Author: Londonbear

Those who have watched today’s White House press conference between Bush and his bitch poodle (the description of Blair on BBC4’s “Late Edition”, a sort of weekly “Daily Show”) will recall him going into overdrive answering a question from the British press corps. He was so rattled that during the following question he refered to his questioner as “a lad”

It now turns out that the question was so embarassing to Bush that the transcript on the White House site completely changes the sense. This is what it claims:

Q Mr. President, the Iraq Study Group described the situation in Iraq as grave and deteriorating. You said that the increase in attacks is unsettling. That won’t convince many people that you’re still in denial about how bad things are in Iraq, and question your sincerity about changing course

The correct version and more about the reporter follows.
The questioner was the BBC’s political editor Nick Robinson. The question actually asked was

…That will convince many people that you’re still in denial about how bad things are in Iraq, and question your sincerity about changing course

You might think that this question was carefully prepared beforehand but Nick Robinson writes a blog for BBC News and today’s entry reveals that he composed it on the hoof:

Sitting in the press conference, I thought it was extraordinary that just the day after the Iraq study group had been so critical of what was happening in Iraq, the president used such soft language to describe the situation there. All we got from the president was a very gentle phrase about the trouble in Baghdad being ‘unsettling’.

That’s why I put the question to him that I did.

Just so you can verify what was actually asked, there is also a link to the relevant clip. If you do watch it, look closely at the cut-away of Blair while he answers and the subtle double take he does when Bush makes some of his wierder claims.

It also turns out that the response was a far from pleasant experience for Robinson. He wrote an interim blog (same link) what looks like as soon as he came out of the conference:

I’ve just been eyeballed long and hard by George Bush for suggesting he might be in denial re Iraq. It’s important, he told me, that you understand that I understand that it’s bad.

Perhaps he should be warned and reminded what Bush said in his answer. “I talk to families who die.”

Bush however did manage to get a snipe in at Robinson which many people may have missed. Robinson asked Blair a supplementary question and then Bush moved on to an American reporter. In his reply he demonstrated his knowledge of world culture and obviously wanted to demonstrate his empathy with Britain:

I appreciate the Prime Minister’s answer to this lad —  we call them lads, in Great Britain — lad’s question, is that –(laughter)

Will anybody who has ever heard the term “lad’s question” please inform the Oxford English Dictionary! Lucky for Bush the bitch poodle was at hand to rescue him from further embarrassment.

PRIME MINISTER BLAIR: You’ve made a friend, I think, there. (Laughter.) It’s a long time since anyone’s called him that. (Laughter.)

As you can see that is one of the few truthful statements at the press conference.

Pathetic middle aged men with a potency anxiety buy a fancy sports car as a penis extension. Pathetic middle aged impotent British Prime Ministers commission a new nuclear weapons system as their’s. Today Blair will demonstrate his lame duck status by proposing a replacement to Britain’s so-called independent deterrent.

In his youth Blair was a member of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament but as is well known he sheds principles faster than his hair and his head is getting a pretty big bald spot these days.

Blair is not the first PM to initiate a new nuclear programme and it does seem to be a peculiarly Labour Party trait to have to show their masculinity in this way. Throughout the history of the UK’s nukes it seems to be that party in charge when significant developments are initiated. Blair does not even have the balls to make a decision, instead he had now started the charade of a “consultation”. The pathetic ponce cannot even openly chose his own strap-on. He is aking his acolytes to chose how the British treasury should be shafted in a White Paper to be published today. Just like the Iraq War decision, even that is a fake.  
First, let’s get rid of the notion that Britain has an “independent” nuclear defence. The warheads may be made in the UK but the designs are American and the Trident rockets  virtually leased from the USA.

Instead the Trident II missiles belong to a pool of missiles managed by the United States and stored at Kings Bay, Georgia. British boats pick up their load of missiles at Kings bay when they are commissioned and exchange them there when missiles need servicing. The Trident warheads are mated to the missiles on-board the submarine at the Royal naval Armament Depot at Coulport.

Even the construction and maintenance of the warheads has been contracted out to a consortium including an American company:

The management of the Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) was put up for bid in 1998, and on 1 April 2000 an industrial consortium consisting of British Nuclear Fuels (BNF), Lockheed-Martin, and Serco Limited, took over under a 10 year contract worth 2.2 billiion pounds

How did this peculiarly British pretence start? Well with the post-WWII Labour government headed by Attlee. After all the British developments and expertise were sent to Palo Alto as part of the war effort, there was a “sharing” of information on how to build a bomb  

Immediately after World War II, on 29 August 1945, the new Labour government headed by Prime Minister Clement Attlee convened a organized a secret Cabinet committee on atomic energy to establish nuclear policy. This committee, called GEN.75, was a subset of the full Cabinet and was termed the “Atom Bomb Committee” by Attlee. Later on an even smaller secret group of ministers known as GEN.163, which was a subset of GEN.75, made key decisions relating to the atomic bomb program. An advisory group, called the Advisory Committee on Atomic Energy (ACAE) was also set up and on 18 December 1945 PM Attlee reconvened Gen.75 to consider this group’s report. The initial step of building one or more nuclear reactors was adopted.

Secrecy was to become another feature of the British decision making as was the grand dillusion of British government self-importance. The pretence of a great power had to be maintained even as the population faced harsher rationing than had been in place during wartime and virtually no consumer goods were available. All had to be exported to pay the war debt. The inevitable winds of change that would divest the Empire were just an ominious zephyr but nobody could buy a Ford. Still having a suitably large bang would buy you a place at the big boys’ table.  

After Labour lost power, the first test was to be under a Conservative administration in October 1952. It was so hastily arranged that the technicians ha to borrow plutonium from Canada. There were a couple of strange co-incidences. The ship that was used as the primary observation platform was HMS Campagnia – the site of the main observatory for the first US test was a hill named Compagnia. Even more prescient, the test was at sea to examine the effects of a nuclear weapon being smuggled into the country on board ship, the big scare that the neocons use to justify hysteria against countries that have no effective aerial delivery system but might (as in Iraq might have WMD) send them along with the Walmart consignments.

The Attlee legacy included Britain’s first operational bomb in 1953 which was effectively a copy of the US Mk4 which first saw service in 1949. The first weapons were dropped from aircraft but the first missile was an air to ground British rocket called Blue Steel. It had a range of about 200Km and an accuracy of 100-750 metres.

British rocketery continued with the development of a system capable of delivering a warhead without the use of a plane to ferry it near the target. The first successful launch was the Black Arrow which was cancelled before the first test.  (Another wierd co-incidence is that the Israelis have an interceptor rocket called the Arrow that they have tested on another of their rockets called the Black Sparrow) The cancellation came at a time when the test had already been set up in Australian and the technicians thought “what the heck” and launched. Black Arrow was one of three rocket systems under development with the overtly military Blue Steel being the prime candidate for the first UK delivery system. The skin was so thin it needed the liquid fuel to provide stability and this in part led to the development of a silo system to protect it. That was later to be adopted by both the US and USSR for their land-based systems.

While Blue Steel was in itself quite succesful, using a Rolls Royce engine considerably improving on the US rocket it was based on, costs meant that development to an operational nuclear system was out of the question. Instead the choice was to go with the submarine based Polaris system bought off the shelf from the USA. a decision made in June 1963 but soon after the shortcomings of the initial system were discovered and an upgrade was decided on rather than going with the US Poseidon system.

In June 1967, the Labour Government announced in Parliament its decision not to upgrade the Polaris system by purchasing Poseidon missiles from the United States. Instead of deploying Poseidon, it was decided to re-direct work at Aldermaston to investigate the possibilities of designing a new warhead capable of penetrating Soviet defences using decoys, hardening techniques and penetration aids. Studies of the concept were made in 1967 and the decision to proceed was made by the first Wilson government that same year. By 1969 the Chevaline concept was defined and by 1972 the system had been worked out in detail. It was approved for deployment by the Heath government (1970-74), a decision finally ratified by the second Wilson government in February 1974. At the time of the Wilson decision to proceed the cost was estimated at £250 million. By 1975 this cost had increased to £400 million, and a review was held to determine whether the program should be cancelled in September. This was an important moment in British nuclear policy making because the key issue on review was more than just Chevaline – it was whether the British could afford to maintain its deterrent and competitive in the arena of nuclear arms.

Such was the secrecy surrounding this decision that its existence was not formally revealled until 1980 by which time the costs had spiralled to £1,000 million. Although based on a US program called Antelope, the extra development needed had inflated the bill.

Chevaline was a complex system was based on the coordination of the 16 missiles on a single submarine, maneuver by the RVs to elude interceptors, along with multiple decoy re-entry vehicles, and hardening of the warhead against ABM weapon effects. Each missile would fly a different trajectory so that all missiles would arrive simultaneously over the target (Moscow) and release two real warheads (reduced from the three of the AT3) plus four decoy RVs, and a large number of decoy balloons. The defense would be presented with 96 simultaneous maneuvering targets to intercept (even after the balloon decoys burned up). The system proved far more difficult to develop and deploy than expected.

The current system, Trident is unusual in that it was initiated under the Maggie and Ronnie show. Still Thatcher had the same motive – showing she had bigger balls than other PMs. Production continued until 1999 after a Labour review of the defence systems. That involved scrapping the remaining air dropped bombs and cancelling the final 7 Trident missiles – saving £50 million but involving writing off £40 million. In a first flush of post Cold-War but before 9/11 idealism Blair reduced the number of operational missiles to under 200. With the lack of any real separation of the US and UK nuclear arsenals, this would be a wet fart after the American bang.

Eight years on Blair is both a dying duck after the announcement of his resignation by August next year and desperate to put his legacy in place. There are a number of options on the table for defence after the operation life of the current system is up. This will not be needed for 20 years or more and even the USA has not decided its strategy. Still, with Blair in the last stages of megalomania, ensuring contracts for the eventual new submarines go to a British company have to be in place. This of course has nothing to do with his probable future employment with the likes of Carlisle and those with similar interests in the military/industrial complex. The decision has already been made by him despite the pretence of a Cabinet decision. The White Paper with its recommendations had already been printed.

The excuse for a replacement system appears to be “well you never know what will turn up”. The implied threat of course is the supposed Iranian development of nuclear weapons technology. Scare a Minuteman and you can get him to buy more guns, scare a country and you can con them into buying a load of new submarines.

The British Foreign Secretary has given a roadmap for the eventual pullout of British troops from Iraq. This involves the handover of the remaining provinces under British control to Iraqi responsibility.

British forces would initially withdraw completely from patrolling leaving the Iraqis with day-to-day responsibility for security.

The very significant new factor in today’s annoucement that the second city of Basra is likely to be handed over in Spring next year.
Bob Marshall-Andrews, the Labour MP who has a long track record of opposition to the war has claimed in an interview on BBC News 24 claims this is a political withdrawal to enable Blair’s retirement in a more honorable fashion. While in favor of withdrawal, his criticism is that this is being presented as a result of military success. It does however give an idea of how the US could withdraw with a facade of victory.

This is the BBC report of the annoucement in the Commons today.

The UK has “confidence” it may be able to hand over Basra security to Iraqi forces “at some point next spring”, the UK’s Foreign Secretary has said.

Margaret Beckett told MPs Iraq’s fate was “hanging in the balance” and said it was necessary “to hold our nerve”.

Mrs Beckett added that there was no question of “cutting and running”.

“The progress of our current operation in Basra gives us confidence we may be able to achieve transition in that province… at some point next spring.”

She said UK forces were making “progress” and warned that to leave too early would make the bloodshed “even worse”.

The Basra withdrawal from security operations is similar to those that have already happened in smaller provinces. The next will be the important Shia province of Najaf.

It is essential to remember this is a withdrawal to large bases to provide “oversight” rather than a full evacuation. It should also be viewed in the light of the demand for significant forces increases needed in southern Afghanistan.  

Al Jazeera’s English network has exposed a glaring error in the border security of virtually all western nations. Apologies as they do not seem to have their act together to provide lifts from the interviews in their English coverage but I will do the best to paraphrase the interview.

A-J’s Stephen Cole (formerly BBC) interviewed the Head of Interpol including about a database of stolen and lost passports. During it he revealed that only two countries use the database and only one on a full basis. You will not doubt realise that is not the USA.
The two countries to actually consult the Interpol database – to which most countries in the organisation submit data – are France and Switzerland. France only uses the system at Paris Charles de Gaulle airport but Switzerland consults it at every border control point.

The Swiss get about 100 hits a month picking up people who are using stolen or lost passports to try to cross their borders. This is of course indicative that their is a potentially huge number of people regularly travelling on illegal documentation who are not being caught by other countries. Others have pointed out that the so-called secure data now being incorporated in the “biometric” passports can be duplicated or changed using technology not dissimilar to that used to clone credit cards. Even without these changes, entry can be gained at ports and airports which do not have the necessary technology to collect the biometric readings from the person wanting entry and compare them to the passport data.

This also points out the futility of the Republican security walls they want to line the US borders with. If you are a terrorist, why bother with trying illegal entry when it seems you can use a stolen passport with impunity.

Former US Vice-President Al Gore is to advise the UK Government on the policies needed to slow the affects of climate change. The announcement came at the launch of the Stern Report into global warming that I previewed in my diary yesterday.

The report is considered so significant – described by Blair as the most important he has received during his period as Prime Minister – that he and his probably successor, Gordon Brown, were both at the formal publication announcement.

Tony Blair said the Stern Review showed the scientific evidence of global warming was “overwhelming” and its consequences “disastrous”.

The report said that rich countries must shoulder most of the responsibility for greenhouse gas emissions.

And chancellor Gordon Brown promised the UK would lead the international response to tackle climate change.

The printed Stern Report runs to some 700 pages but the summary and Stern’s presentation at the launch are available in .pdf format from links on the BBC summary.  

As I emphasised yesterday, this is the first analysis of global warming to take into account its future economic impact. Sir Nicholas is a former chief economist at the World Bank. The key bullet points of the report are:

TEMPERATURE

# Carbon emissions have already pushed up global temperatures by half a degree Celsius

# If no action is taken on emissions, there is more than a 75% chance of global temperatures rising between two and three degrees Celsius over the next 50 years

# There is a 50% chance that average global temperatures could rise by five degrees Celsius

ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT

# Melting glaciers will increase flood risk

# Crop yields will decline, particularly in Africa

# Rising sea levels could leave 200 million people permanently displaced

# Up to 40% of species could face extinction

# Increased examples of extreme weather patterns

ECONOMIC IMPACT

# Extreme weather could reduce global gross domestic product (GDP) by up to 1%

# A two to three degrees Celsius rise in temperatures could reduce global economic output by 3%

# If temperatures rise by five degrees Celsius, up to 10% of global output could be lost. The poorest countries would lose more than 10% of their output.

# In the worst case scenario global consumption per head would fall 20%

# To stabilise at manageable levels, emissions would need to stabilise in the next 20 years and fall between 1% and 3% after that. This would cost 1% of GDP.

The later points are the most important. A comparatively small investment now of around 1% of global GDP would stabilise emissions and save reductions of up to 20% of global GDP. Change is happening but could be managed given world-wide effort. The alternatives are even more worrying with the possibility of mass migration from newly unhinhabitable areas and wars for control of the increasingly scare natural resources. If Bush and the fundamentalist neocons want to engineer Armageddon in advance of “the Rapture”, they need assiduously do nothing.

A highly significant report on global warming is due to be published in the UK tomorrow when it will be unveiled by Tony Blair. It is the first done by an economist looking into the relative costs of acting immediately or delaying. The major point have been leaked and are in today’s Observer.

The 700 page report (how many forests is that one wonders) was commissioned by the Chancellor Gordon Brown and is authored by the distinguised economist Sir Nicholas Stern. He was previously a senior official with the World Bank.

The report refutes Bush’s arguments about the cost to the US economy of implementing cuts in greenhouse gases. A new Kyoto treaty to cut emmissions even further needs to be signed next year, not after Bush has left office. Big money – around $350 billion – needs to be spent globally on measures in the short term. Failure could cost the global economy over $6.6 trillion.

Also published this weekend is a report on the effects of global warming on Africa, the continent that emits the least greenhouse gases but which is most affected by them.
I should point out that the three main parties in the UK are vying to be the greenest. While the LibDems have a long record, the Conservatives have a range of suggested policies that on the face of it are greener than those of the Labour government This report is an attempt to regain some of that ground.

The Observer has some salient points in the run-up to the mid-term elections next month-

The Stern report will advocate extending the European ‘cap and trade’ system – under which carbon emissions are capped at a certain level, with businesses which need to emit more forced to buy spare emissions quotas from low-polluting businesses around the world, encouraging industry to find cleaner and cheaper ways of operating.

He will also urge a doubling of investment in energy research and a speedier Kyoto process – meaning that negotiations with the US will have to be undertaken while George Bush is still president. International governments had hoped to deal with a more sympathetic successor after 2008.

The immediate costs are also put into context.

Stern’s forecast cost of 1 per cent of global GDP is roughly the same amount as is spent worldwide on advertising, and half what the World Bank estimates a full-blown flu pandemic would cost. Without early intervention, he estimates the cost would be 5-20 per cent of GDP, some paid by governments, some by the private sector. But he stresses that unilateral action will not be enough – if Britain shut down all its power stations tomorrow, the reduction in global emissions would be cancelled out within 13 months by rising emissions from China.

Stern will advocate new funds to help Africa and developing nations adapt, but will argue the key challenge is from emerging nations such as China and India. Emissions from China are nearly level with the US and likely to increase as the Chinese get more cars and electrical goods – up to 30 million households are likely to get digital TVs alone in the next few years. Britain will push this week for more energy-efficient consumer goods.

The Independent on Sunday (Sindie) puts the Stern review in its UK and US political context.

The Stern review will tomorrow spell out the enormous consequences for the world of failing to control climate change and will take issue directly with President Bush’s insistence – at times apparently backed by Tony Blair – that tackling it would be economically ruinous.

It will show, on the contrary, that refusing to take action would lead to the biggest worldwide economic crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s, with “catastrophic consequences” around the globe, whereas tackling it would be relatively inexpensive, and could, indeed, stimulate the world economy.

The 700-page review will call for immediate action, criticise the United States, take a swipe at the conventional economics that have dominated thinking for the past quarter of a century, suggest measures to cut pollution at home, and call for increased aid to help poor countries – such as those in Africa – cope with the effects of global warming.

It’s the effects on Africa that are discussed in the other report previewed this weekend. This is an update of a report by the Working Group on Climate Change and Development, an alliance of 22 bodies, “Africa – Up in Smoke?”. This persuaded Brown of the importance of the issue. It has dire predictions for the consequences of what is already being experienced on the continent.

“Africa is steadily warming,” it concludes. “It is becoming clear that in many places dangerous climate change is already taking place.” The six warmest years ever recorded in Africa have all been since 1987, it says, and in many parts of the continent temperatures are expected to rise twice as fast as in the world as a whole. The result will be to drive its climate ever more towards extremes. Traditionally arid areas such as the north-east and south of the continent, and the Sahel on the fringes of the Sahara in west Africa, are becoming drier – with increased droughts – while rainy areas, such as equatorial Africa, are getting wetter, with more floods.

Even worse, perhaps, the weather is becoming increasingly unpredictable, with confusing changes in the seasons, making it harder and harder for poor farmers to know when to invest their scarce time and resources into planting, tending and harvesting their crops.

The report predicts that “climate change will reduce crop yields by 10 per cent over the whole of Africa”, a catastrophic development in a hungry continent which, even now, is struggling to increase its harvests enough to feed its rapidly growing population. But even this figure, as an average, disguises much greater, more local disasters.

Tanzania, for example, expects its maize harvests to fall by a third, and its millet yield to go down by three-quarters. Meanwhile the sorghum crop, another staple, is expected to drop by as much as four-fifths in Sudan.

In all, according to other predictions, 40 per cent of Africa’s countries will suffer “major losses” in cereal production. Yet four out of every five of its people depend on agriculture for their livelihoods – and the number of the desperately poor has almost doubled, to more than 500 million, in the past 25 years.

Their solution is going to be as painful as Stern predicts and illustrates the level of action needed. The BBC reports

Between $10bn (£5.2bn) and $40bn is needed annually, the report says, but industrialised countries have given only $43m – a tenth of the amount they have pledged – while rich country fossil fuel subsidies total $73bn a year.

The agencies say that greenhouse emissions cuts of 60% – 90% will ultimately be needed – way beyond the targets set in the Kyoto agreement.

“Climate change is overwhelming the situation in Africa… unless we take genuine steps now to reduce our emissions, people in the developed world will be condemning millions to hunger, starvation and death,” said Tony Juniper, executive director of Friends of the Earth.

Inaction by the USA is going to create even further foreign policy problems. It is not like those most affected by global warming are unaware what is causing the effects they are witnessing. As the Sindie points out:

Around Habiba Hassan’s home no one can remember a drought this severe. Children have been dying, and the land, in her words, is “turning to desert”. She has no doubt about the cause: “It’s global warming.” How does she know? The people of her village had learnt about it from the BBC Somali service, heard on their £2.50 radios.

The BBC World Service is funded by the British government’s Foreign Office. Cannot even trust your friends not to fund subversives can you Mr Bush!

Four pieces of news from Africa this week are likely to have significance in the future. One is likely to ignite demonstrations by the religious Right all over the USA from next June.

(I had intended to post this here much earlier but could not get access. I had to park it in Eurotrib and the orange one).
Lucy in Texas with Demos

The hot news for the USA is the annoucement on Wednesday  that Ethopian officials have completed negotiations with the Houston (Texas) Museum of Natural Sciences to loan a fossil for study. It will also form the centepiece of an 11 city tour of museums.

The remains of the female Australopithecus afarensis are better known as “Lucy” after they were found while the Beatles song was playing to the archaeologists. No transitional speciaes have been found but the Australopiticines are believed to be an important pre-cursor to hominids, including homo sapiens sapiens (that’s thee and me) The “family tree” goes something like this.

Of course this goes a long way to demonstrating that the crude version of Darwinian theory, of human evolution from a common ancestor with the modern great apes, has a basis in the fossil record. Even stronger evidence of a close family relation with man was found earlier this year. The skeleton of an immature female was found which included the skull and a sandstone impression of the brain. Those studying it now believe it demonstrates that the species had the long slow development typical of humans. Of course a scientifically based claim merely that the skeleton is 3.3 million years old is enough for Genesis purists to man the barriers. They point to a Tuesday morning about 3000 BC as the time of the Creation. Look forward to fun and games from them when the touring exhibition starts.

An African Nobel Prize

Thursday will see the launch in London of the Mo Ibrahim Prize for Achievement in African Leadership This project has the support of Bill Clinton, Nelson Mandela and Kofi Annan. An annual prize of $500,000 for 10 years and $100,000 a year for life after that. It will go to the African head of state  whose nation tops an annual table of good governance, 53 countries will be assessed by Harvard University. It will be the world’s richest prize.

Importantly, the money will only be given after the head of state leaves office. They will only get it if they hand over to their successor in a democratic process. Its supporters see it as a way of improving governance and removing the motivation for corruption. Some dissenters point out that the mineral riches of Africa could give the corrupt and even bigger booty. To achieve the ideas the rest of the world will have to cooperate with incoming democratic governments to track down and repatriate the riches corrupt leaders have stolen. That way there will be a stick as well as a carrot towards government for the people.

OIL

Where would a report from overseas be with this administration if it did not include a reference to “black gold”. The dollar signs must be spinning in the eyes of the State Department that oil and natural gas has been discovered in Zambia. The locations are in the Chavuma and Zambezi districts in north-western Zambia near the border with Angola, itself an oil exporting nation.

Zambia is considered very much a political success story. Although there are allegations of improprieties in the election, the sitting President Levy Mwanawasa was re-elected to a second five year term in September.

When I was there a couple of months before the 2001 election the local press were reporting corruption in the previous administration. Pretty low level stuff compared to Halliburton, Enron etc but significant in terms of the ordinary Zambian. At that time there were financial difficulties and anecdotally I was told by a middle class white Zambia that the best contraceptive was to whisper “school fees”.  Mwanawasa is credited in the linked BBC report with tackling corruption and attracting foreign investment to the country. The local currency the Kwacha has strengthened (because of past inflation you never see the sub-unit the ngwee – 100 ngwee = 1 Kwacha – and, at least while I was there, you virtually only saw paper currency)

The principal and virtually only Zambian foreign exchange earner was copper. Dependency on the world price of the metal and the currency strength meant that there is still a lot of poverty. Foreign investment is being used to encourage diversification into tourism and things like oil exploration. Like many developing countries; its capital, Lusaka, is a contrast between office blocks and fancy country club style hotels for the rich and shanty slums besides the railway track for the poor. Millions are below the poverty line and of course AIDS is taking a toll. Nevertheless, Zambia is one of those nations I have optimism for and this oil discovery should go a long way towards providing economic stability so that the worst of extreme poverty can be relieved. Let’s hope a new period of economic  “chachacha” will improve the lot of those millions living on under $1 a day.

In case you are wondering why Zambias seem to be fixated on ballroom dancing (a main road in Lusaka is named it), it was the name given to the period of time in which the Zambian people fought for and gained their independence in 1964. It alludes to a steam locomotive starting up.

4000% Inflation

If Mwanawasa looks like a strong contender for a Mo Ibrahim Prize, his immediate southern neighbour must be a strong contended for the booby prize. More evidence this week of the basket case the Zimbabwean economy has become under Mugabe. The cost of tickets on Air Zimbabwe were increased by 500% putting air travel out of the reach of all but the richest. Many of those are anyway banned from travelling to EU countries because of their connection with the government and its repressive tactics.

Last month the official annual inflation figure for August was announced as 1204.6% This is expected to reach 1,800% by the end of the year. Unofficially the annual rate is already believed to be 4000%. The price of an return air ticket from Harare to London of Zim$ 1,865,000 (US$ 7,460) hides the recent currency reform when three zeros were knocked off the end. Thus new Zim$1,865,000 equals old Zim$1,865,000,000. Even today you only need carry 10 pieces of paper to have a million (Zimbabwean) dollars in your pocket.

 

George W Bush has condemned Americans to death. I am not talking about the woman whose pleas for clemency produced his sociopathic laughter, I am talking of the thousands who have been and will be killed as a result of his lies.

He is not the only one. Just as culpable is Hillary Rodham Clinton and every Senator and Representative who voted for or supported the invasion of Iraq. Every voter who voted Republican in 2002. And yes, I am afraid that everyone who failed to oppose Bush’s adventure before the War, including those who have now “seen the error of their ways”. Every one of those or you is responsible.

Just like maxing out a credit card, responsiblity has its costs. Unlike financial responsibility, you cannot declare bankruptcy and avoid the responsibility for this war. You cannot run away from it. Your vote, your silence signed the death warrent of every American soldier, every Coalition  soldier, every contractor and every Iraqi who has died and will die because you did not challenge Bush’s lies. “Bombing” did not kill them, nor soldier, nor “insurgents”. nor “terrorists”, not even the bacterium in the child’s tainted water that was not boiled away because there was no electricity. Every death, every wound is down to you. Accept  your responsibility and accept the debt you owe to your victims.

The china shop principle is well known. You break it, you pay for it. In the case of Iraq the cost will not only have to be repaid in money but in blood and dishonor.

In order to assess what the cost is going to be, let’s first look at the china before it was broken. In the north there was a virtually autonomous state run by a coalition of politcal parties and their militias who were united in their opposition to Saddam. The rest of the country had a relative stability too. In the main cities, the basic infrastructure worked. Hospitals for the majority were chronically but at least there was a good cohort of skilled doctors and a vaccination program was about to start under the auspices of the WHO. Food rations were reasonably accessible. A fairly nasty military dictator (whose actions I will remind you were tolerated by successive US administrations before the invasion of Kuwait) was syphoning off money from the oil-for-food program by manipulating sales vouchers. On the other hand there was a functioning army and police which provided general stability for those who were not Saddam’s political opponents. For most there was a sort of perverse security in that provided you did not express political opposition to Saddam, you were fairly assured of your personal safety. Kurds and the Marsh Arabs did undergo collective punishment by gas bombing or the draining of the marshes but generally Sunni and Shia lived together peacefully.

Let’s be frank, the War did achieve one aim, the overthrow of Saddam Hussein Al-Tikriti. He is currently stroking his beard in court and is after all getting on a bit. We are not likely to again see him reviewing an army marching under that cermonial arch of raised swords. Bush did at least get his ambition of bettering his father.  What should now be honestly considering is the very minimum that could be regarded as a successful outcome of the UN and “Iraqi elected government” sanctioned presence of American (and coalition) military personnel. If we accept the “china shop” principle, could we “fix it” after “breaking it”? To see if that is at least a possibility, we have to see where we are now.

The deficiencies in things like the electrity, sewerage and water systems are well known. Maybe instead of statistics we should be looking at the everyday experience of ordinary Iraqis. That’s something we rarely glimpse apart from through the few blogs still written and their authors.  The BBC aired on Tuesday the story of a Baghdad emergency room, filmed by one of the doctors who has now fled the country. The hospitals are, you will remember, one sector on which  hundreds of millions of US tax dollars have flowed. Mostly into the hands of contractors like Halliburton. The film is in their  “This World” strand  and if you can access it I urge you to watch it if you can. The viewer is accessed via the link near the top right. If you cannot, a  fuller description  is available. A lot focusses on the work of a “Doctor Ali” whose one relaxation is to be in the operating theatre of the hospital. At least there he is not afraid of militia, the official security forces or ordinary Iraqis marching into the ER demanding a relative be treated immediately. The doctor filming also went out with the ambulance crews on emergency calls to bombings. One salient point is that in the areas they control, Sadr’s militia is seen as protecting the population more than the police, indeed they are criticised for removing the militia’s checkpoints that stop bombs getting through. Particular harrowing was the mother being reassured that her children were probably OK as they were inside. Only those playing outside had been killed by the bomb. On the way to the hospital this Shia woman screams for her tears for the return of Saddam. At least then you were not constantly afraid of random attack. You may know Kipling’s “White Man’s Burden”. This woman reminded me of the lines.

The cry of hosts ye humour

 (Ah, slowly!) toward the light:–

” Why brought ye us from bondage,

 ” Our loved Egyptian night! “

The best summation of the situation though are the words of the doctor/film maker himself.

Despite the daily dose of horror, the doctor says life is not worse at the ER than for anyone else in Baghdad.

“We become immune. Everyone is under threat in Baghdad.”

But despite the dangers, the doctor is not planning to join the exodus of middle-class professionals.

“People don’t know what is going on in Iraq, they can’t hear the Iraqi people screaming. Iraqis need a voice. Making films is a better way of serving my country, of trying to draw people’s attention.”

In formulating policies on further involvement in Iraq it is those screams we should try to hear. As demonstrated in the film through the words of ordinary Iraqis, the westernised politicians appointed by Bush’s much vaunted democratic process are seen increasingly as self-serving kleptocrats. Perhaps it is time to not regard Sadr and his fellow politician/clerics and their militias as the problem but a possible part of the solution.

The best that probably can be aimed for is to leave behind conditions that will allow a speedy return to the situation before the war. The only bright aspect you can console yourself with is that, for the moment, the dams have been breeched and the souther Marshes ae starting to recover.

This is going to be contraversial because it means a new mental approach. Instead of limiting the loss of American lives it becomes necessary to acknowledge that sacrifice and probably at a far, far higher rate than before will be necessary on the part of the Americans before withdrawal merely to reduce the daily death rate among Iraqis. Unless you opposed the war and, dear Democratic members of Congress, voted against it: you agreed to the deaths of Americans in 2006, 2007 and onwards when you failed to properly provide a balance to the Executive in 2003. If you counter argue “we were lied to” I say – you permitted yourself to be lied to. You did not examine the neocon’s case. If you had even bothered to get expert advice, you would not now have the lives of perhaps a million on your conscience – those who have died and those who will die before and after the War as a result of the mess you created. It was your craven populism then that led to the situation now.

A policy of leaving with the intention of saving US lives has inevitable consequences. You are acknowledging what was obvious to all of us who realised the impotence of a convential army, even the size of the US one, to control a hostile population. That surely is the lesson of Israel in Palestine, let alone Lebanon. You may have virtually unlimited nuclear overkill but as I wrote elsewhere before the war as an analogy “Humvees will not go down narrow Iraqi streets”.

If you are not prepared to make ten or a hundred times the sacrifice of US lives lost in Iraq, you cannot use armed force in hegenemistic exploits anywhere. You (I would strongly argue) would conceed that you are spending hundreds of billions each year on a white elephant. The agent of the “New American Century”  became impotent in the first couple of years of the millenium. You will therefore have to face up going through the end of Empire before it was even widely acknowledged. Rather than arguing the Republican line that other country’s should “step up to the line” by spending far nearer the propotion of GDP expended by the USA, you should argue that the USA should acknowledge its place as, at most “prima inter pares” and spend nearer the average of, say Chine. Despite the problems of the structural changes involved, this would actually free up money for that great goal of many Democrats, universal health care for every America

(Also posted in Orange)

Today is the festival of Diwali for Hindus, Sikhs and Jains. The different traditions have various explanations for the origins of the “Festival of Lights” but the symbolism is the same: the victory of light over darkness, good over evil and, most importantly for Bush, knowledge over ignorance.

Perversely there is even some hope that Bush might at long last be faced with the real situation in Iraq. General John Abizaid may be the commander in Iraq but he has long been marginalised by the neo-cons because of his deep personal knowledge of the area. There is a chance, just a chance, that the video conference call Bush is making today will allow Abizaid to beat the truth of the situation through those neandathal brow ridges.

While we are at it, it is a useful time to enlighten BooTrib readers about what actually happened in Amarah this week.
In the cursory way that the US broadcast media cover anything in Iraq and outside Baghdad in particulat, the situation in Ararah has been woefully explained. If you are to believe them, this is an attempt by the Mehdi Army, the militia led by the cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, to take over the city. When you know that the Mayor is a member of Sadr’s party and the city council is under their political control, you begin to see that this analysis is flawed.

Here the Foreign editor of London’s Evening Standard has gone into some detail. This was not a Shia/Sunni clash but a fight between two different Shia factions. On Sky News this morning  it was even suggested that al-Sadr himself did not order the attack but it was a local decided attack. Here is the  background to the fighting:

Fighting broke out on Thursday after Qassim al-Tamimi, the provincial head of police intelligence and a leading member of the Shia Badr Brigade militia, was killed by a roadside bomb.

In retaliation, his family kidnapped the teenage brother of the rival Mahdi Army commander in Amarah, Sheik Fadel al-Bahadli, to demand the hand-over of al-Tamimi’s killers.

Badr and the Mahdi Army, allied to Muqtada al-Sadr, have struggled for years for control in the south.

The BBC have a slightly different take on what happened to Sheik al-Bahadli’s brother which goes to explain the attacks on the police station.

t is thought the violence was sparked on Thursday morning by the arrest of the brother of the local leader of the Mehdi militia, loyal to the radical Shia cleric Moqtada Sadr.

Gunmen attacked a number of police stations in Amara ….

As should have been obvious since the upsurge in violence led to the burning of a British armored personnel carrier in Basra earlier in the year, the police are not neutral. They have their own loyalties to the different factions and in Amarah it was those allied to the Mehdi militia who have control – that way the arrest of the young Sadr loyalist can be seen as both an arrest and a blackmailing kidnap.

These clashes happened in a city from which the British had withdrawn and handed over control to the local Iraqis. The initial policing action to stop the fighting has been left to the Iraqi Army and negotiators. The are following the exact tactic that Abizaid had tried to introduce in the US controlled areas but then got diverted for political reasons to “pacify” Baghdad so the US media based there do not have so many opportunities of getting shots of things like ammo dumps blowing up. That is hand over control, stand back and monitor and only intervene if the Iraqi control totally breaks down. From the in the BBC page:  

Major Charlie Burbridge, based in Basra, confirmed that British forces were providing air surveillance in the city.

He told Reuters news agency: “There were a number of clashes between the Iraqi police and rogue elements of militias in Amara.

Notice no talk of “insurgents” in an attempt to build some sort of tenuous link with a worldwide “terra” campaign but calling it what it is, a traditional tribal clash set against a backround of different power bases. When you do not have an election timetable with three weeks to go you can let things play out without crashing in with the cavalry. Burbage is further quoted in the Standard page linked above to explain this.

‘The situation there we consider very serious, there’s no doubt about that.

‘There are reports of 200-300 gunmen. Maysan for many years has been a very difficult place for the rule of law to operate. Local disputes are settled with the gun. We’re watching how the Iraqi security services are dealing with it.

‘We see this as a very serious test of the Iraqi security forces which they had to face at some time.’

He said that the battle group was backed up with ‘intelligence assets’ and defence sources confirmed that the SAS would be called upon if the situation deteriorates further.

British commanders were pinning their hopes on a top-level political delegation including the Iraqi security minister Shirwan al-Waeli.

He said: ‘Amarah is a tribal town so it turned into a crisis,’ adding that police neutrality was a problem because some officers were loyal to their tribes.

You will also realise that the “Balkanisation” of Iraq is not going to stop the killing. These sorts of inter-factional fights go hand in hand with those between the different Islamic traditions of Sunni and Shia (and Sunni Arabs and Sunni Kurds). There is increasing evidence that the Sunni “insurgents” have one large faction which contains the former Iraqi Army. These are the ones who simultaneously released the videos of the snipers shooting Americans and offered to enter talks. Their object is not to get the Americans out, very much the opposite in some ways . What they are attempting is to bomb their way to the negotiating table in the hopes that the Americans will realise that a Sunni strongman is needed to establish the sort of control that the country had under Saddam. To do this they need the Americans on side to help overthrow the discredited Baghdad central government and replace it with a provisional government led by these ex-military men. In actuality, this may be dellusional on their part as they try to regain the centuries old political dominance of the minority Sunni over the Shia. To a large extent then, American policies and aims in Iraq are irrelevant. The scenario will play out with or without them and whatever Bush decides. The inevitable outcome will be either control by one of the sectarial leaders like Sadr or the emergence of a new Saddam. Either way, the prospect of establishing an American style democracy is gone. In Bush’s terms, the war is lost.  

Now my analysis may be out on some of the details but I would assert it is a lot close to the reality than the cowboys and indians vision of the likes of Rumsfeld. Abizaid, coming from the region, knows the nuances and will have far greater knowledge. Let’s hope he can get the real position over and take the initiative for US policy out of Rumsfeld’s cold dead hands. We will know he has if Rummy decides to spend more time with his family by Christmas.    

The BBC explanation of Diwali quotes the Time of India:

“Regardless of the mythological explanation one prefers, what the festival of lights really stands for today is a reaffirmation of hope, a renewed commitment to friendship and goodwill, and a religiously sanctioned celebration of the simple — and some not so simple — joys of life.”

It is also a time for renewal and new beginnings. In one tradition, the lights are to guide a returning warrior prince home from exile. Too many homes in the USA are awaiting the return of their warrior prince or princess. Let’s hope that today will see the first steps in that journey.

A Diwali prayer is “Lead me from darkness to light”. We can only hope and pray that Bush is led out of the darkness of ignorance today.

Happy Diwali  

The BBC has been told by its sources within Britain’s security services that they believe the UK is now Al Qaeda’s principle tartget. From a series of disperate people and small groups, they have now set up a complex cell structure similar to that employed by the IRA in their campaign on the mainland.

Despite intensive security measures and the IRA being easier to infiltrate (if only because of the relative lack of available and appropriate agents), the IRA succeeded in exploding large vehicle bombs which destroyed parts of the City of London and much of central Manchester. A particular target of Al Qaeda is believed to be the London 2012 Olympics. The security services are already vetting anybody involved in these games, including the contractors working on the various buildings and sites.

The message is clear. The “War on Terra” has made the UK less safe. We are fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq so that we can draw attacks at home, cynically I could add so that the USA is not attacked.
This is no political leak of the likes of the non-existant threat to the sports stadiums in the USA. This is a credible briefing to a reliable news organisation. We know from the David Kelly case that these contacts are regular and their briefings are authoratative. As you can imagine, this is the main lead on their main early evening news.

This is the substance of the main story on their web site:

Security sources say the situation has never been so grim, said BBC home affairs correspondent Margaret Gilmore.

They believe the network is now operating a cell structure in the UK – like the IRA did – and sees the 7 July bomb attacks “as just the beginning”.

Each cell has a leader, a quartermaster dealing with weapons, and volunteers.

According to our correspondent, each cell works on separate, different plots, with masterminds controlling several different cells.

Those involved in the cells were often aware they were being followed and so were meeting in public spaces. In addition, training is taking place in the UK and Pakistan.

It was thought that five years ago al-Qaeda was a number of “loosely-connected organisations” with common aims, but it is now more organised, she said.

Security officials are concerned the group is targeting universities and the community, and are “less worried” about mosques, she added.

The network is targeting men in their late teens and early 20s, according to our correspondent.

“They set up groups a bit like Boy Scouts or Boys’ Brigade… totally legitimate.

“Those who are particularly interested they start giving religious indoctrination.Then those who are very interested they start introducing to political teachings, anti-Western rhetoric.

“And those who are still interested they then start giving technical training. They also start sending them on bonding sessions to things like white-water rafting. You end up with a small team of people – the cell is prepared.

“A lot of this is happening outside London,” our correspondent added

The July 7 bombers in London are known to have gone white water rafting together and that is believed to have been one of these bonding session. This has obviously been a major investigation as they have senior reporting staff on it. The item continues and explains the way the threat has developed.

BBC security correspondent Gordon Corera said the view was Britain was particularly vulnerable because “it may be easier for al-Qaeda to strike the UK than other targets”.

He said these views were “based on activity they are actually seeing. Plots they’re disrupting, trials which might be coming up soon”.

“There is hard evidence behind it, rather than just theories,” said our correspondent.

“That’s based partly on what they are seeing, in terms of the types of activity, and partly based on the coincidence, that al-Qaeda’s leadership is based in the tribal areas of Pakistan where there are links to the UK and flows of people going back and forwards. It makes it easier to make the UK a target than the other countries it might wish to target.”

The network also appeared to be better organised, he continued.

“The leadership of al-Qaeda does appear to have been re-grouping and to be more coherent and organised than had been thought in recent years.

“The view is it clearly was an organised group before 9/11, but the campaign in Afghanistan disrupted that leadership very heavily. But in recent years, particularly in the tribal areas between Pakistan and Afghanistan, the al-Qaeda leadership has been able to re-group and re-organise itself.

“In doing so it’s (Al Qaeda is) able to open up channels of communication, contact, recruitment and planning around the world, and operate those in a more coherent fashion than maybe we were seeing three years’ ago.”

(some reformatting and emphases by me on the orginal cut and paste, cross posted in orange)