VOICES NEWSLETTER # 57 ( October/November 2008)

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Obama and McCain
Bombing Afghanistan
Nawabad
Pakistan: the next war?
Why Pakistanis blame the US
Britain's role
US war resisters
Stop Cheney!
Iraqis resist deportations
In brief


Obama and McCain
On 4 November Americans will go to the polls to elect the next President of the United States. Much has been made of the alleged differences between the candidates, but in fact, as the Daily Telegraph’s diplomatic editor David Blair has noted, ‘Mr Obama and Senator John McCain agree over the central thrust of US foreign policy and their differences are only at the margins’ (16 July).

Indeed, Blair notes, Obama’s promise ‘to “end the war” by withdrawing all combat
troops [from Iraq] within 16 months’ – the main difference between the two - ‘is virtually meaningless’: the clock will only start ticking in January 2009 (keeping combat troops in Iraq until summer 2010) and even after they have departed a “residual” force will remain, ‘training Iraqi soldiers, protecting diplomats and, crucially, fighting terrorists. In other words … conducting combat missions.’

In reality then, ‘Mr Obama has an open-ended commitment to keeping US combat troops in Iraq. His only difference with Mr McCain is that under an Obama presidency, a few brigades might leave Iraq a few months earlier.’

Increased bombing
‘Bearing in mind the current heavy investment in constructing bases’ one would expect the ultimate troop numbers, following such a draw down, to be ‘in the region of 60-90,000, including US Air Force squadrons, army aviation, Special Forces and many support troops’, located in ‘a few very large self-contained bases outside of key urban areas, with some smaller bases in strategic locations’ (Paul Rogers, tinyurl.com/4xdzyd).

Moreover, as one ‘senior military planner’ has explained to the New York Times, “air power will have to increasingly fill the role of a quick response force”, and detailed plans to ‘refocus’ air power in Iraq have already been made (29 July). As in Afghanistan and Pakistan the consequences are likely to be ominous.

Bombing Afghanistan
“You cannot take revenge against a plane … But I will not forgive the foreigners for this crime” – Tauz Khan, whose father, brother and daughter were all killed in air strikes last year (NYT, 3 Aug).

Air Force and allied warplanes are dropping a record number of bombs on Afghanistan targets,’ according to the US Air Force Times (18 July).

‘For the fi rst half of 2008, aircraft dropped 1,853 bombs – more than they released
during all of 2006 and more than half of 2007’s total – 3,572 bombs … Information
from the Air Force shows that in June warplanes released 646 bombs – the second highest monthly total for Afghanistan or Iraq. The record was set in August 2007,
when 670 bombs fell on Afghanistan.’

Moreover, ‘[a]s high as those numbers are, they may underestimate the intensity of
the combat’ as ‘[t]he statistics do not include cannon rounds shot by fi ghters or AC-130 gunships, Hellfi re and other small rockets launched by warplanes, and assaults by helicopters. In close-quarter firefights where friendly soldiers could be wounded if bombs are used, cannon fi re and missiles are often the preferred alternative’ (AFT, 18 July).

300 tons
USAF figures also show that ‘300 tons of bombs were dropped on Afghanistan [by
fi xed wing aircraft] during June and July alone – the same as the amount dropped
on the country during the whole of 2006’ (Observer, 10 August).

Based on its own field research, the respected (pro-war) think tank The Senlis
Council, has estimated that as many as 2-3,000 Afghan civilians may have been
killed by US/NATO air strikes in southern Afghanistan during 2006 (tinyurl.com/
yqhs3m).

Meanwhile, according to the Observer (10 Aug), ‘the number of legal claims lodged by Afghan civilians against the British government has grown more than five-fold during the past 12 months to almost 1,300, suggesting a dramatic increase in the number of innocent victims’ of fighting involving British troops.*

Destroying villages
On 3 Aug the New York Times reported that ‘[a]n estimated 10,000 to 15,000 people
ha[d] been displaced by the insurgency in the south’ of Afghanistan, and that a 3,000
strong refugee camp on the western edge of Kabul had been ‘steadily swelling as families displaced by the heavy bombardment in southern Afghanistan arrive in batches.’

‘Khan Muhammad, 35, came with 40 people from his extended family three months ago after their village, Tajoi, near Kajaki, was bombed [by the US/NATO] and
his 4-year-old son, Umar Khan, was killed. “His mother was cooking, and he was lying
beside her,” he said. “The whole village was destroyed, and after that we left.”’

ACTION
Join JNV, voices and Maya Evans opp. Downing St on 7 Oct – the 7th anniv. of the
2001 invasion of Afghanistan – for a sevenhour unauthorised reading of the names of
Afghan civilians killed by US/NATO forces during the past seven years. 12 noon – 7pm.

* Though the UK currently spends almost £400,000 a day on military operations in Afghanistan, ‘less than £ 150,000 in compensation has been paid to civilians [or their relatives] injured or killed during fighting involving British soldiers in Helmand’ (Observer, 10 Aug).

Nawabad
“Suddenly, there were large planes above us. Then they bombed the house …They bombed and fired from 1 a.m. to 8 a.m. All of my relatives were killed in this bombing -- my cousins, my uncles, nieces, nephews, two of my daughters and my son” – taxi driver Hajj Gul Ahmed (50) (Washington Post, 31 Aug).

On 22 August some ninety civilians were killed by US airstrikes on the village of Nawabad in western Afghanistan.

Predictably, the deaths were immediately denied by the US military, who ‘insisted that
only seven civilians were killed … alongside 35 Taleban militants during a legitimate
combat operation’ (Times, 7 Sept).

However, following a visit to the area by a UN human rights team, the UN issued a statement asserting that its investigations had “found convincing evidence, based on the testimony of eyewitnesses, and others, that some 90 civilians were killed, including 60 children, 15 women and 15 men” (tinyurl.com/48j9ru).

“The destruction from aerial bombardment was clearly evident with some 7-8 houses having been totally destroyed and serious damage to many others,” it noted.

‘A policeman, Abdul Hakim, whose four children were killed and whose wife was paralyzed, said she had told him how an Afghan informer accompanying the American Special Operations forces had entered the compound after the bombardment and shot dead her brother, Reza Khan; her father; and an uncle as they were trying to help her. She said she had heard her father plead for help and ask the Afghan: “Are you a Muslim? Why are you doing this to us?” Then she heard shots, and her father did not speak after that, he said’ (NYT, 8 Sept).

Following the massacre, the Afghan Council of Ministers demanded ‘a renegotiation of agreements regulating the presence of international troops in Afghanistan’ and an end to “air strikes on civilian targets, uncoordinated house searches and illegal detention of Afghan civilians” (AFP, 25 Aug). They were quickly rebuffed: on 27 Aug US Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Conway, asserted that airstrikes would continue to play a ‘primary’ role in Afghanistan: “Air power is the premier asymmetric advantage that we hold over ... the Taliban. They have no like capability,” he explained (Reuters, 27 Aug). “We’ll continue to drop bombs.”

New rules?
On 16 Sept the Guardian reported that NATO had ‘issued new military rules of
engagement in Afghanistan’ in an attempt to limit civilian deaths, but there was more
than a touch of déjà ve BBC quoted NATO spokesman Brig Richard Nugee:u about this. On 3 January 2007, th

“I believe that the single thing that we have done wrong and we are striving extremely
hard to improve on is killing innocent civilians.” Yet, in an 8 Sept report, Human Rights Watch concluded that reported ‘[c]ivilian deaths in Afghanistan from US and NATO airstrikes nearly tripled from 2006 to 2007’ (tinyurl.com/4cx3ht).

True to form, on 9 Sept a NATO bomb struck a house in Afghanistan, killing two
civilians and wounding ten (Reuters, 10 Sept).

Pakistan: the next war?
“It is very important that the principles on which our stability has been based -- territorial integrity of countries, democratic governance and international law -- are upheld” – Foreign Secretary David Miliband, denouncing Russia (Daily Telegraph, 28 Aug).

September saw a major escalation of the “war on terror”, with ‘the first publicly acknowledged … ground raid [by US Special Forces] on Pakistani soil’ (NYT, 3 Sept), followed by a series of airstrikes by unmanned US drones, killing dozens of people including women and children (Times, 6 Sept; FT, 9 Sept; AP, 18 Sept).

Pakistan responded by vowing to defend its territory “at all costs” (AP, 16 Sept) and threatening to block off supply routes to NATO troops in Afghanistan’, where ‘about 85% of Nato supplies come in through the port of Karachi’ (Sunday Times, 14 Sept).

Angoor Adda
The 3 Sept attack on the village of Angoor Adda, about 20 miles inside Pakistan (WP,
12 Sept), involved ‘more than two dozen members of the Navy Seals’, supported by
an AC-130 gunship (NYT, 10 Sept).

‘The commandos surrounded the mud-walled compound of Payo Jan Wazir, a 50-year-old wood cutter and cattle-herd’, believing an al-Qaeda leader was hiding inside (Sunday Times, 14 Sept). ‘According to villagers, the troops burst in, guns blazing,
killing Payo Jan, six children, two women and a male relative. Among the dead were
a three-year-old girl and a two-year-old boy, they said.’ Ten more villagers who came to
investigate were also shot by the commandos, bringing the death-toll to 20.

Britain’s role
Bush ‘secretly approved orders’ for such attacks in July (NYT, 11 Sept), and on 12 September the Guardian reported ‘speculation that [Bush] is trying to line up British support for the new policy, including the possible involvement of British special forces in future cross-border incursions.’

According to the Sunday Times: ‘US and British special forces have been carrying
out missions inside Pakistan since March this year following an agreement in January
between Bush and Pervez Musharraf, then president of Pakistan’ (14 Sept). However,
those missions ‘concentrated on surreptitious “special reconnaissance” operations designed to go undetected’, the only firepower coming from unmanned drones.

‘In return, Pakistan’s military received £227m to upgrade its F-16 fighters …
explain[ing] why the Bush administration - and Whitehall - were so keen to keep Musharraf in office after elections in February in which the party he backed was defeated.’

Underlying reasons
The underlying reasons for the escalation are not hard to discern. In mid-August
the Taliban mounted “their most serious attacks in six years of fighting … including
a coordinated assault by at least 10 suicide bombers against one of the largest American military bases in the country’ (NYT, 12 August), and ‘many US planners believe that it may be impossible for paramilitary forces in Afghanistan to be defeated or even curbed without neutralising the major military advantage of operating bases
and training camps across the border in Pakistan’ (Paul Rogers, Oxford Research
Group, July 08, tinyurl.com/68gz42).

Further escalation is therefore a real possibility. Following a 16 Sept Pakistani
announcement ‘that its forces have orders to open fire if US troops launch another
raid across the Afghan border’ (AP)*, the US ‘reiterated [its] commitment to respect Pakistan’s sovereignty’ (AFP, 17 Sept), and then launched another missile strike into Pakistan’s South Waziristan region, killing six (AP, 18 Sept).

* Since 3 Sept Pakistani forces are alleged to have shot at or near US forces attempting to cross the border on at least two occasions, and to have shot down a
US drone (BBC, 15 Sept; AP, 23 Sept).

Why Pakistanis blame the US
Ordinary Pakistanis overwhelmingly oppose US military intervention in their country – and with good reason.

In a 25 May – 1 June Gallup poll 52% of Pakistanis said that the US was ‘most
responsible for the violence that is occurring in Pakistan today’, 69% opposed ‘the US military working with the Pakistani military to pursue Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters inside Pakistan’, and 58% favoured negotiating with the Pakistani Taliban, with only 19% backing military action instead of negotiations (tinyurl.com/4wtcmu).

Moreover, though most Pakistanis oppose suicide attacks (even against US
military personnel), ‘More than any other goal, Pakistanis think that standing up to America is the goal of Bin Laden and Al Qaeda - and 57 percent agree with that [goal].’

“Talibanising” the border
Given recent history, these figures should come as no surprise. Indeed, it was US
pressure on the Pakistani government to crack down on militants in its border areas
with Afghanistan that helped to bring about their “Talibanisation.”

Since 2001 the US has paid the Pakistani army some $12bn ‘to wage a counter-insurgency campaign in the tribal areas’ (Economist, 18 Sept). In 2003, US
commanders warned Musharraf that ‘if his army refused to go after [“high-value”
al-Qaeda fugitives in South Waziristan], their army would do so’ and ‘[i]n March
2004 - for the fi rst time in the history of the state - a reluctant Musharraf dispatched
80,000 Pakistani soldiers to the tribal areas’, outraging tribal leaders [maliks] ‘who saw
the invasion as a betrayal of their basic pact with Pakistan’s rulers’ (Graham Usher, The Pakistan Taliban, MERIP, 13 Feb 07).

The campaign was a disaster, and the Pakistani Army was forced ‘to sue for a ceasefire with ... [Pakistani] Taliban commanders, who emerged as the true defenders of the tribes.’ The political impact was profound, shifting power from the political administration to the army and from the maliks to the tribal militants.

260,000 refugees
Since then, the US has done its best to derail any peace deals between the Pakistani Government and militants in Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) bordering Afghanistan. In August, under intense US pressure, Pakistan launched an offensive in the Bajaur tribal area – barely reported in the British press - killing hundreds and forcing hundreds of thousands more to flflfl ee their homes (Sunday
Telegraph, 31 Aug).

Sitting in the middle of a flyblown camp, Mohammad Ali, a 20-year-old refugee from the attacks, told the Sunday Telegraph that about a dozen civilians had died in his village but that the Taliban fighters had left long before the planes arrived.

“ Why didn’t they arrest the Taliban? Why were they bombarding us?”, he asked. “We want peace, but we cannot have it because of terrorist America, which orders our government to attack its own people … The Taliban are godly people, they are Islamic, and we are happy that they send suicide bombers for revenge. If it is God’s will, I will join them. We have to defend our villages and our religion.”

Britain's role
Even as it plans to further escalate its role in the war in Afghanistan, ‘Britain has begun negotiations with the government in Baghdad on a longterm military commitment to Iraq that UK officials say could leave significant numbers of UK troops in the country beyond next year’ (FT, 6 Aug).

On 22 July, in a statement widely interpreted as ‘signall[ing] the effective end of Britain’s role’ in the occupation of Iraq, Gordon Brown predicted that Britain’s mission in Iraq would be “fundamentally changed in the fi rst months of next year” (Guardian,
23 July).

However, according to the FT, the MoD ‘envisages a possible longer-term relationship with the Iraqi military similar to the type that the UK has with other armed forces in the region, such as those of Oman* or Jordan’ and ‘[s]ome offi cials are keen to counteract media reports that by the middle of next year substantially all British troops will be out of Iraq.’

In a 16-17 July poll for the Independent on Sunday, 74% of Britons said that ‘British
troops should be withdrawn from Iraq as soon as possible’ (tinyurl.com/57d9nt).

Almost double
Meanwhile, according to the Daily Telegraph, ‘[British] Military chiefs have been in
discussion to almost double troop numbers in Afghanistan … Senior military offi cers
have held preliminary talks about troop strength and believe increasing numbers
up to approximately 14,000 from the current 8,200 may be necessary to defeat
the Taliban’ (8 Aug).

Moreover, ‘Britain’s special forces are to play a key role in a newly-planned “surge”
against Taliban forces in Afghanistan,’ with SAS and SBS troops ‘used to dramatically
expand the Army’s “decapitation” strategy working alongside US Marines against the
Taliban leadership’ (Independent, 19 Aug)

Earlier this year the Telegraph reported how ‘The Taliban leadership in southern
Afghanistan [wa]s passing into the hands of younger, more extreme insurgents’ as
the result of ‘the relentless targeting of traditional commanders by British forces’
(24 Mar), making a negotiated settlement – the favoured option of the vast majority
of ordinary Afghans - less likely (see voices 55).

* ‘Virtually a colony in the 1950s and 1970s, due to the extent of British influence
over the Omani government and the oil business, the Omani regime was also one of
the world’s most repressive, then or since … Britain fought wars in defence of the Omani regime in the late 1950s, and 1960s and British officers remained as commanders of the Omani military until the 1980s’ (Mark Curtis, The Great Deception, p. 21).

US war resisters
“I can’t bring myself to shoot another person. If people want to criticize me for
that, then I’m honored to be criticized because I’m not a killer” – Jeremy Hinzman

On 22 August, Robin Long – the first Iraq war resister to be deported from Canada (see voices 56) - was sentenced to 15 months in prison and a dishonourable discharge - for desertion “with intent to remain away permanently”.

On 13 August, Jeremy Hinzman - the fi rst US soldier to apply for asylum in Canada since the start of the Iraq war - was given until 23 September to leave the country with his wife, son and baby daughter, or be deported.

However on 22 September he was granted a last-minute stay of deportation, while Canada’s federal court considers whether or not to hear his appeal against the deportation order (AFP, 22 Sept).

According to the judge who granted the stay, a ruling on Hinzman’s bid to remain in Canada on humanitarian and compassionate grounds is likely to take only a few months (The Canadian Press, 22 Sept).

Amnesty International have said that they will regard him as a prisoner of conscience if he is deported and jailed.

A month earlier, on 16 July, US war resister James Burmeister was sentenced
to six months in jail for going AWOL. After leaving Iraq, he’d revealed that US troops in
Iraq were planting equipment, such as AK-47s, to lure Iraqis to spots where American
snipers could shoot them. “I know going AWOL was wrong, but I thought it was the
best way to stop the small kill teams,” he later explained.

ACTION
* Send a copy of voices’ postcard Let Them Stay: Sanctuary for US War Resisters in Canada (available free from the voices office) to the Canadian High Commissioner in
London (James R. Wright), or write to him at Canada House, Trafalgar Square, SW1Y 5BJ.

* Send letters and postcards of support to:

- Robin Long, c/o Courage to Resist, 484 Lake Park Ave # 41, Oakland CA 94610,
USA (he must add you to his “approved mail list” to receive correspondence direct
from you).

- James Burmeister, Box A, Fort Knox, KY40121, USA

* For more info about US war resisters in Canada see www.resisters.ca. For more info
about James Burmeister’s case see www.couragetoresist.org.

Stop Cheney!
Backed by the occupying powers, Big Oil has been pushing hard for highly exploitative long-term contracts (so-called Production Sharing Agreements, or PSAs) that would cede them extensive control over the future of Iraq’s oil (see voices 56 and www.HandsOffIraqiOil.org).

However, apparently emboldened by campaigning inside Iraq (led by oil workers), the Iraqi government has recently cancelled six no-bid service contracts with these companies – one-year contracts that were widely regarded as stepping stones to
the prized PSAs (NYT, 11 Sept). According to Greg Muttitt, an expert on Iraq’s oil with
the NGO Platform, the companies had been insisting on extension rights, giving them first refusal on subsequent long-term contracts, and the Iraqi Government had baulked at this.

Nonetheless, Shell has opened an office at a secret location in Baghdad (DN!, 23 Sept) and signed a multi-billion dollar contract to process natural gas in southern
Iraq (a joint venture with the oil ministry in which Shell will have a 49% stake – see
AFP, 23 Sept), and on 13 October Iraq’s oil minister will be in London ‘meet[ing]
energy firms bidding for long-term oil and gas service contracts’ in Iraq, ‘discuss[ing]
details of the fi elds on offer as well as contract terms’ (Reuters, 14 Sept).

ACTION
* On 11 Oct there will be only 100 days left of the Bush-Cheney administration. Join
Hands Off Iraqi Oil on the day & help to stop Dick Cheney from getting his (giant,
Mr Tickle-style) hands on Iraq’s oil barrels. Samba, a giant puppet and more! Meet 12
noon, outside the Shell Centre (see here).

* Hands Off Iraqi Oil will also be holding a demo outside Iraq Petroleum 2008 - a key networking opportunity for oil industry officials – on 1 Dec. Put the date in your diary now and watch this space!

* Invite a speaker from Hands Off Iraqi Oil to your local group or event: 0845 458 2564 or handsoffiraqioil@gmail.com.

Iraqis resist deportations
On 9 August, 13 Kurdish Iraqis detained at Campsfield Immigration Detention Centre
near Oxford, went on hunger strike to protest against their forthcoming deportation
(tinyurl.com/6cja2l).

The protest ended on 17 August, but on 15 Sept the Home Offi ce attempted to forcibly deport roughly 60 Iraqis – including the leader of the Campsfi eld hunger strikers, Fazzel Abdul Ahmed – using a German aircraft at Stansted. However, one of the asylum seekers was able to smash one of the plane’s windows, forcing the flight to be cancelled (tinyurl.com/3egqk2).

The UK has also continued to forcibly deport Kurdish Iraqis back to Iraq using Royal
Jordanian: on 30 July Ramyar Muhammad Amien Dawan was reportedly beaten and
forced to board a RJ plane in Jordan, after he refused to board it voluntarily (tinyurl.
com/6pgmqn).

Amnesty International opposes all deportations to Iraq at the current time (see voices
56).

ACTION
- Send a copy of voices' Stop Deporting Iraqis postcard to the Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith (copies available free from voices).

- Contact Royal Jordanian (Space One, 1 Beadon Rd, Hammersmith, London W6
OEA or lontbrj@rj.com) and urge them not to accept bookings from the Home Offi ce
Office for deportations to Iraq.

In brief
Three choices
‘Senior British military commanders in Afghanistan have been told to change their
military tactics in the face of mounting civilian casualties’ (Observer, 31 August).

‘Philip Alston, UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions … [said] His chief concern was night raids by foreign intelligence agencies which appeared to take place without accountability to the Afghan government and left those subjected to them with three choices. “They can either stay in their home and run the risk of being shot in their bed. Secondly, they could try and run, in which [case] they would be shot, or thirdly, they fire back in which case they are treated as a terrorist and shot.”’

Helping al-Qaeda
The operations of British and foreign troops in southern Afghanistan are helping
to galvanise al-Qaeda, according to the head of the UN’s al-Qaeda monitoring unit,
Richard Barrett (Observer, 14 Sept).

"The presence of foreign forces provides a glue and [al-Qaeda] have been quite clever to exploit fears of an outside force,” he told the Observer. “You could say that the threat of foreign occupation is giving them oxygen in the region with tribal leaders leaving aside local differences to unite against foreign forces.”

£3bn ammo deal
Leading British arms dealer BAE Systems has signed a 15-year £3bn contract with
the MoD to supply ammunition to British troops (Press Association, 21 Aug). ‘Under
the arrangement, the firm will supply around 80% of the ammunition used by
the military for operations and training, from 5.56mm bullets for the SA80 rifl e to
mortar rounds and artillery shells.’

Between Aug 06 and Sept 07 British forces in Afghanistan fi red almost four
million bullets and 25,000 artillery rounds (Telegraph, 12 Jan).

Hundreds killed
‘More than 3,500 insurgents have been “taken off the streets of Baghdad” by the
[SAS] in a series of audacious “Black Ops” over the past two years’ (Sunday Telegraph, 31 August). While the majority were captured, several hundred were killed.