( PDF | ASCII text formats )
From: embolden the people
To: globalaffairs@yahoogroups.com ; studentsnowar@yahoogroups.com ;
ba-cesi@yahoogroups.com ; iac-discussion@yahoogroups.com
Date: Tuesday, 12 November 2002 12:11
Subject: [iac-disc.] US Air Force Doctrine Document 2-1.2, "Strategic Attack" and US war crimes
Source to the following was originally posted at: http://www.freelists.org/archives/ngpj/11-2002/fullthread3.html
|
Dear friends and allies in the justice and peace movement:
In light of the US drive toward war with Iraq and the urgency of preventing that disaster and somehow derailing this Bush/Cheney death train, I would like to call to your attention some recent findings by Thomas Nagy, Professor of Expert Systems at George Washington University, concerning U.S. Air Force Doctrine Document 2-1.2, "Strategic Attack." And I'm asking you to help in spreading the word about the horrific implications of this document concerning US war crimes (those already committed and about to be committed in the next war against Iraq if the policies in this document are followed now as they were in 1991).
The “Strategic Attack, United States Air Force, Air Force Doctrine Document 2-1.2, 20 May 1998” document [was] posted on the U.S. Air Force Doctrines documents site, http://www.e-publishing.af.mil/pubs/speclist.asp?puborg=AFDC&series=dd. [November 2005: See local archived PDF copy --ratitor]
Nagy called this document to my attention, and believes (as I do) that the content, if widely known, could and should be used to argue for revoking the blank check given to President Bush regarding the the use of force against Iraq. This is because the document appears to be documentary evidence from the USAF regarding what appears to be an open admission and approval of the war crime of destroying or rendering useless items essential to the survival of civilian populations. This is specifically banned by Protocol Additional #1 of the Geneva Conventions, Article 54, par. 2 -- and is an illegal action under international law and a war crime.
Article 54. Protection of objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population
- It is prohibited to attack, destroy, remove or render useless objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population, such as food-stuffs, agricultural areas for the production of food-stuffs, crops, livestock, drinking water installations and supplies and irrigation works, for the specific purpose of denying them for their sustenance value to the civilian population or to the adverse Party, whatever the motive, whether in order to starve out civilians, to cause them to move away, or for any other motive.
Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949,
and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed
Conflicts (Protocol I), 8 June 1977
http://www.icrc.org/ihl.nsf/7c4d08d9b287a42141256739003e636b/f6c8b9fee14a77fdc125641e0052b079?OpenDocumentNagy's work and research in this area has uncovered important, shocking findings in the past, as you may already know. Nagy previously obtained a U.S. military report that was issued the day after the 1991 Gulf War started -- it detailed the vulnerabilities of Iraq's water systems (which the U.S. bombed during the Gulf War) including a listing of the specific items which would need to be barred by the UN sanctions committee in order to totally degrade the water and sanitation system of Iraq. Water-borne diseases are now pervasive in Iraq.
Nagy's findings were published in England and then in the September, 2001 issue of The Progessive -- "The Secret Behind the Sanctions: How The US Intentionally Destoryed Iraq's Water Supply." (Summary: Pentagon documents reveal how the United States, contrary to the Geneva Convention, intentionally destroyed Iraq's water supply. Nagy shows that there were extremely serious and still-deadly U.S. violations of international law and human rights in US Defense Department planning for the 1991 US war against Iraq and for the sanctions against Iraq.)
Noam Chomsky wrote on 8 November 2002:
"Dear Frank Kromkowski: . . . I'm familiar with Nagy's earlier work. He's quite right. And I have no doubt that the same is planned this time. All that has to be added is that this is standard operating procedure. The US has never accepted international conventions on war crimes and crimes against humanity. It's hard to think of a use of force where they have not been grossly violated, quite consciously and purposefully, and accepted by educated opinion, often praised. Not pretty, but no point having illusions about it. Noam Chomsky. "
Thomas J. Nagy, Ph.D. is Associate Professor in the George Washington University School of Business and Public Management, a member of the International Association of Genocide Scholars, Presenter at the 1999 and 2001 DOD's Joint Services Conference on Professional Ethics (regarding the issues raised in his correspondence . . . excerpts below). Nagy can be reached at George Washington University by phone, 301-564-0326, by e-mail, nagy@gwu.edu, and his home page is at http://home.gwu.edu/~nagy/.
Nagy's concern is with previous and likely future grave violations of Protocol 1, Article 54, paragraph 2 (1977) of the Geneva Convention which bans attacking or rendering useless infrastructure essential to the survival of civilian populations under any circumstances. Nagy says:
"I am gravely concerned in view of, inter alia the admission on page 26 [displayed as page 34 in the PDF document] of U.S. Air Force Doctrine Document 2-1.2, `Strategic Attack' dated 20 May 1998 that `The electrical attacks [on Iraq] proved extremely effective. . . . The loss of electricity shut down the capital's water treatment plants and led to a public health crisis from raw sewage dumped in the Tigris River.'"
Lt. Col. Rizer in the May 2001 issue of Air & Space Power Chronicles elaborates on the effect of this bombing attributing to it a massive epidemic of water borne disease that killed 100,000 civilians and doubled the infant mortality rate. [Kenneth R Rizer, "Bombing Dual-Use Targets: Legal, Ethical, and Doctrinal Perspectives," http://www.airpower.maxwell.af.mil/airchronicles/cc/Rizer.html]
Nagy is very concerned, as I am (I'm a volunteer for the Montana Peace Seekers and the Helena Peace Seekers organization, www.montanapeaceseekers.org), that in view of the imminent prospect of an expanded war against Iraq that the same doctrine -- illegal -- will be applied resulting in more than the 100,000 civilian fatalities from water borne disease estimated by Lt. Col. Rizer in his Maxwell AFB article referenced above.
Nagy's concern is all the greater in view of his recent trip to Iraq at the behest of the Canadian Affiliate of the Nobel Peace Prizing winner in 1985 to estimate civilian fatalities in the event of another full scale war. Nagy is a great and knowledgable peace advocate who speaks out on these issues as a parent, ex-refugee and college professor who did his postdoctoral work in public health and as former research director with the American Bar Association.
Nagy is pursuing contacts with congressional opponents of the war resolution to discuss the USAF documents and possible constructive steps such as inclusion of the relevant portions into the Congressional Record and using the documents as the basis for calling for reconsideration of legislative approval of the blank check to President Bush.
Neither he nor I can see how these actions and policies he has discovered could possibly contribute to US national security in a way consistent with law and morality. Nagy's "The Secret Behind the Sanctions" report relies on documents obtained from the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency and paints a chilling picture of US military planners determined to use sanctions to spread disease and death among civilians in Iraq.
Nagy says, and I wholeheartedly agree, that the documents demonstrate that:
"As these documents illustrate, the United States knew it had the capacity to devastate the water treatment system of Iraq. It knew what the consequences would be: increased outbreaks of disease and high rates of child mortality. And it was more concerned about the public relations nightmare for Washington than the actual nightmare that the sanctions created for innocent Iraqis."
This Nagy report was the fifth story among Project Censored's "Most Censored News Stories of 2001-2002", http://www.projectcensored.org/stories/2003/5.html
In light of the even greater vulnerability of the Iraq people after 12 years of sanctions that Pope John Paul II (rightly) called "merciless" -- sanctions which are the most severe ever imposed in human history -- a new war against Iraq would be even more devastating to the civilian population. This must be stopped.
Nagy comments on the 'Strategic Attack" document and its policies:
"On the contrary they appear to be, on their face, to constitute grave war crimes within the meaning of Article 54 (which is now customary and ordinary and hence binding upon the U.S. according to Lt. Col. Solis, who teaches international law at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point). Nor is this a matter of past history, since according to the UN, water borne disease continues after all these years to be the leading killer of children under the age of 5 in Iraq -- a situation that Rep. Hall (2000 letter to then Sec. of State Albright) quoting UNICEF attributes to U.S. holds on contracts deemed by the UN to be indispensable to the rehabilitation of the water supply . . ."
Nagy is a peace advocate, a pacifist like myself, but he does not attack military personnel in his approach to this issue and its tremendous ethical implications. Nagy writes:
"I have over the years taught many military officers. I do not believe they are willing killers (directly or indirectly of children). In fact I believe that that vast majority are conscientious and decent people. I believe, however, that continuing to kill Iraqi children endangers, rather than safeguards our own children. I blame primarily professors such as myself for refusing to face up to the consequences of a disastrous policy which was not designed for genocide but has had and continues to have a genocidal impact to the detriment of all."
Nagy says:
"It is my hope that this letter will hasten the end of a grave crime, prevent future instances and lead to a saner, more humane and safer world -- especially for children. I'm sure that you and your colleagues [in Congress] agree with these goals. I ask only that you will do your duty pursuant to your oath to defend the Constitution by passing on my letter and doing all in your power to see that justice is done and that the laws are followed. I presume that, unlike me, you are a lawyer and are fully conversant with the Law of Air Combat as well as the Nuremberg Principle that superior orders can not be used as a defense in matters involving war crimes."
Sincerely, Thomas J. Nagy, Ph.D.,
Assoc. Prof. of Expert Systems,
George Washington University
School of Business and Public Management,
Washington, D.C. 20052
202/994-7090,
nagy@gwu.eduNagy also noted that in the "Strategic Attack" document, he thinks,
". . . is a picture pre-post of the U.S. attack on a Korean dam as a success story. I think I recall Prof. Kleinfelter, a prof at National Defense U. (at Ft. Leslie McNair) in D.C. as saying that that's clearly a war crime. Think it is on tape at C-SPAN. This guy is a specialist on aerial bombardment history . . ."
I urge you to do everything you can to share this information wherever and however you can, in the hopes that its being known may help to save the lives of thousands and thousands of innocent Iraqi children and their families.
Sincerely,
~ Frank Kromkowski (H: 406/443-0843; W: 406/841-2780)
Some other articles about or by Nagy:
Tom Nagy's home page at GWU: http://home.gwu.edu/~nagy.
- August 13, 2001 Interview of Nagy by Amy Goodman on Democracy NOW! Story: "The Secret Behind The Sanctions: How The US Intentionally Destroyed Iraq's Water Supply," http://www.webactive.com/pacifica/demnow/dn20010813.html
"Newly declassified documents have been found which reveal that US officials were aware as early as 1991 of the impact that US bombing and sanctions would have on Iraq's water supply. The documents predicted that preventing Iraq from importing desperately needed chlorine and spare parts would result in epidemic disease. The new documents come more than ten years after the imposition of US-backed sanctions against Iraq which have killed more than a million people. Guest: Thomas Nagy, Nagy is author of "The Secret Behind the Sanctions: How the U.S. Intentionally Destroyed Iraq's Water Supply."
- Thomas Nagy biography from the conference, The Effects of Sanctions on Health: A Case Study on the Gulf, held 9 February 2002 at McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada: http://www.flyte.net/iraq/about.html#Thomas
- "They Dignified Our University", Anti-Sanctions Protesters Rock Berkeley's Commencement, by Nadine Naber and Fadia Rafeedie, Press Information Notes, 5/24/00, http://www.merip.org/pins/pin21.html
"In February 1998, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, Secretary of Defense William Cohen, and National Security Adviser Sandy Berger held a `town meeting' at Ohio State University to rally public support for a new round of bombing of Iraq. Despite the administration's careful orchestration of the event, the officials were repeatedly embarrassed by sharp questions from the audience about the devastating impact of economic sanctions on the Iraqi people, and the double standards inherent in US foreign policy in the Middle East. The Ohio State `town meeting' was a symbol that the anti-sanctions movement, long tiny and isolated, had come of age.
"This May, protesters at the commencement ceremonies of George Washington University and UC-Berkeley took the movement to a new level of militancy. In Washington Sunday, dozens of activists handed out `Unofficial Commencement Ceremony Supplements,' prepared by George Washington university professor Thomas Nagy, listing `the top ten reasons to cheer' commencement speaker Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. Among them: `Albright's sanctions have killed half a million Iraqi kids under the age of five' and `Albright's sanctions have destroyed the educational system of Iraq. . . .'"
- Congresswoman McKinney decries war against Iraqi people, News Brief, 8/14/01,
http://www.ratical.org/co-globalize/CynthiaMcKinney/news/pr010814.htm
- "Total control, not self-defense, behind US plans to topple Saddam" By Stephen Gowans, What's Left, http://www3.sympatico.ca/sr.gowans/total.html
- Excerpts from the book The Decline and Fall of Public Broadcasting by David Barsamian, South End Press, 2001,
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Media_control_propaganda/Decline_Fall_PublicBroad.html
- How Many Dead Children from Sanctions?, Americans Against Bombing / Americans Against World Empire, http://www.iraqwar.org/childunicef.htm
- Many more Nagy references can be found via a Google.com Search: http://www.google.com/search?q=%22Thomas+Nagy%22++%2B+%22George+Washington+University%22&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&start=20&sa=N -- or -- searching "nagy + sanctions" (URL given below) shows that Nagy's research has gotten published and referenced in the alternative press and reveals some very interesting commentaries on the implications of Nagy's work, and is very worth spending some time on. Please see: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=Nagy+%2B+sanctions&btnG=Google+Search
- Gannett News Service finally broke the taboo (in the mainstream press) about discussing the sanctions-contaminated water, the leading cause of death of Iraqi kids for more than a decade. It put the following story on the wires (run in the Detroit News): http://detnews.com/2002/nation/0208/04/a05-553459.htm. "Report: Sanctions imperil Iraqis. Civilians fear being caught in crossfire" By Greg Barrett / Gannett News Service. This story (printed below) also ran in the Seattle Times. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/cgi-bin/PrintStory.pl?document_id=134506556&zsection_id=268448413&slug=sanctions04&date=20020804
Report: Sanctions imperil Iraqis
Civilians fear being caught in crossfire
By Greg Barrett / Gannett News Service
4 August 2002
WASHINGTON -- Massive new irrigation systems stretching like tentacles in the breadbasket regions of rural Iraq would normally be cause for celebration. In a nation where nearly a quarter of the children suffer from chronic malnutrition, abundant crops of wheat and barley would signify hope and progress.
But when Hans von Sponeck, former assistant secretary general of the United Nations, visited Iraq last month he found neither: The spigots were turned off. Although the sophisticated sprinkler systems had survived the exhaustive vetting of U.N. trade sanctions, the water pumps had not.
"The danger is, these pumps could be used by the (Iraqi) military for other purposes," said von Sponeck, a 32-year veteran of the United Nations who resigned two years ago to protest the sanctions. "Anything that has a sophisticated pumping mechanism can be used for propelling weapons of mass destruction, I guess."
Such is life in Iraq 12 years after the international trade sanctions of Aug. 6, 1990, attempted to peacefully push Iraqi President Saddam Hussein back from Kuwait, and 11 years after the allied forces of the Persian Gulf War rained bombs on Baghdad.
The ongoing collateral damage of the war and sanctions on Iraqi civilians has totaled more than 1 million deaths, half of which are children under age 5, according to UNICEF and World Health Organization reports.
As U.S. lawmakers this summer debate whether the military should again strike at Saddam's regime or simply tighten the trade embargo, Iraqi civilians fret over the inevitable crossfire. More than 700 targets were bombed in 1991 to cripple Saddam -- bridges, roads and electrical grids that powered 1,410 water-treatment plants for Iraq's 22 million people.
Coupled with the U.N. sanctions that blocked or rationed dual-use imports such as the water pumps, electric generators and chlorine -- that can also be used in the making of mustard gas -- epidemics ensued. Iraqi children died from dehydration and waterborne illnesses such as cholera, diarrhea and other intestinal diseases.
At his confirmation hearing last year, Secretary of State Colin Powell laid the blame at Saddam's feet.
"No one cares for children more than I do," Powell said. "And I understand that a nuclear, biological or chemical weapon of a Saddam Hussein threatens not only the children of Iraq but the entire region far more than tightened sanctions."
At the freshly painted Al-Mansour Children's Hospital in Baghdad, pediatrician Qusay Al-Rahim said the nation that once was among the most industrialized in the Middle East has made some progress in the past decade. Electricity is again reliable. More than half of the pharmaceutical drugs his patients need are available. Hospital elevators work and colostomy bags no longer have to be washed and reused.
The sanctions -- which have been maintained because Saddam refused to comply with U.N. resolutions for arms inspections -- do not prevent the import of food and most medicines. Just Thursday, the Iraqi government invited the chief U.N. weapons inspector to Baghdad, hinting that inspections could be renewed after nearly four years.
War's collateral damage
In an independent study published 19 months after the completion of the six-week gulf war, the New England Journal of Medicine reported a trend that foretold Iraq's future.
During the first eight months of 1991, nearly 47,000 more children than normal died in Iraq, and the country's infant and child mortality rates more than doubled, to 92.7 and 128.5 per 1,000 live births respectively.
["Effect of the Gulf War on Infant and Child Mortality in Iraq", by Ascherio A., Chase R., Cote T., et al, New England Journal of Medicine, September, 1992, vol. 327, pp. 931-936.
excerpts: http://www.scn.org/ccpi/infrastructure.html#nejm
Abstract and related articles: http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/abstract/327/13/931
full article: http://www.scn.org/ccpi/NEJM-24sep92.html]
A 1999 UNICEF [+, ++] study showed a continuing trend: In 1998, the infant and child mortality rates were 103 and 125 per 1,000, respectively. The U.N. Oil-for-Food program was created five years ago to generate a sense of normalcy for Iraqis. Yet as of July 30, 2002, it was still withholding more than 1,450 import contracts worth $4.6 billion in humanitarian supplies for Iraq. A U.N. pledge in May to regenerate and expedite the contracts has so far produced only a trickle of change -- 14 humanitarian supply contracts worth $7.6 million. The United States, meanwhile, concerned with Saddam's potential for developing weapons of mass destruction, initiated roughly 90 percent of the blocks on humanitarian supplies by the U.N. Security Council.
In Amman, Jordan, this summer, Jordanian Minister of Water Munther Haddadin addressed the plight of Iraqi children, who, for example, suffered almost a fourfold increase in low birth weights (4.5 percent to 21.1 percent) between 1990 and 1994. The rate remains steady today at 25 percent.
Less than a month after the Persian Gulf War, U.N. Secretary General Javier Perez de Cuellar told the U.N. Security Council the conflict had "wrought near-apocalyptic results upon the economic infrastructure of what had been, until January 1991, a rather highly urbanized and mechanized society."
In a letter to the council dated March 20, 1991, de Cuellar wrote: "Iraq has, for some time to come, been relegated to a pre-industrial age, but with all the disabilities of post-industrial dependency on an intensive use of energy and technology."
Degraded water supply
It was a result the United States predicted even as allied forces bombed Iraq's civilian infrastructure.
In a January 1991 document titled "Iraq Water Treatment Vulnerabilities," the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency said the bombing of Iraq coupled with an embargo of chemicals and supplies could fully degrade Iraq's civilian water supply.
"Unless the water is purified with chlorine, epidemics of such diseases as cholera, hepatitis and typhoid could occur," read declassified portions of the report.
George Washington University professor Thomas Nagy came across the document in 1998 during online research about depleted uranium. The subject line of the Pentagon paper read: "Effects of Bombing on Disease Occurrence in Baghdad."
Its analysis, as Nagy said, was blunt: "Increased incidence of diseases will be attributable to degradation of normal preventive medicine, waste disposal, water purification-distribution, electricity and decreased ability to control disease outbreaks."
Nagy gets tearful discussing the document.
"Switch the nouns," said Nagy, who immigrated to America in 1949 and considers it his savior. "Imagine if the document had read, `U.S. Water Treatment Vulnerabilities,' " and it described in detail how to spread epidemic to the U.S. civilian population.
"It would be called terrorism," he said. "Or worse. Genocide." The Pentagon, meanwhile, dismissed the document. Defense Intelligence Agency spokesman Lt. Cmdr. Jim Brooks called it an assessment written for U.S. policy-makers, but he said he didn't know who had requested it or for what purpose.
"It's too long ago," Brooks said. "If you have this report, the best thing to do is to then look at what policies went into place. . . . There are no sanctions that prevent (Saddam) from sustaining the water treatment program" and caring for his people.
But Saddam has delivered on his part of the U.N. Oil-for-Food Program, according to the United Nations, which has 158 observers in Iraq monitoring the movement of supplies. Since the relief effort began in 1997, Saddam has never been cited for diverting or hoarding supplies, said program spokeswoman Hasmik Egian.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
###
Project Censored- "Most Censored News Stories of 2001-2002"
http://www.projectcensored.org/stories/2003/5.html
[Project Censored press release, excerpt below]
# 5 - U.S. Intentionally Destroyed Iraq's Water System
Source:
The Progressive
September 2001
Title: "The Secret Behind the Sanctions: How the U.S. Intentionally Destroyed Iraq's Water Supply"
Author: Thomas J. Nagy
www.progressive.org
Faculty evaluator: Rick Luttmann
Student researchers: Adria Cooper, Erik Wagle, Adam Cimino, Chris Salvano
During the Gulf War the United States deliberately bombed Iraq's water system. After the war, the U.S. pushed sanctions to prevent importation of necessary supplies for water purification. These actions resulted in the deaths of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians many of whom were young children. Documents have been obtained from the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), which prove that the Pentagon was fully aware of the mortal impacts on civilians in Iraq and was actually monitoring the degradation of Iraq's water supply. The destruction of civilian infrastructures necessary for health and welfare is a direct violation of the Geneva Convention.
After the Gulf War, the United Nations applied sanctions against Iraq, which denied the importation of specialized equipment and chemicals, such as chlorine for purification of water. There are six documents that have been partially declassified and can be found on the Pentagon's web site at www.gulflink.osd.mil. "These documents include information that prove that the United States was fully aware of the costs to civilians, especially children, by upholding the sanctions against purification of Iraq's water supply.
The primary document is dated January 22, 1991 and is titled, "Iraq Water Treatment Vulnerabilities." This document predicts what will take place when Iraq can no longer import the vital commodities to cleanse their water supply. It states that epidemics and disease outbreaks may occur because of pollutants and bacteria that exist in unpurified water. The document acknowledges the fact that without purified drinking water, the manufacturing of food and medicine will also be affected. The possibilities of Iraqis obtaining clean water, despite sanctions, along with a timetable describing the degradation of Iraq's water supply was also addressed.
"The remaining five documents from the DIA confirm the Pentagon's monitoring of the situation in Iraq. In more than one document, discussion of the likely outbreaks of diseases and how they affect "particularly children" is discussed in great detail. The final document titled, "Iraq: Assessment of Current Health Threats and Capabilities," is dated, November 15, 1991, and discusses the development of a counter-propaganda strategy that would blame Saddam Hussein for the lack of safe water in Iraq.
"The United States' insistence on using this type of sanction against Iraq is in direct violation of the Geneva Convention. The Geneva Convention was created in 1979 to protect the victims of international armed conflict. It states, "It is prohibited to attack, destroy, remove or render useless, objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population such as foodstuffs, crops, livestock, drinking water installation and supplies, and irrigation works, for the specific purpose of denying them for their sustenance value to the civilian population or to the adverse Party, whatever the motive, whether in order to starve out civilians, to cause them to move away, or for any other motive." The United States, for nearly a decade, has "destroyed, removed, or rendered useless" Iraq's "drinking water installations and supplies."
Although two Democratic Representatives, Cynthia McKinney from Georgia and Tony Hall from Ohio, have spoken out about the degradation of Iraq's water supply and its civilian targets, no acknowledgment of violations has been made. The U.S. policy of destroying the water treatment system of Iraq and preventing its re-establishment has been pursued for more than a decade. The United Nations estimates that more than 500,000 Iraqi children have died as a result of sanctions and that unclean water is a major contributor to these deaths."
Update by John Nagy
"The Secret Behind the Sanctions" gives Americans an ax to break out of the cocoon of denial enveloping the genocidal intent and effects of nearly 12 years of economic sanctions against the people of Iraq. This ax is equipped with three blades:
- Blade 1 summarizes partially declassified documents showing that in 1991 the U.S. devised a plan for the total destruction of the water supply; that the U.S. knew in detail the lethal consequences of the plan for the children of Iraq and the U.S. and even assessed the most probable impacts of disease throughout 1991.
- Blade 2 furnishes instructions for accessing the named documents from the Department of Defense's own website.
- Blade 3 gives evidence ranging from Rep. Hall's letter to Sec. of State Albright through UN statistics showing that the genocidal plan had been and continues to be implemented with all of the horror predicted by the Defense Intelligence Agency.
Tragically and criminally, these DIA documents were actively hidden from the American people till 1995 by which time a compliant mainstream media had driven the fatal lies of genocide denial deep into the American psyche.
Developments since the publication of the story:
Several anti-sanctions groups have reported that the Progressive article ranks among the most powerful in persuading the public of the evil of the sanctions. The article opened a new front against sanctions by the publication of David Duncan's "A prayer for children and water" and Ned Breslin's "Water as a Weapon of War." Now the environmental community and water engineering community are alerted to the updated horror of the U.S. tactic of poisoning wells.
The article has now been translated into Spanish, Danish, and Swedish with summaries available in French and German and stories on the content of the article appearing in newspapers as geographically removed as Katmandu, Nepal; Cork, Ireland; and Moscow, Russia.
In the U.S., the mainstream media has ducked and covered with the exception of the Orlando Sentinel, the Madison Capital Times, and the National Catholic Reporter. In contrast, U.S. alternative media has acted honorably, including Democracy Now! and Counterspin.
Until recently the only venue in Washington, D.C. to discuss the content of the article was at the Department of Defense ethics conference, JSCOPE. Recently I was able to reach audiences in the belly of the beast at a teach-in at American University, then at the World Congress of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War-Physicians for Social Responsibility.
My advice to people working in this area is to look for editors, reporters and, advocates of the integrity of Matt Rothschild, Felicity Arbuthnot, and Sam Husseini and allies in the peace movement abroad (e.g., McMaster University and University College, Cork).
Tom Nagy is an ex-refugee, ex-public health postdoctoral fellow, pacifist, parent, and professor at George Washington University in Washington, D.C.
Copyright © 2002 Freelist.org
Copyright © 2002 Gannett News Service
Copyright © 2002 Associated Press
Copyright © 2002 Project Censored
Reprinted for Fair Use Only.