mail] (since 2002)  Go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/ and search for "tulsapeace"

If you enjoyed this news digest and/or found this update useful, please consider making a donation of time, money, or effort to the Tulsa Peace Fellowship.  An archive of previous editions of "Truth in Recruiting" going back to January 2009 is available online on our Ning website discussion forum:   http://tulsapeacefellowship.ning.com/forum/categories/truth-in-recr...

 

TPF needs your support.

You can donate online via PINC (pull down menu for US$ donations)
http://www.pincgiving.com/donate/organization/1202854

Or, please mail a check or money order made out to the"Tulsa Peace Fellowship" to :

The Tulsa Peace Fellowship
c/o UU Church of the Restoration,
1314 N. Greenwood Ave, Tulsa Oklahoma. 74106-4854
Find on a map: Google Maps link

Contributions to TPF are not tax deductible at the present time. Details on tax status available

The next regularly scheduled business meeting of the Fellowship will be held
Thursday, July 7th 2011, 6:15 PM – 8:00 PM @ the UU Church of the Restoration, in Tulsa, just north of downtown
--including members from other local non-partisan groups such as Veterans for Peace, the Center for Racial Justice in Tulsa, the Tulsa Interfaith Allliance, Pax Christi, and the Quakers. Come join us!   Especially parents, guardians, and students in the Tulsa Public Schools system who are interested in countering the presence of military recruiters on school grounds.

The next monthly anti-war demo in Tulsa
is scheduled for Saturday August 6th, 2011, 12noon to 2pm, with the theme: "U.S. Out of Afghanistan Now!"
Details online: http://tulsapeacefellowship.ning.com/

An archive of TPF counter-recruitment updates and other related TPF material is available to members online:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/tulsapeace/
You must sign in to yahoo! groups to see the archived "message history"
TPF messages have been archived online since 2002
TPF was founded some 30 years ago.
Current membership online: 692 subscribers

The information provided in this digest/update herein is for non-profit use only, according to "fair use" doctrine.  Copyright and all commercial exploitation rights remain with the various authors/publishers cited above. The Tulsa Peace Fellowship does not necessarily endorse the views expressed in the articles appearing herein.

further information

IN ACCORDANCE WITH TITLE 17 U.S.C. SECTION 107, THIS MATERIAL IS DISTRIBUTED WITHOUT PROFIT TO THOSE WHO HAVE EXPRESSED A PRIOR INTEREST IN RECEIVING THE INCLUDED INFORMATION FOR RESEARCH AND EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES. Tulsa Peace Fellowship HAS NO AFFILIATION WHATSOEVER WITH THE ORIGINATOR OF THESE ARTICLES NOR IS Tulsa Peace Fellowship ENDORSED OR SPONSORED BY THE ORIGINATORS.

SOURCE ARTICLE LINKS ARE PROVIDED AS A CONVENIENCE TO OUR READERS AND ALLOW FOR VERIFICATION OF AUTHENTICITY. HOWEVER, AS ORIGINATING PAGES ARE OFTEN UPDATED BY THEIR ORIGINATING HOST SITES, THE VERSIONS POSTED MAY NOT MATCH THE VERSIONS OUR READERS VIEW WHEN CLICKING THE SOURCE ARTICLE LINKS, OR INDEED, THE WEBPAGES MAY NO LONGER EVEN EXIST.

Strength Through Peace:  Out of Iraq & Afghanistan
Accountability:  Indict & Imprison Bush & Cheney for War Crimes
JROTC: Out of Our Schools
Schools as Military-Free Zones
Alternatives to War:  Department of Peace & cabinet-level Secretary of Peace

THE 10 REASONS

Ten excellent reasons not to join the military:
a.. You July Be Killed, Even By Mistake
b.. You July Kill Others Who Do Not Deserve to Die
c.. You July Be Injured
d.. You July Not Receive Proper Medical Care
e.. You July Suffer Long-term Health Problems
f.. You July Be Lied To
g.. You July Face Discrimination
h.. You July Be Asked to Do Things Against Your Beliefs
i.. You July Find It Difficult to Leave the Military
j.. You Have Other Choices, including the Choice to Learn a Marketable Skill

for more info:
http://www.10reasonsbook.com/medcare.htm