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WAMM Newsletter 0911 A publication of Volume 29 Number 8 September 2011 Women Against Military Madness Demonization, War Crimes and by Sara Flounders The antiwar the Task of the Antiwar Movement movement must When U.S. imperialism engages in an attack on force in history has had the capacity to wreak counter media any government or movement, it is cowardly to be such havoc, using cruise missiles, bunker busters, neutral, and rank betrayal to stand on the same drones, depleted uranium and dense inert metal demonization in side as the imperialist octopus, which seeks to explosive bombs, antipersonnel razor shredding dominate the world. This has been an ABC for bomblets, and antipersonnel mines. the midst of a workers’ movements and serious antiwar move- ments for over a century. What should be the response to this war mobilization terror? Currently, the corporate media in the U.S. and its and must focus allies can demonize the leader of a country target- Whatever one’s evaluation of the leadership of a ed by the Pentagon to the point that the conse- small, underdeveloped country facing U.S. sanc- on the outrageous quences of using the most deadly weapons against tions, sabotage, and assassination attempts, their crimes being a totally defenseless population are hidden and leaders are not the reason the U.S. is hell-bent on dismissed. How does this monopoly of ideas intervening to try to overthrow the Syrian govern- committed, impact the antiwar movement in the United States ment and is destroying Libya today. regarding intervention in Syria, and the war The U.S. and all the old regimes tied to it in the refusing to accept against Libya? region are trying desperately to manage and con- or give weight to Some alleged antiwar groups and even liberal and tain the social explosion that is shaking the mostly progressive media unfortunately spend more time Arab countries from Morocco to Saudi Arabia, any justification cataloguing the real, or alleged, shortcomings of highlighted by the tremendous popular revolu- for them. the demonized leader, in the current cases of tions in Tunisia and Egypt. They want to hold this Bashar al-Assad and Muammar Gadhafi, than still unfolding mass upheaval in channels where it rallying people to respond to a criminal interven- doesn’t threaten neocolonial domination of the tion and attacks by the U.S. and NATO “great” region. Replacing the Ba’athist government in powers. The influence of this kind of critic coin- Syria with an openly client regime and gaining cides with the opinions of U.S. ruling powers. military bases in Libya––which lies between Egypt They are like the voices who said “neither NATO and Tunisia ––would serve this purpose. nor Milosevic” in 1999, “neither Bush nor Sad- What is also at stake in Libya is that U.S., French, dam” in 1991 and 2003, and “neither Israel nor British, and Italian regimes are determined to lay Hizbollah” in 2006. This approach played into the hold of Libya’s now well-developed infrastructure warmongers’ motives and weakened the antiwar of oil refineries, pumping stations, gas lines, ports, forces. and pipelines directly into Europe, as well as bil- Thus, it is important to thoroughly answer their lions of dollars in gold reserves, oil reserves—the arguments and point to the antiwar movement’s largest in Africa—and Libya’s other rich assets. main tasks. All of this has been built up over the four decades since the Libyans expelled colonial and neocolo- Since March, NATO forces have carried out more nial domination by the U.K. and the U.S. The War Octopus. This image than 20,000 sorties in Libya, hitting 8,000 targets created by H.Pieck of Amsterdam, selected by U.S. Military Intelligence and the CIA, These imperial powers are especially determined 1939, depicts expanding empire killing many civilians, in what is described as seeking to conquer the world. implementing a “no-fly zone.” No other armed continued on page 2 310 East 38th Street, Minneapolis, MN 55409 • 612-827-5364 • [email protected] • www.worldwidewamm.org Women Against Military Madness is a nonviolent, feminist organization that works in solidarity with others to create a system of social equality, self-determination and justice through education, action and the empowerment of women. WAMM’s purpose is to dismantle systems of militarism, economic exploitation and global oppression. Antiwar Movement, from front cover Propaganda from World War II, remixed Printed on recycled and to stop Libya’s assistance in the development of by Micah Ian Wright. recycleable paper. other African countries. Libya planned a United A NATO-instigated Federation of Africa and backed it with $90 bil- coup was portrayed as a The statements and opinions lion in investment funds. This move toward inde- popular, mass uprising reflected in this newsletter are the views of the author and not neces- pendence deeply threatens the continued in Libya. Even some sarily official positions of WAMM. multinational corporate looting of the continent. usually liberal and We encourage a diversity of opinion progressive media to represent the range of perspec- joined the chorus. tives that coexist under the banner Corporate media sells the war of WAMM’s mission statement. In preparation for a war of conquest, the role of the corporate media is to endlessly repeat every Newsletter Editor charge and statement made by the institutions of people have held pro-government, anti-NATO Mary Beaudoin U.S. power. An almost frenzied level of lies, wild rallies in Tripoli. Libya’s government has distrib- Newsletter Committee uted more than 3 million weapons in Polly Mann, Carol Masters, fabrications, racist stereotyping, and ugly carica- Patty Guerrero tures saturates all political discussion. a country of 6.5 million people to enable them Proofreader to resist occupation, something no government Ilze Mueller The corporate media spread the demands that the does if it considers its citizens to be hostile. Pentagon death machine must act in the name of Layout Ginny Sutton “humanity” in order to “save lives.” The war itself What antiwar forces should do is cloaked in neutral terms. Demonization is meant to disorient and put the massive, criminal The response to colonial wars of aggression destruction planned by the U.S. and NATO should be the same as the response to a racist beyond debate. Enormous pressure is placed on mobilization, a racist lynch mob or a police attack WAMM Staff every level of the U.S. population to accept the on an oppressed community: Mobilize all possible Kim Doss-Smith, Director premise that the targeted country and its leader- forces to stand up to the crime and say “no!” Vanessa Lawrow, Office manager ship are to blame. The attacks are presented as if Refuse to take part in the orchestrated campaign WAMM Office Assad is the only person who lives in Syria and of vilification that blames the victims. 310 East 38th Street, Suite 222 Minneapolis, Minnesota 55409 Gadhafi is the only one who lives in Libya. However difficult it may be, it is essential to reject 612-827-5364 (phone) the racist political onslaught that accompanies the 612-827-6433 (fax) As the Libyan people continue to resist, Western [email protected] (e-mail) media continues to distort this reality. The military onslaught on Libya and intervention in www.worldwidewamm.org (web) Libyans have endured more than five months of WAMM Office Hours nonstop aerial assault. More than one million Mon–Fri: 10:00 am–5:00 pm continued on page 3 WAMM is funded primarily through the generous contributions of our members. WAMM also receives funds from the following organizations: The Pat Owen Fund of the Minneapolis Foundation The Barbra Wiener Fund, a fund of Headwaters Fund Community Shares Minnesota The U.S. Department of Defense Unified Combatant Command divides the world into regions to be controlled militarily. Map from U.S. Army Logistics University. 2 September 2011 www.worldwidewamm.org WAMM Antiwar Movement, from page 2 political prisoners; and her support of the Pales- tinian people generated reactionary campaigns that poured funds into opposing candidates in her Syria. The responsibility of progressive intellectu- WORD UP! als and groups in the United States is to explain small Georgia congressional district. Again and the corporate interests behind the latest “humani- again the district lines were redrawn in an attempt tarian” war, and never to echo in left terminology to disqualify McKinney from the U.S. Congress. the charges made in the corporate media. The But she has earned international acclaim for her antiwar movement must counter media demo- candidacy for president on the Green Party ticket, History-Making Propaganda nization in the midst of a war mobilization and for participation in humanitarian convoys to Four powers—the United must focus on the outrageous crimes being com- Gaza and for being jailed by Israel. States, France, the UK and Qatar—have combined their mitted, refusing to accept or give weight to any It was expected that McKinney’s tour would be justification for them. technical means…These are attacked politically by reactionaries and militarists. mainly CNN (which, although The good news is that despite an ocean of propa- What was unfortunate was that some of the private, interacts with the Penta- ganda, poll after poll has confirmed that from 60 “neither Gadhafi nor NATO” people have also gon’s psychological warfare percent to 65 percent of the U.S. population is criticized her, some saying she must echo the unit), France24, the BBC and Al imperialist demand that Gadhafi “must go.” Even Jazeera. These media are being against the U.S. war on Libya.
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