Military Resistance 11B16
Obama Sends 100 U.S. Troops To Back French War On Mali:
“The U.S. Defense Official Said ‘I Think It’s Safe To Say The Number Will Probably Grow’”
“Officials Said The Obama Administration Had Not Ruled Out Arming The Predators With Missiles In The Future”
“Senior U.S. Officials Have Said For Months That They Would Not Put U.S. Military ‘Boots On The Ground’ In Mali”
French soldiers crouch behind a wall during fighting with Islamists in Gao February 21, 2013. French and Malian troops fought Islamists on the streets of Gao and a car bomb exploded in Kidal on Thursday, as fighting showed little sign of abating weeks before France plans to start withdrawing some forces. REUTERS/Joe Penney
22 February 2013 by Craig Whitlock, Washington Post & BBC
President Obama announced Friday that about 100 U.S. troops have been deployed to the West African country of Niger, where defense officials said they are setting up a drone base to spy on al-Qaeda fighters in the Sahara and assist French forces in neighbouring Mali.
Senior U.S. officials have said for months that they would not put U.S. military “boots on the ground” in Mali, an impoverished nation that has been mired chaos since March when a U.S.-trained Malian army captain took power in a coup.
But U.S. troops are becoming increasingly involved in the conflict from the skies and the rear echelons, where they are supporting the French and African militaries seeking to stabilize the region.
A U.S. defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity to provide further details about military operations, said the 40 troops who arrived in Niger Wednesday were almost all Air Force personnel and that their mission is to support drone flights.
The official said drone operations were “imminent,” but declined to say whether unmanned Predator aircraft had already arrived in Niger or how many would be deployed there. The drones will be based initially in the capital, Niamey, but military officials would like to move them eventually to the northern city of Agadez, which is closer to parts of northern Mali where al-Qaeda cells have taken root.
“That’s a better location for the mission, but it’s not feasible at this point,” the official said, adding that Agadez is a more remote city “with logistical challenges.”
The introduction of Predators to Niger fills a gap in the Pentagon’s military capabilities over the Sahara, which remains beyond the reach of its drone bases in East Africa and southern Europe.
The U.S. defense official said it is likely that more U.S. troops will deploy to Niger, but declined to be specific. “I think it’s safe to say the number will probably grow.”
The Predators in Niger will only conduct surveillance, not airstrikes, the official said. “This is purely an intelligence gathering mission,” he said. “Other officials said the Obama administration had not ruled out arming the Predators with missiles in the future”
A senior Niger official said in January that US Ambassador Bisa Williams requested permission to establish a drone base in a meeting with Niger President Mahamadou Issoufou, the Reuters news agency reported.
Last month, the US and Niger struck an agreement on the status of US forces as the two nations “define precisely what kind of military presence we may have in Niger in the future”, a spokeswoman for the US state department said.
The new deployment of US forces are stationed in Niger with the government’s consent, Mr Obama said in his letter to Congress.
They will be armed for their own protection, he said.
Thousands of troops from France and African nations have been sent to Mali to oust Islamist militants.
They have recaptured the major towns in northern Mali.
AFGHANISTAN WAR REPORTS
Foreign Occupation “Servicemember” Killed Somewhere Or Other In Afghanistan:
Nationality Not Announced
February 22, 2013 AP
A foreign servicemember died following an improvised explosive device attack in southern Afghanistan today.
POLITICIANS REFUSE TO HALT THE BLOODSHED
THE TROOPS HAVE THE POWER TO STOP THE WAR
German Soldier Wounded In Khawaj Ghaltan
February 22, 2013 Associated Press
A German soldier was wounded and two Afghan policemen were killed in a pre-dawn operation against insurgents in the Khawaj Ghaltan neighborhood of the eastern city of Kunduz.
Four insurgents were also killed, said Sarwar Husseini. Also in the southern city of Kandahar a police officer was killed and two were wounded in a hand grenade attack, said Javeed Faisal, a spokesman for the provincial governor.
The Taliban Vowed On Thursday To Target Government Employees:
“No Afghan Can Accept That The Above Mentioned People Are Civilian”
“We Have Pledged In The Beginning Of Our Yearly Operations That These People Are Criminals”
February 22, 2013 The Gulf Today
KABUL: The Taliban vowed on Thursday to target government employees and other Afghan civilians they consider linked to the US-led coalition despite a warning from the United Nations that such killings may violate international law.
Zabiullah Mujahid rejected an annual report issued by the UN Mission in Afghanistan that accused the Taliban of targeting civilians and blamed the insurgency for the overwhelming majority of deaths in its war against President Hamid Karzai’s government and the foreign military coalition.
“Regretfully the report published by the head of the UNAMA in Kabul, about the civilian casualties in the country, does not bear impartiality,” Mujahid said in the email, written in English.
“The obvious thing is that our enemy is exhausted with our mine tactics and has suffered serious losses and you want to defame our effective resource,” Mujahid said.
Mujahid retorted that the Taliban do not consider many of these people to be civilians.
“No Afghan can accept that the above mentioned people are civilian. We have pledged in the beginning of our yearly operations that these people are criminals.”
“They are directly involved in the protraction of our country’s invasion and legally we do not find any difficulty in their elimination, rather we consider it our obligation,” Mujahid said.
IF YOU DON’T LIKE THE RESISTANCE
END THE OCCUPATION
MILITARY NEWS
Insurgent Attacks In Damascus Target Political, Security And Military Symbols Of Assad Dictatorship:
“Mortar Rounds Hit The Syrian Army’s General Staff Headquarters”
February 21, 2013 By SAM DAGHER, Wall Street Journal [Excerpts]
BEIRUT — Dozens of Syrians were killed and wounded on Thursday in a wave of car bombs and mortar attacks targeting political, security and military symbols of President Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Damascus, according to witnesses, state media and opposition activists.
The attacks were among the deadliest in the capital since the start of the civil war in March 2011. Many observers and analysts said they saw them as an attempt by militant members of the opposition to ratchet up the pressure on Mr. Assad to accept a negotiated settlement and relinquish power.
At least 53 people were killed and 235 wounded in the deadliest attack, which involved a car bombing, Syrian state media said.
The attack occurred in Mazraa, a busy area of central Damascus not far from the offices of the governing Baath Party, several ministries and the Russian Embassy.
Security has been tight for months in Mazraa, which is bisected by a congested thoroughfare called Thawra Street. Several checkpoints dot the area.
Residents and opposition activists said there were three other car bombings in Damascus on Thursday, of a police station, a security unit in charge of telecommunications surveillance and a drug-enforcement agency—all in the Barzeh neighborhood, on the capital’s northeastern side.
Several mortar rounds also hit the Syrian army’s general staff headquarters on Ummayad Square, on the city’s west side, and nearby Jahez park, as well as other streets and squares known to house government and security offices, according to residents and activists.
The observatory said at least 22 people, mostly security-force members, were killed in those other attacks.
Later Thursday, three mortar shells exploded in the Maleki upscale neighborhood on the capital’s northwestern side, where Mr. Assad and several members of his regime maintain residences, the observatory said, adding that further details weren’t known.
A woman living in Barzeh, where other explosions occurred, said the attack on the police station there has provoked clashes between rebels and security forces and regime loyalists that were continuing.
She said she had been out shopping and still hadn’t been able to go home, where her husband was stuck.
By sundown, many parts of Damascus were deserted, with armed regime security forces in military fatigues as well as in civilian clothes fanning out on the streets, according to residents.
Separately, at least 18 people were killed in an airstrike by the Syrian regime on a rebel field hospital in the southern city of Deraa, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
FORWARD OBSERVATIONS
“At a time like this, scorching irony, not convincing argument, is needed. Oh had I the ability, and could reach the nation’s ear, I would, pour out a fiery stream of biting ridicule, blasting reproach, withering sarcasm, and stern rebuke.
“For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder.
“We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake.”
“The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppose.”
Frederick Douglass, 1852
The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point is to change it.
-- Karl Marx, “Theses on Feuerbach”
OBEY
Photograph by Mike Hastie. [For more about the photograph, see below]
From: Mike Hastie
To: Military Resistance Newsletter
Sent: February 22, 2013
Subject: OBEY
OBEY
The Corporate State of Obedience.
Killing us as fast as they can.
We are billions of processed containers laced
with Obedience going down a conveyor belt
called Oblivion.
There are only so many chairs around a global
dinner table, and the Corporate Elite will be lifting
off from helicopters and pushing us off, as what
happened at the end of the Vietnam War.
As we all remember who were alive at that time,
there was an American on one of the helicopters
who was hitting a Vietnamese man with a closed
fist as he was trying to get on the helicopter.
The American’s facial expression said it all as it
personified U.S. corporate greed around the world.
The United States is the most rabid extremist country
in the world.
In order to survive, one must excuse themselves from
their daily routine of habits, and rebel against the King’s
table.
Mike Hastie
Army Medic Vietnam
February 22, 2013
Horror arises and in its presence men and women are seized by an
involuntary outburst of feeling which is very much like a scream--
sometimes, as we have seen, literally a scream. And in this crude cry
the will to bear witness is born.
This pitiful sound, which sometimes, goodness knows how, reaches into the remotest prison cell, is a con- centrated expression of the last vestige of human dignity. It is a man’s way of leaving a trace, of telling people how he lived and died. By his screams he asserts his right to live, sends a message to the outside
world demanding help and calling for resistance.
If nothing else is left, one must scream. Silence is the real crime against humanity.
-- Nadezhda Mandelstam, Hope Against Hope
Photograph by Mike Hastie.
Taken in Santa Monica, California on August 19, 2012.
The scene is, “ Arlington West,” where every Sunday for the past several years, crosses have been displayed on the beach for every American soldier killed in Iraq and Afghanistan.
A White Cross represents 1 soldier, a Red Cross represents 10 soldiers killed. This is a “Veterans For Peace” project.
While photographing that day, a woman walked by wearing a shirt that had the word, “OBEY” on it. I simply asked her if she would pose for the picture.
Obviously, there are COUNTLESS crosses missing for every civilian killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. This is the great silent tragedy representing the chairs missing around the global dinner table.
Photo and narrative from the portfolio of Mike Hastie, US Army Medic, Vietnam 1970-71. (For more of his outstanding work, contact at: () T)
One day while I was in a bunker in Vietnam, a sniper round went over my head. The person who fired that weapon was not a terrorist, a rebel, an extremist, or a so-called insurgent. The Vietnamese individual who tried to kill me was a citizen of Vietnam, who did not want me in his country. This truth escapes millions.
Mike Hastie
U.S. Army Medic
Vietnam 1970-71
December 13, 2004
“To Believe That The Syrian Regime Is On The Left Or, Worse, That Assad Is ‘A Socialist, A Humanist And A Pacifist’ As Chávez Put It So Embarrassingly, Is At Best Ignorance”
“There Shouldn’t Be Any Hesitation For Anyone On The Left In Standing Completely On The Side Of The Syrian People In Their Fight Against This Brutal, Exploitive, And Corrupt Dictatorship”
“In Syria Like Everywhere Else, The Left Should Support The Popular Movement Against The Dictatorships Unhesitatingly”
Excerpt from interview of Gilbert Achcar, International Socialist Review No 87, January-February 2013
Well, syria is no exception to the whole pattern of the uprising in the sense that you have a very dictatorial regime, actually one of the most despotic in the region, along with Gaddafi’s Libya and the Saudi Kingdom.
On the other hand, this is a country where the social economic crisis was most acute, with very high unemployment, 30 percent poverty rate, and on the other hand, a ruling family concentrating power and wealth at an incredible degree.
The cousin of the Syrian president controls 60 percent of the economy. His personal wealth is estimated at $6 billion. All this was a very explosive cocktail, and it exploded.
On the Left, you’ve had communists participating in the Syrian government. It’s a tradition that exists from the time of the Soviet Union, which used to have close relations with the Syrian regime that were continued by Putin’s Russia.
But most of the Left, if not all the Left in the true sense of the term, is against the regime.
The major left-wing party of Syria is represented in the Syrian National Council: it is the dissident wing of the Communists, which split in the 1970s and opposed collaboration with the regime.
To believe that the Syrian regime is on the left or, worse, that Assad is “a socialist, a humanist and a pacifist” as Chávez put it so embarrassingly, is at best ignorance.
There shouldn’t be any hesitation for anyone on the left in standing completely on the side of the Syrian people in their fight against this brutal, exploitive, and corrupt dictatorship.
Beyond that, in Syria as in every other country of the region, you find among the forces struggling against the regimes Islamic fundamentalists. It was the case in Tunisia and Egypt likewise.
They should not be taken as pretexts to denigrate the whole uprising.
In Syria like everywhere else, the Left should support the popular movement against the dictatorships unhesitatingly, and in doing so, all the more once the dictatorships are down, it should support the most progressive forces within the movement, along the process of radicalization within the revolution that Marx once called “permanent revolution.”
Troops Invited:
Comments, arguments, articles, and letters from service men and women, and veterans, are especially welcome. Write to Box 126, 2576 Broadway, New York, N.Y. 10025-5657 or email : Name, I.D., withheld unless you request publication. Same address to unsubscribe.
General Worried About Finding Job As Lobbyist, Defense Consultant After Retirement
21 February 2013 by Paul, The Duffle Blog
CAMP SMITH, HI — Sources revealed today that a top U.S. Marine General is “extremely hesitant” about plans for his possible retirement, indicating a greater problem with military transition assistance programs.
General John Murphy, the former commander of Fleet Marine Forces-Pacific, is looking toward a future in the private sector, but he says he may have to lower himself to take any position in order to support his family.
“It’s scary out there with the economy the way it is,” said Murphy in a telephone interview with The Duffel Blog. “I’m certainly hoping that I can secure a job as a D.C. lobbyist or a consultant to a defense contractor. But shit, I’m just not sure anymore. I might have to degrade myself and be a military analyst at Fox News just to feed my goddamn kids.”
Murphy’s worries underscore a major problem of assisting military members on their way out of the service. Junior enlisted personnel usually go through a weeklong Transition Assistance Program, or TAP, but the classes for general officers have serious drawbacks.
“The enlisted classes set the guys up for everything. They basically pave the way for them to go college, give them job placement, the whole nine yards,” said Michael Phillips, a counselor with the TAP program. “But for Generals, they need to do a lot of the work on their own.
“Most of them have to search for at least a few minutes in their rolodex to find a contact at BAE Systems or Lockheed before they have an executive position.”
But it’s not only the possibility of not having a career outside of the military, Murphy says.
“It’s also the shitty pension that I’m going to get,” Murphy said tearfully. “How the hell am I going to live on a salary of over $200,000 a year? You can’t even get a decent sports car for that.”
Murphy isn’t the first General with retirement worries. The Duffel Blog reached out to a number of retired Generals and Admirals for comment.