ISSN 1173-2679
Peace Researcher Journal of the Anti-Bases Campaign November 2016
Number 52
NEW SPY LAW STRENGTHENS COVERT STATE In this issue: Pine Gap, Anzac Day, Five Eyes, Korea,PeaceProtesting Researcher 52 War November 2016
In this issue ... 2 Intelligence And Security Bill 2016. Giving The Spooks Yet More Powers
by Warren Thomson 4 Review by Jeremy Agar “The 5th Eye”: A Film By Errol Wright & Abi King-Jones 6 From Haumoana To Pine Gap: Springtime 2016
by Liz Remmerswaal Hughes 9 What Is Pine Gap? by Warren Thomson 10 Spooky Bits by Warren Thomson 15 The Glorification Of War: Anzac Day In the Hague, 2015 by Robin Lloyd 16 Anzac Day: Protests Then, Propaganda Now by Murray Horton 17 Peace Researcher Printer Retires
by Murray Horton 18 Protesting War: Working Pre-Emptively For Peace by Dennis Small 27 CAFCA/ABC Organiser Account Financial Report For Year Ended 31/3/16
by James Ayers, Organiser Account Treasurer 28 Korean Nuclear Standoff In Context Of International Rivalries: Can NuclearFree New Zealand Help Out?
INTELLIGENCE & SECURITY BILL 2016 Giving The Spooks Yet More Powers - Warren Thomson
F
ollowing the Intelligence Agencies Sanitation Exercise (or was that “Review”?) which reported at the beginning of 2016*, the Government drafted legislation to increase the powers of the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) and the Security Intelligence Service (SIS) while maintaining that remodelling the warrant process would save democracy and ensure that the hidden operations of the spooks would be transparent and properly controlled. The only positive aspect of all this is that it is apparent that the Government is aware a large sector of the population, including some of its well-heeled supporters, are not entirely happy with further undermining of the right to privacy, and has manufactured some “safeguards” to facilitate the process. *For our analysis of the Review, conducted by Sir Michael Cullen and Dame Patsy Reddy - who has since been appointed as Governor–General - see Peace Researcher 51, June 2016, “A Critique Of The Cullen-Reddy Intelligence Review”, by Warren Thomson, http://www.converge.org.nz/abc/pr/51/pr51-001.html Ed. There are a few positive elements in the legislation, specifically those which marginally strengthen the powers of the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security, like giving more scope to investigate operational matters, and strengthening the warrant system. But the minor improvements are overridden by the fixation on ignoring the major issues surrounding the spy agencies and tinkering with the details, as in the recent review. Legislating for the GCSB, while ignoring its main role of spying for the Five Eyes mafia, is akin to producing “Hamlet” with the Prince absent from the performance. Three Serious Consequences •
one is that the GCSB is specifically given the authority to spy on New Zealanders, a power which it has been denied for most of its existence;
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two, the Bureau is given total power to deal with “threats” to its facilities or functions even though it is not an enforcement agency;
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and three, the oversight continues to depend on the selection of those very few chosen to carry it out (remember the incompetence of the first Inspector-General*). In spite of the increased supervision there is an alarming dependence on the agencies following the rules about warrants, and the system detecting breaches. History is not reassuring about this. *See PR 29, June 2004, “Ahmed Zaoui Still Imprisoned Without Charge: Government Loses Legal Battles, Inspector-General Loses Job”, by David Small, http://www.converge.org.nz/abc/pr29101.html.That Inspector-General, the country’s first, was Laurie Greig. Ed.
by John Gallagher 33 Memorial Tree Planted For Mia Tay
by Murray Horton Cover: Graphic by Ian Dalziel. Published by Anti-Bases Campaign (ABC) PO Box 2258, Christchurch 8140 New Zealand
[email protected] www.converge.org.nz/abc www.facebook.com/AotearoaABC
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GCSB’s International Role Ignored But the ultimate problem is that the Government (and the Labour Party) continue to disregard the role of the GCSB internationally. The participation, even peripherally, in sordid operations involving assassination, rendition, torture and collateral murder of both suspected “terrorists” and innocent members of foreign populations fails to even get a mention in this
venting the collection of “incidentally obtained” information is virtually useless. The GCSB can use class warrants or “foreign” involvement to pull in an enormous amount of information then pretty well store it anywhere around the globe, or even in their own computer systems, so that it is accessible to Five Eyes but not the Inspector-General. They can alternatively follow a legal procedure in the legislation that allows them to use “incidentally obtained” information by seeking a warrant to do so. Obviously, however, analysing the data to decide whether to seek a warrant gives them the opportunity to do whatever spying they want to before a warrant is obtained.
Dominion Post, 17/4/13
new legislation that is supposed to control the GCSB. Specific aspects of the new legislation that the AntiBases Campaign (ABC) objected to are outlined below. “Any Action” Section 63 (1) (f) [“taking any action to protect a covert collection capability”] would make it legal to shoot or detain protestors who enter the grounds of the Waihopai spy base. It directly contradicts the stipulation in this legislation that the GCSB is not an “enforcement agency” and gives the GCSB powers way beyond its specified functions. This represents a horrific extension of the authority of the GCSB. National Security The definition of “national security” is unsatisfactory because “to cause serious harm to the safety or quality of life of the New Zealand population” is too broad (if we wish to describe fracking, deep sea mining, overfishing and dairying as transgressing national security, then the definition is meaningful). “Unlawful acts” can mean anything from a parking ticket to assassination. Virtually every protest involving a significant number of people will in some way be unlawful, for example, impeding traffic. All significant reform movements in this country have at times used means “unlawful” at the time to advance their cause. As written, the legislation enables any number of people to be put under surveillance
on the basis of minor transgressions of the law. Subsection (2) does not protect dissenters while the exclusion for collecting intelligence is dependent on “lawful” protest. We should also note that it is a simple matter for a Government to institute laws to make protest unlawful (the controversial new marine terrorism act shows this). This legislation should, at least, invoke the concept of reasonable acts of protest or else thousands of people can be deemed to have taken part in dissent that is not “lawful” and become subject to surveillance. Easy Means Of Exceeding Authority In Section 16 and especially 17, (2) (c) gives the GCSB an easy means of exceeding its authority. It merely requires another agency to ask for its assistance for it to take actions not permitted under its normal regulation. It should be noted that the extension of GCSB powers throughout this Bill gives it operational potential far beyond anything the agency had pre-2013 (i.e. before the most recent GCSB Act. See PR 45, June 2013, “Crime Pays! Government Legalises GCSB Culture Of Impunity”, by Murray Horton, http:// www.converge.org.nz/abc/pr/45/pr4 5-001.html. Ed).
Section 91 states: “(1) The DirectorGeneral of an intelligence and security agency may retain any incidentally obtained intelligence that comes into the possession of the agency only for the purpose of disclosing it, in prescribed circumstances, to (a) any employee of the New Zealand Police: (b) any member of the New Zealand Defence Force: (c) any employee of the other intelligence and security agency: (d) any public authority (whether in New Zealand or overseas) that the Director-General considers should receive the information”. The Director General has carte blanche to provide any data or gossip to pretty well anyone he or she likes. Total Lack of Debate About Fundamental Purpose & Secrecy From the time the Intelligence Review was announced to the time of Select Committee hearings for new legislation, ABC has been seriously concerned about the growing powers of the spook agencies and the total lack of debate around their fundamental purpose and their secrecy. Those of us who believe in real democracy and human rights, especially the right to privacy, can have nothing to feel happy about in these new laws that the Government, with a more or less compliant Labour Party, is foisting upon us. ■
“Incidentally Obtained” Information The (intentionally) myopic attitude to the overall rationale/mode of operation of the GCSB means that the sections of legislation aimed at prePeace Researcher 52 November 2016
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REVIEW - Jeremy Agar
THE 5th EYE A Film By Errol Wright & Abi King-Jones The
5th Eye. How about that? Wow. We’ve made it to the big boys’ club; we’re in the team with the cool guys. That’s the John Key take on New Zealand’s role as a satellite of the American empire but it’s not how the Waihopai Three see matters. They think the Five Eyes are there to kill people and killing people is wrong. The Domebusters, you’ll remember, deflated, in 2008, one of the big white balls that house the spying satellite dishes in a pleasant valley near Blenheim. A priest (Father Peter Murnane), Sam Land, a “subsistence farmer” (as the media always put it), and a teacher (Adrian Leason) based their activism on a movement within Catholicism. Project Ploughshares is inspired by a Biblical passage:
“God shall judge between the nations, and shall decide for many peoples; and they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation; neither shall they learn war any more". It’s not a bad ambition, but the notion that violence and war is a bad idea is proof to the people who hold power around the world that pacifist ideals are naïve and doomed to irrelevance. As a rule of thumb we can say that the world’s governments, typically in the hands of petty men with fragile egos, do not uphold the wishes of their citizens, who aren’t as bad as their leaders. To camouflage moral vacuity, especially if they’re intellectually weak, they 4
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need to hide behind a bogus complexity. The clear and simple motivation of the Waihopai Three bewilders officialdom just as their clear and simple language threatens them. The State would have been challenged to offer a convincing rebuttal of the Domebusters and it could not allow its agents to be cross examined in a court as that would allow the public to know what was going on under the balls. So it put forward no witnesses, thus allowing the “subsistence farmer”, the priest and the teacher to dominate proceedings. Which were often amusing. The raid wasn’t slick. The trio rented a truck, which they had to abandon when it got stuck along a farm track in a paddock next door to the domes. So the “subsistence farmer” took off into the night on a bike to work on Plan B for getting to the balls. He returned bleeding, having crashed into a wire fence. Meanwhile the teacher, given a mysterious object from which to keep in touch with his mates, heard nothing. Why hadn’t he responded? He was unaware that he had been sent a text. “What’s a text?” “Otherworldly” Defeated The Secret World Yet, when three otherworldly men with an almost Biblical sense of the modern world met the 21st Century of global technological supremacy; the otherworldly won. In this comedy of errors it’s a suitably ironic thought that had the domes been attacked by real terrorists from foreign lands – the ones it was perhaps spying on – they would almost certainly have been destroyed. These antics frame a detailed analysis of the several important issues by patriotic New Zealanders who have long seen what’s going on under the balls (these, by the way, are there so that we can’t see in which direction the satellite dishes are pointed and thereby know who’s being scrutinised.) Nicky Hager wrote the book on Waihopai (“Secret Power: New Zealand’s Role In The International Spy Network”, 1996). His research has been invaluable, revealing that when the trio said that
Waihopai was part of the US “war on terror”, something always denied by the State, they were right. Our governments have consistently lied to us over decades, as have their surrogates in the media who parrot the falsehoods, never on the basis of caring a toss as to the truth. Despite persistent and nasty attacks from Prime Ministers on down, Hager’s findings have never been refuted. Another talking head I first took to be a film star but it turned out to be a certain Murray Horton from AntiBases Campaign (ABC), who has been visiting Waihopai for years with his fellow peaceniks. These excursions have been the only readily accessible way the people of NZ have come to know of the very existence of the balls. ABC, like Hager, has explained the links between what the so-called intelligence service is doing in Marlborough and how the country’s foreign and “defence” policies are devised. Liars: From Lange To Key Back when the 1984-90 Labour government was forced by peace activists to form its nuclear-free stance and the Prime Minister, David Lange, was revelling in his role as the plucky dove of peace, Lange felt able to declare that Waihopai operated only by and for New Zealand and its interests. This was always deemed unlikely by those who paid attention to the despised activists and everyone now has the ability to see for themselves that the assertion was totally untrue. The lying has never stopped. When it’s not directly false, the language from the State has been obfuscation and equivocation and evasion. To expect an honest and open discussion of NZ’s sovereign interests from either of the two larger parties in Parliament is a form of denialism. When you consider that the other Four Eyes scrutinising the planet belong to the US, the UK, Canada and Australia it would be easy to assume that the club is, as promised, a matey outfit, the four being probably the other countries with which NZ has most in common. We literally speak the same language. But that’s not why the Five Eyes quintet is often referred to as the “Anglo-Saxon” countries. The latter
Waihopai’s deflated dome, 2008, above. (Inset): The Domebusters during their Wellington trial, 2010. From left: Sam Land, Adrian Leason, Peter Murnane.
term is to do with economics. The Anglo-Saxons are the world’s neoliberal purists, the world’s main cheerleaders for the ruinous plundering of the late capitalist epoch. To say this is by no means to criticise the film, which is dense enough with information as it is. More importantly, any directly CAFCAesque analysis of Waihopai would have smudged the clarity of the Domebusters’ vision. Their motivations were simple and morally direct. These days we hear about “posttruth” politics, a new acceptance that while our politicians and strategists have always and routinely lied, the new aspect is that the opinion leaders and commentariat who mediate between the world’s governments and the world’s people expect them to. They don’t mind at all. Post-truth society welcomes the lies, preferring to “spin” them as “perceptions” or as the expression of a necessary realpolitik. Moral and intellectual honesty is despised and ridiculed. It’s not Anglo-Saxon. That said, we might consider the Anglo-Saxons’ claim that their inte-
rest is in sharing information so they can deter terrorism. Why then does the club include reasonably benign places like Canada and New Zealand but not other clubbable countries like France and Belgium, where terrorist atrocities have actually occurred? Why, of all the world’s around 200 countries, almost all of which are less secure than the club members, are just these five chosen?
2010 Wellington trial because the jury, the people, accepted their defence that they acted to prevent a wrong. The verdict was as surprising as it was welcome, a validation of the jury system, the means by which the law, often an ass, can be reconciled with justice. The Government didn’t appeal. That would have again risked the people of New Zealand being informed about what’s being done in their name.
Why do they spy on people like Angela Merkel? Is she a terror suspect? Why spy on the President of Mexico? Is he? Why are they spying on pretty well every government? And on individuals? We all know that it’s because of the needs of big money and its government partners, but as long as the questions cannot be answered honestly the slippery words of politicians from David Lange through to John Key cannot be true.
For the most up to date reporting of the historic Domebusters’ case, see “Three Cheers For The Domebusters Who Kicked Waihopai In The Ball!, by Murray Horton, Peace Researcher 47, August 2014, http:// www.converge.org.nz/abc/pr/47/pr4 7-001.html. Anti-Bases Campaign has actively supported this film project from the outset. Not only is Murray Horton one of those interviewed in it, ABC put money into it (as did the Campaign Against Foreign Control of Aotearoa [CAFCA]) and helped to publicise its various cinema screenings.
Acquitted The good news is that the “subsistence farmer”, the teacher and the priest were found not guilty at the
Details of “The 5th Eye” can be found at www.cutcutcut.com Ed. ■ Peace Researcher 52 November 2016
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FROM HAUMOANA TO PINE GAP Springtime 2016 - Liz Remmerswaal Hughes
Liz
Remmerswaal Hughes attended the Close Pine Gap action in Alice Springs, Australia, from 26 September - 2 October 2016, as well as the IPAN (Independent And Peaceful Australia) conference there. Liz is a long time pacifist and supporter of Anti-Bases Campaign who believes that Anzac Day should be a day celebrating peace and Guy Fawkes’ Day should be renamed Parihaka Day. She is a journalist, an environmental activist and former politician - her group, the Cape Kidnappers Protection Society, won in the Environment Court in 2004 and she subsequently served six years on the Hawke’s Bay Regional Council before stepping down in 2013. Liz is now focused on peace building as Co-Vice-President of WILPF (Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom) Aotearoa. She is married to Ton, has four grown up children and lives at Haumoana Beach, Hawke’s Bay. “Come meet the best and brightest of Australia’s peace movement.”
“Come bear witness to the war crimes being committed by the US military at their Pine Gap base.” “Come join with the Arrernte people in healing the land of this murderous presence.” “Come as individuals and/or as tribes. Come for all or part of it.” “Come make peace in our times for the benefit of all beings present and future.” Who can resist an invitation like that? Thanks to the wonders of modern technology and an obliging Visa card, booking a ticket to attend the peace convergence week at Alice Springs/Pine Gap was ridiculously easy, tapped out on my phone while journeying home to Hawke’s Bay from the stimulating National Council of Women conference in Wellington. Perhaps I was fired up by (then Wellington Mayor) Celia Wade-Brown’s final “Mayors for Peace” seminar the
Protesters at Pine Gap gate, 2016. Photo by Liz Remmerswaal Hughes.
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night before, featuring haunting tunes written by Syrian children, and the prospect of civil society internationally absorbing the 65 million refugees that are busy being created by the machinations of war. As newly elected national Co-VicePresident of WILPF (Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom), I had recently tuned into the WILPF Hiroshima Day webinar featuring the famous Dr Helen Caldicott (Physicians for Social Responsibility) and learned about the proposed United Nations ban on nuclear weapons. Now here was what seemed like the next step - an amazing gathering in the “poisoned heart” of Australia thanks Pine Gap - bringing together all the activists, academics and peace people for a week of talk and action - it was irresistible! My aim was to network, learn and report back to NZ, as well have an adventure I guess. However getting there was quite a challenge.
30 Hours In A Mini-Van To Get To Alice Once in Melbourne, it involved 30 hours in a crowded mini-van on a non-stop nocturnal trip across the outback with a group of strangers, trying to avoid kangaroos, not get lost and to keep the tank filled with gas - and we failed on all three counts. It was a long time since I had attempted anything so taxing, (remembering the broken down “Magic Bus” from Athens to London circa 1980s), but was a lot cheaper than flying, and a good chance to meet the Melbourne activists who had organised the “Disarm” camp near the United States military base that we were focussing on. Thus I became part of this diverse community which began its memorable week of activities, albeit only camping part time having fortuitously discovered a dear friend’s sister in the town with hot and cold running water, etc. Whew! “Alice”, which I fondly remembered from Nevil Shute’s wartime book “A Town Like Alice”, is 30 km from Pine Gap, the joint United States-Australian military surveillance base located without permission on Aboriginal Arrernte land there. It is regarded as one of the most important US military installations outside of North America, collects data as part of the “Five Eyes” intelligence network, through which Australia, Canada, the United States, New
Zealand and the United Kingdom collect and share information and spy on their citizens. It employs over 800 people, both Americans and Australians, employees and contractors, many of whom are known as “gardeners” and unable to share any information about what happens there. As Edward Snowden, the National Security Agency whistleblower wanted by the US government, pointed out of such “intelligence” operations: “These programmes were never about terrorism: they’re about economic spying, social control and diplomatic manipulation. They’re about power”. Disarm More than a year earlier, activists from Melbourne anti-war group Disarm began organising for a protest at Pine Gap. As organiser James Brennan tells it: “Each step of the way we were told that it was going to be hard to hold a protest here. We were told that the locals didn’t want us coming, that the police would attack us, that we couldn’t camp where we wanted and that we didn’t understand the importance of Pine Gap to the community”. “What we were met with was vastly different and a truly inspiring experience. The camp, situated on the side of Hatt (later renamed Hate) Road, which leads to the base, was
exceptionally well run. There was a kitchen cooking three meals a day, shared small and large undercover meeting spaces, a media tent, a women’s camp, toilets and individual and shared camping spaces. We held meetings each evening, and more through the day. While not everyone knew each other, an environment was established to enable people to join the publicly announced actions or make connections and organise other actions”. On nearby tribal land on the soft clay pans there was a concurrent “Healing and Unity Camp” and the two camps were encouraged to interact. In the days that followed, activists occupied the office of the Minister for Indigenous Affairs, blockaded the road to the facility, joined a Don Dale Prison solidarity action, and organised a community bike ride from Alice Springs to Pine Gap. I was lucky to bike the 30km to the gates with 20 others half my age, and a police car tailing us along the main highway. It was fun. Everyone was subjected to police searches at a protest at the gates of the base, and one group warned officials about an outbreak of “Pentagonorrhoea” (which we told them was caused by involvement in dirty wars). They also dismantled a prop bomb in tribute to the late Dr Bill Williams, a tireless campaigner for nuclear disarmament and founder of ICAN (International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons). Peace Pilgrims Arrested
Cyclists at Pine Gap protest, 2016. Photo by Liz Remmerswaal Hughes.
On Thursday September 29th, five peace pilgrims, including veteran protesters Margie Pestorius from Cairns, (widow of Bryan Law*), Jim Dowling from Brisbane and Tim Webb from New Zealand (cousin of the Waihopai Domebusters’ Sam Land - who was himself arrested at a Pine Gap protest in October 2006), managed to get inside Pine Gap at dawn before being arrested and charged by Federal police, possibly facing up to seven years in prison. However the charges were thrown out by Judge Daynor Trigg because the police failed to gain the consent of the Attorney-General before beginning the prosecution, a requirement of the legislation. We quietly enjoyed this courtroom drama. Peace Researcher 52 November 2016
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*See Anti-Bases Campaign’s press release, “ABC Is Deeply Shocked To Learn of Bryan Law’s Death”, Murray Horton, 3/4/13, http://www. converge.org.nz/abc/press_release_ files/BrianLawDies.html. Bryan Law and Jim Dowling were among the four Christian peace activists who got into Pine Gap in a landmark non-violent direct action in December 2005. See Peace Researcher 36, August 2008, “Pine Gap Spybase ‘Invaders’ Acquitted: Huge Defeat For The Covert State”, by Murray Horton, http://www.conv erge.org.nz/abc/pr36-167.html. Ed. Four other activists spent ten hours that day chaining themselves by the neck to the gates of Raytheon military contractors in the town, stopping production for the day and drawing attention to the unnamed facility, but they were not arrested. We got the feeling that the police, many of whom had been flown in for the week, had been given instructions to be as friendly as possible and avoid making arrests, in effect downplaying our activities. However I have to admit that I was pretty keen to get on my return flight home and had no intention of getting arrested, unlike the brave souls who did.
Independent And Peaceful Australia Network After attending the IPAN Annual General Meeting and sharing some our activities in New Zealand, I joined around 130 activists at the Chifley Hotel in Alice for the conference opening. Speakers Senator Scott Ludlam (Greens) and Professors Lisa Natividad (Guam), Kosuzu Abe (Japan) and Richard Tanter (Australia) captivated the room. The next day the impressive line-up continued and I was also proud of fellow New Zealander, Alex EdneyBrowne, from Melbourne University, who spoke of her PhD work on drone warfare investigating the chilling psychological and physiological effects of military drone technology on people living under drones and US Air Force drone operators, like at Pine Gap. The claims that drone strikes are “surgically precise” and “collateral damage” is minimal are false, and operators are often traumatised by their actions. It was also made clear that Pine Gap makes Australia a target by being integral to America’s global nuclear war fighting capacity, and embroiling it in rising tensions between the US and its key rival, China, in the AsiaPacific.
Quaker Grannies For Peace Lamentations As a Quaker I was thrilled to meet the activist Quaker Grannies for Peace, Peri Coleman from Adelaide, Dawn Joyce from Brisbane and Helen Bayes from Melbourne. Their first action - dressed in genuine 19th Century Quaker bonnets and simple clothing, was to blockade the road outside Pine Gap gates by setting up their picnic table there and offering staff croissants and coffee on their way to work, and a few home truths about the dastardly nature of their workplace. As the workers are all bussed in, this didn’t happen, but the buses did need to swerve to avoid them and they didn’t go unnoticed. Meanwhile the Grannies sweet talked all the accompanying policemen and were free to go when they chose to. Each day they would set up a stall in the local mall to educate passers-by, give away the white peace poppies they crocheted and also were in solidarity with the other peace activists, which was appreciated. 8
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That evening a large group climbed nearby Anzac Hill for an evening of lamentations, recognising all the wars past and present, including the frontier wars, with songs, poetry, dance and camaraderie under a lantern-filled, moonlit sky, smelling the traditionally perfumed smoke of the fire. I felt transported back in time, feeling the pain of my foremothers as they farewelled their sons, brothers and husbands to unjust and far-flung wars - in 1899, 1914 and 1939 - these wars that left a legacy of injury, depression, alcoholism and violence. It seemed ironic that my grandfather left NZ aged 16 to join the Australian Army because he was too young to join at home! If only Anzac Day was honoured in such a spirit, rather than seeming to glorify war. Many Australians I spoke to were acutely aware and jealous of our nuclear free status as well as our Treaty relationship with Maori,
flawed as it may be. The challenges that their peace people face are enormous with their Government’s very close ties to USA, the increasing expenditure on arms and a more militarised culture. It is good for us Anzacs to support each other and work together more closely. I am sure this will happen more often in the future, maybe as soon as the Waihopai weekend in January 2017? Something to work towards, for sure. For more information: www.ipan.org.au www.icanw.org https://closepinegap.org Long History Of Kiwi Activists At Pine Gap There is a long and honourable history of New Zealand anti-bases campaigners taking part in activities in Alice Springs and at Pine Gap. For example, see Peace Researcher 16 (first series), December 1987, “The Siege Of Pine Gap”, by Murray Horton, https://www.scribd.c om/document/33725264/Peace-Res earcher-Vol1-Issue16-Dec-1987. Australians who played a leading role then, as now, included Helen Caldicott, Richard Tanter and Jo Vallentine (who was a Senator then). That action involved hundreds of people, with more than 200 arrests, including 13 grandparents or great-grandparents (Jo Vallentine was the very first person arrested). The Aussies have been fighting for the closure of Pine Gap even longer than ABC has been fighting for the closure of Waihopai. Ed. ■
Pine Gap domes
WHAT IS PINE GAP? - Warren Thomson
The
Nautilus Institute, a liberal think-tank that analyses military and intelligence issues, says of the Pine Gap spook base near Alice Springs: “Pine Gap is perhaps the most important United States intelligence facility outside that country, playing a vital role in the collection of a very wide range of signals intelligence, providing early warning ballistic missile launches, targeting of nuclear weapons, providing battlefield intelligence data for United States armed forces operating in Afghanistan and elsewhere (including previously in Iraq), critically supporting United States and Japanese missile defence, supporting arms control verification, and contributing targeting data to United States drone attacks”. But Pine Gap is also believed to play a key role in gathering target data for US drone strikes and its full function remains an official secret (Age, 28/2/16). The largest of several new radomes was constructed in 2013, and researchers believe it to be linked to recently launched satel-
lites from the Space Based Infrared System, described by defence industry giant Lockheed Martin as one of the "highest priority space programs" for the US.
reported as having changed his mind about the operations of Pine Gap particularly because of changes to its role since the al Qaeda attacks in September 2001.
In the last ten years, spying on communications, like Waihopai does, has become more of a function. In 2015 the Sydney Morning Herald reported: “The United States-Australia Joint Defence Facility at Pine Gap is now engaged in foreign satellite intelligence collection as part of the ‘Five Eyes’ intelligence alliance's ‘collect-it-all’ surveillance of global Internet and telecommunications traffic” (31/5/15).
He told ABC that for the past decade it has also been involved in the US drone programme, which has killed thousands of militants and some civilians in countries including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia and Iraq. "We're now locked into this global network where intelligence and operations have become essentially fused… And Pine Gap is a key node in that network - that war machine, if you want to use that term - which is doing things which are very, very difficult I think, as an Australian, to justify". The Australian Signals Directorate for many years has also operated established satellite interception facilities at Kojarena, near Geraldton in Western Australia, and Shoal Bay, near Darwin. ■
A senior strategic analyst, Australian National University Professor Des Ball, who has written about Australian intelligence facilities for many years, and who previously supported Pine Gap, has called for the Federal Government to rethink the facility, saying some of its work now is "ethically unacceptable". On the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s ABC Website (14/8/14) he is
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SPOOKY BITS - Warren Thomson
Spying On Peace Groups In August 2016 Anti-Bases Campaign received this note from a member: “INFO ON STATE OR CORPORATE SPYING/PROTEST GROUP INFILTRATION” “A friend of a friend went to a job interview last week that was quite vague. It was for a ‘role play instructor’. In the interview, applicants found out the ‘employers’ wanted people to infiltrate protest groups for $60 an hour. The company is called Virtus Training Group, and it is based in Wellington. They have also advertised in Christchurch and Hamilton. Last weekend they had a training day for new recruits. It seems one of the directors is exmilitary. “The job advertisements and the Website say training includes things like 'acting' and 'advanced interrogation skills'. On the company Website http://vtg.nz/ it lists some of the services as 'a realistic protest based on prescribed parameters and background research. Our VTG roleplayers are trained to respond as an actual protester would...' It seems that a similar round of recruitment happened in February 2016 and was advertised on Student Job Search.
NZ Officials Hacked The NZ Herald reported (15/10/16) that unspecified “agents” accessed deleted files and installed spy software on NZ trade officials’ devices after breaking into their hotel room. New Zealand government officials travelling abroad had their mobile phones and laptops containing classified information hacked by foreign agents after their hotel room safe was broken into. Sources for the revelation were Government cybersecurity officials. The account of the incident does not
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name either the department hacked or the foreign power believed responsible. According to the Herald, the incident occurred when two trade negotiators attended an overseas conference. Whoever carried out the spying was able to get a cloned copy of hard drives which allowed them to recover “… not only deleted protectively marked documents, but also intellectual property and sensitive information pertaining to trade negotiations". When the officials returned to NZ it was found malware designed to log all electronic activity had been installed on the devices. Details of the hotel-room break-in were contained in a case study prepared for a Security Intelligence Service-run initiative to improve Government information security (https://protectivesecurity.g ovt.nz/homecase-studies/showrisks oftaking-electronicmediaoverseasan d-notreportingthe-carrying-ofprotecti velymarked-info) A spokesman for the New Zealand “Intelligence Community” described the Herald account as "factually accurate". What we don’t know is if those penetrating the officials’ data were “friends” or “enemies”.
While We Busily Hack Others One of the gross deficiencies of the recent Intelligence Review and discussion of new legislation to give NZ spooks more powers (see my article elsewhere in this issue), is the complete absence of consideration of the Government Communications Security Bureau’s main function, which is to use its technology to spy for Five Eyes. New Zealand has not publicly acknowledged any of its own offensive capability in this arena and is the only member of the Five Eyes alliance not to do so. Amongst other evidence are the documents leaked by Edward Snowden, which showed the GCSB in 2013 used "Warriorpride" malware capable of targeting Android or Apple mobile phones to transfer data from an "ASEAN
target" to a US National Security Agency server (see NSA story below).
More Money Thrown At The Spooks A Government press release (26/5/16) proudly announced: “The New Zealand Intelligence Community (NZIC) will receive new operating and capital funding of $178.7 million over four years as part of Budget 2016. This is on top of approximately $130 million that the SIS and GCSB already receive annually. This investment (sic) allows significant staff recruitment and further extends the NZSIS’s ability to respond to the threat from foreign terrorist fighters”. We are told that: “New Zealand is not immune to global threats such as cyber-attacks and the risks posed by extremist groups such as ISIL. Proper resourcing is critical in an increasingly complex international and domestic security landscape”. On the other hand, we could cut our ties to the US war machine, reducing the chance of a terrorist attack to virtually nil, and spend the money on housing.
The Hackers Hacked The NSA has long been a propagator of malware designed to wreck other people’s software systems. A few years ago it boasted that it had crashed critical components in Iran’s nuclear production facilities. In August 2016 several news sources reported that top-secret computer code that the National Security Agency has used to break into the networks of foreign governments and other espionage targets has been outed on various Websites. The code was reported by former NSA personnel to be almost certainly genuine, if a little outdated, and used in the production of the NSA custom-built malware.
What will terrify the NSA is that some of their own most secret systems have been hacked and their methods revealed. Most of the code that has been hacked and publicised was designed to break through network firewalls and get inside the computer systems of countries like Russia, China and Iran. The intention is to place malware in the data systems of targets which can be used to monitor network traffic or enable a devastating computer attack. One programme mentioned is SECONDDATE, which according to the Guardian (16/5/16) is a tool designed to intercept Web requests and redirect browsers on target computers to an NSA Web server. That server, in turn, is designed to infect them with malware. According to the Intercept, citing documents released by Edward Snowden, SECONDDATE plays a specialised role inside a complex global system built by the US government to infect and monitor what one document estimated (by the NSA itself) to be millions of computers around the world. http s://theintercept.com/2014/03/12/ns a-plans-infect-millions-computersmalware/ One ex-NSA operative commented that this is expensive software used to take over firewalls, such as Cisco and Fortinet; that are used "in the
largest and most critical commercial, educational and government agencies around the world" (Age, 16/8/016). We should note that as well as confirming that NSA systems have been hacked, the various comments from insiders confirm that the NSA is indeed operating a massive campaign to infiltrate other computer systems to either manipulate them or destroy them (see also New York Times, 16/8/16).
NSA Newsletters Reveal Operations The New York Times (16/5/16) reported the Intercept Website publishing excerpts from an in-house NSA newsletter, beginning with more than 150 articles from 2003. One article (https://theintercept.com/ snowden-sidtoday/2829969-support -to-un-diplomatic-efforts-on-iraq/) described the American and British ambassadors to the United Nations expressing thanks to the Agency for providing what the latter called “insights into the nuances of internal divisions among the five permanent members of the UN Security Council” during the diplomatic negotiations ahead of the Iraq War. This one article, of course, powerfully exemplifies what Five Eyes (including our very own GCSB) is all
about: spying on diplomats and business people to give Washington an advantage in its international bullying. Another article gave a first person account by an NSA analyst about the day the United States military took custody of six Algerian men in Bosnia whom it brought to Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. But an American judge who had access to classified intelligence ruled that the alleged evidence of any embassy plot involving the detainees was too thin to support the accusations. He ordered five of the six men freed. One man was held on other charges and forcibly repatriated to Algeria in 2013.
Guantanamo Finally Closing Down One of the most sordid episodes in a long history of brutality and incompetence by the Western intelligence community may finally be coming to an end as the current US Administration tries to close the detention centre in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, before President Obama leaves office in January 2017. Shutting down the prison has faced strong opposition from some in Congress. Hundreds of suspected “terrorists” were incarcerated in Guantanamo with some subjected to torture and degrading treatment. George W Bush proclaimed the prisoners “the worst of the worst” but the terrible truth is that more than half of those incarcerated were released because there was no evidence of their participation in any sort of terrorist organisation and many were victims of misidentification, or in some cases, victimisation by military or officials. In August 2016 there were still 61 detainees at the prison (Reuters, 25/8/16).
More Illegal Spying By The Brits According to the Guardian, British security services snooped on 20 high-profile individuals in operations that were either unjustified, or may have been unjustified, according to previously withheld information. The unidentified individuals were not Peace Researcher 52 November 2016
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notified of the surveillance. The disclosures came during an Investigatory Powers Tribunal hearing brought by Privacy International against bulk data collection by the intelligence agencies. Information reluctantly released by Government lawyers on behalf of Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) and MI5 shows that between 2009 and 2013 there were three searches into highprofile individuals by three intelligence officers that were “not operationally justifiable”. British intelligence officers are banned from using the services’ database to “search for and/or access information other than that which is necessary and proportionate for your current work”, but these incidents significantly demonstrate the problems of oversight of these agencies. In the same period there were also another 17 searches, by five officers, “which may not have been operationally justifiable”. The Government’s lawyers, who initially refused to release details, citing the risk of damage to “national security”, claimed there were no records of conversations with the officers involved, which made it “not possible to ascertain whether they were in fact operationally justifiable”. The officers were warned that if they were caught misusing the database again they could face disciplinary action. Millie Wood, a legal officer for Privacy International who bought the case against the spooks, said: “Obtaining the factual background to the use and misuse of bulk communications data has resembled a drip experiment. It was only after several rounds of requests for further information by Privacy International that it was revealed that amongst the instances of misuse of communications data; there were a number of unjustified searches for high-profile individuals”. The same court action has revealed that under 15 secret “directions” in force under the UK Telecommunications Act enabling the intelligence services to collect bulk data about online and phone traffic, in 2015 GCHQ “identified 141,251 (our emphasis) communications addresses or identifiers of interest from communications data acquired in 12
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bulk pursuant to section 94 directions which directly contributed to an intelligence report” (Guardian, 27/7/16). Privacy International said that overall the documents show the staggering extent of UK government surveillance being carried out. The data is obtained under section 94 of the Telecommunications Act 1984. The Government's independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, David Anderson QC, has previously told the BBC the legislation was "so vague that anything could be done under it" (BBC Website, 21/4/16). And several documents implied the potential for cover-ups was discussed as the risk that the public might become aware of the powers. An MI5 policy issued in 2010 says the agency's access to "anonymised" financial data would be against "public expectations" (BBC, ibid.). It says that if the data is revealed the media response could be "unfavourable and probably inaccurate". David Davis MP, a former Conservative Shadow Home Secretary, told the BBC: "It's clear the agencies and the Government have been keeping information secret about what they've been doing not just for security reasons, as is normally claimed, but to avoid both embarrassment and public opposition".
MI5 Resisting Independent Oversight In a related article on more problems with the intelligence agencies revealed by documents released as part of the four-day hearing of the Investigatory Powers Tribunal brought by Privacy International against the bulk data collection by the intelligence agencies, the Guardian reports that MI5 has been repeatedly resisting independent oversight of its decision to collect communications data from tens of thousands of individuals, previously secret documents have shown (http s://www.theguardian.com/uknews/2 016/jul/26/mi5-resistedindependentoversight-ofcommunications-data-co llection).
Four letters over the course of 2015 from the head of MI5, Andrew Parker, to the then Home Secretary, Theresa May (now the Prime Minister), complain that the non-statutory requirement recommended by both the Intelligence and Security Committee and the independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, David Anderson, is bureaucratic and risks hampering the agency’s response to security threats. Other previously secret documents released to the Tribunal show that MI5 was repeatedly warned by the Interception of Communications Commissioner’s Office (IOCCO) that it was breaching a code of practice on data collection that requires the agency to appoint a designated person independent of an investigation to authorise data collection (Guardian, 26/7/16).
Apology The Director of GCHQ has apologised for historic prejudice against gay people by the agency and the “horrifying” treatment of Alan Turing, the WW2 Enigma hero who was subjected to chemical castration. Robert Hannigan said the secret service failed to learn from its mistaken treatment of the genius, and archaic attitudes had persisted for decades, stifling the careers of brilliant minds. The GCHQ had a ban on gay people joining the organisation that remained in place into the 1990s (Guardian, 16/5/16).
GCHQ Joins Twitter After years of avoiding social media, probably because they were aware that most of the stuff on social media is being spied on by their own organisation and their mates, GCHQ has now set up their own Twitter page. Within half an hour of its launch, the GCHQ account attracted more than 2,000 followers. But much of the initial reaction to the new account was of mockery, including from the former Labour Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott. One would imagine that staff have been indoctrinated about how to use social media sites after Australian
Australian I-G Not Credible Margaret Stone, the Australian Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security, has laughed off Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) cock-ups, where the spooks repeatedly tapped the wrong phones because of careless data input. "I remember asking a senior ASIO officer when there were a series of telephone intercepts in which wrong numbers were used. I said: 'How can this happen? There's a whole series of them here.' And the answer was: 'It's fat fingers’” (Stuff, 3/8/16, from Brisbane Times).
and Belgian spooks gave away their identities on personal Facebook sites a few years ago. The move is part of the public relations campaign that most of the Five Eyes mafia have been running to improve their public image ever since Edward Snowden’s revelations shocked people with revelations of the vast scale of the GCHQ and NSA spy operations.
valent to NZGCSB) have been hunting in schools and tertiary institutions for students with the skills to attack the security of Government computer infrastructure and also hack foreign targets. A spokesperson says the "penetration specialists" are part of a long-term commitment to boost capabilities, and many who were approached have taken jobs with the spies.
Andrew Pike, the Director of Communications at GCHQ, proclaimed: “In joining social media, GCHQ can use its own voice to talk directly about the important work we do in keeping Britain safe” (Guardian, 16/5/16). Neither MI6 nor MI5 has an official Twitter account. In the USA the National Security Agency has been running an account since December 2013 and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) launched an account almost two years ago.
The Directorate also offers university students internships and the Directorate is contributing $A12 million to an Australian National University facility focused on cyber-security training and research. It would be fascinating to see what the recruitment profile is - a considerable number of the most able in the hacker field have somewhat anarchic tendencies. It is not clear how far in this country the GCSB has gone in giving young technophiles a licence to hack, but this is a very valid response to cyber attacks – it’s just that in New Zealand we need a truly independent agency to run such a programme, not a fox to guard the henhouse.
Jobs For Hackers The Aussie spooks, especially the Australian Signals Directorate (equi-
The I-G states that she believes the spies follow the rules and work under difficult circumstances. She said she held "regular inspections of the records and systems and activities of the agencies". These were routine and never totally without warning. "We could, if we were sufficiently ill-mannered, spring a surprise. If we needed to, we would, but so far that hasn't happened," she said. Most importantly, she acknowledged they could hide things from her if they wanted to. Jokes about serious breaches of privacy and putting manners ahead of doing her job? Not much hope of Australians being protected from the spooks.
Getting Rid Of Judicial Warrants? ASIO (the equivalent of the NZSIS) has proposed scrapping the need for judge-approved warrants to detain and question Australians for up to a week without charge in terrorism investigations. Instead of judicial warrants, the power to grant the security agency a controversial "questioning and detention warrant" would rest instead with the Attorney-General, a political appointee. ASIO head Duncan Lewis says such a change would "… make the regime more efficient and effective for use in the current security environment". It is apparently ‘… most desirable in our view for there to be a streamlining (our emphasis) of the warrant authorisation process’. The Law Council of Australia has branded
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such a proposal "unprecedented", but it is typical of the push throughout Five Eyes-associated agencies for more power and less civil liberties protection. The changes being requested by ASIO would also remove a current separate requirement that an independent legal authority, such as a retired judge, is present when a person is being questioned. Rather, oversight of questioning would rest with the intelligence watchdog, the InspectorGeneral of Intelligence and Security (see the Age, 27/8/16).
Who Needs A Warrant? Under laws passed in the wake of the (2001) September 11 and (2002) Bali bombing attacks, ASIO has the power to hold someone for up to seven days and question them in “terrorism” related cases. This power, it should be noted, can be applied to persons of interest even if they are not terrorist suspects themselves. A commentator in the Age (Melbourne) notes ASIO can already ask to have someone detained just because the spooks think he or she knows something about a terrorism offence. All Australians are now subject to the default surveillance of mobile phones because the logs are kept for two years and accessed without warrants. Police now routinely search the phones of people they arrest. Civil liberties in Australia have been disastrously eroded (Age, 29/8/16).
Upcoming Review In September 2016 the Australian government announced it is planning a major “independent” review of the nation's intelligence agencies because, according to Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and co., Australia faces an unprecedented array of security challenges ranging from terrorism to the rise of China and cyber-spying.
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Hypocritical Spook Bosses Now Back Apple Top US national security officials, Michael V Hayden and Michael Chertoff, once demanded more Government spying powers to pry into sensitive intelligence data. Hayden was Director of the NSA, snooping on billions of phone records after the attacks of September 11, 2001. Chertoff pushed for additional wiretapping and surveillance powers from Congress both as a top prosecutor and as Homeland Security Secretary. Now the former spook hawks have changed their tune. Both former officials currently work with technology companies at a corporate consulting firm and both have backed Apple against the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in the tech company’s fight to keep its iPhones encrypted and private. According to the New York Times, they are among more than a half dozen prominent former national security officials who have supported Apple and the idea of impenetrable “end-to-end encryption” during debate over the balance between privacy and security in the digital age. Others who have surprisingly given support for Apple’s position are Mike McConnell, a former Director of National Intelligence; David H Petraeus, a former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency; R James Woolsey, another former CIA Director; and Richard A Clarke, a former top White House counterterrorism official. Like Chertoff and Hayden, most now work with firms that have ties to the technology sector (New York Times, April 22/4/16). Even the spy hawks’ ideology can be overturned with a high enough corporate salary apparently.
More Gun Madness The Pentagon has spent billions of dollars since 2001 funnelling roughly more than a million assault rifles, pistols, shotguns, and machine guns into Iraq and Afghanistan, helping to fuel lasting conflict there, according to the London-based non-profit research and advocacy group Action on Armed Violence. Nearly a million small arms were given to security forces in Iraq, and at least 503,328 small arms were given to local forces in Afghanistan, the group said. They called this an “under-estimate”. The Pentagon does not publish related figures of its own. Action on Armed Violence arrived at its estimate using: a general Pentagon contract list, a Government-wide contracting list, and multiple Government reports on military spending. Action on Armed Violence calculated that the overall value of the contractually-agreed small arms shipments, just to Iraq and Afghanistan, was roughly $US2.16 billion. US intelligence reports and eyewitnesses have previously said, unsurprisingly, that a significant fraction of the US-financed arms were either lost or stolen, and that many wound up in the hands of forces opposed to US interests, including terrorist groups such as the Islamic State, or ISIS (Time, 26/8/16). ■
THE GLORIFICATION OF WAR Anzac Day In The Hague, 2015 - Robin Lloyd, Women's International League for Peace and Freedom USA
Late in April 2015 I witnessed three centennial events related to WW1, all happening in the same week 100 years before: the international Congress for Women at the Hague (April 28), the use of chlorine gas by Germans at Ypres, Belgium (April 22), and the start of the British and ANZAC (Australian and New Zealand Army Corps) attack on Gallipoli, in Turkey (April 25). While celebrating the first - the founding event of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) - I was invited to attend a centennial commemoration of the last at a cemetery outside The Hague. On Saturday April 25, between the WILPF Congress and Conference, a New Zealand WILPFer, Liz Remmerswaal Hughes*, invited Charlotte Dennett and me to attend a solemn ANZAC graveside ceremony sponsored by the embassies of Australia and New Zealand in The Netherlands. It was the 100th anniversary of the start of the disastrous invasion of Gallipoli early in WW1 when
11,500 Australian and New Zealand soldiers died due to the irresponsible decision of Winston Churchill to extend WW1 to the eastern Mediterranean. * See page 6 for Liz’s report on her 2016 involvement in anti-bases activities in Alice Springs and at the Pine Gap US warfighting spy base. Ed. Gallipoli was an event that has seriously impacted Liz’s family. She felt impelled to witness; she could no longer contain the fury and sadness she felt, not just at the senselessness of the degradation and killing that occurred there but at the twisting of historical memory that has turned the event into a foundational patriotic creation story: the “birth of two nations” and a sense of common cause with the rest of the Empire. Grandfather & Father Liz’s maternal grandfather, named Gustav Victor Bergh by his Swedish father, was too young at 16 to join the NZ Army in 1915, so he joined the Australian Army. He was gassed
at the Somme in France, but returned home to Christchurch to marry his sweetheart, Lizzie. Like many soldiers, he never spoke about the war, but his health was poor because of it and he died in his 50s. Liz’s other grandfather, Colonel Jackie Gethin Hughes, born in 1866, was already a soldier who had served in the 1899-1902 Boer War for the English (this was actually the Second Boer War. Ed). “He went to fight at Gallipoli when my Dad was just a baby and remained there for a hellish six months - one of the longest serving officers at Gallipoli. He was a much loved and respected man who cared for those around him in these terrible circumstances of constant shelling and poor conditions. After being invalided out with a multitude of conditions, he spent six months convalescing in a British hospital before he was fit enough to go home to his young family, so my Dad never saw his Dad for two years”. “After his return, his health broken, he was discharged as unfit for service a year before he was due his superannuation, which was difficult and demoralising, and he found it hard to get work. However he did tell his stories and would lead the Anzac Day parade in his Wellington hometown until he died in his 80s”. Twenty four years later, Liz’s own father, Pat Hughes, volunteered to fight Hitler and served in North Africa and Italy. However he had no illusions about war. “These things that happen to families – the ill health, the pain and suffering – the price that is paid decades later – there is no glory to it”, Liz said. Unofficially Joining The Ceremony
Australasian WILPF women, Anzac Day centennial, The Hague, 2015. Liz Remmerswaal Hughes, centre (behind olive tree).
Liz and her New Zealand and Australian friends wanted to mark the occasion for WILPF. They bought
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an olive tree, symbol of peace, and after not hearing back from the the New Zealand Embassy in response to a request to plant it somewhere, decided to bring it to the ceremony anyway, and work out what to do from there. There was a large crowd standing in a dispiriting drizzle around a stone monument, and one could hardly hear the voice of the NZ Ambassador commemorating the disastrous event. Fortuitously, after all the official wreaths were laid by the gathered ambassadors and other organisations, there was a call for others present to lay their tributes. I didn’t know what was planned, but Liz whispered “just follow me” (which I didn’t) and she and three other WILPF members picked up the tree that they had secreted in a corner of the performance area and seamlessly took part in the ritual. None of the officials or well dressed onlookers seemed to mind these informally dressed knapsacked women taking part in the ceremony; in fact it felt as if the women were expressing a truth that the other participants were restrained for patriotic reasons from expressing. The way this disastrously planned and executed battle of WW1 has come to be seen as the occasion for the “birth of two nations” – as it was announced over television - rather than as an occasion for revulsion from war and from the nation state, and from the commander – Churchill – who ordered the deaths of their best and brightest – is a most successful perversion of history in the interests of military elites to maintain the power of the State by glorifying the sacrifice of war. I wonder whether the women of Australia and New Zealand were involved in the decisions to exalt this painful historical moment into an occasion for national pride. ■
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PYM wreath, Anzac Day, Christchurch, 1970. It reads: “To The Victims Of Fascism In Vietnam”. The wreath’s photo depicts some of the hundreds of civilian victims of the US massacre at My Lai. Christchurch’s Mayor threw the wreath away. Photo by PJ Alley
ANZAC DAY Protests Then, Propaganda Now - Murray Horton
I was a leading figure in the Christchurch Progressive Youth Movement (PYM), and we held anti-Vietnam War protests at Christchurch’s Anzac Day ceremonies for three consecutive years (1970/71/72). Christchurch and Wellington PYM was the subject of the 1991 documentary “Rebels In Retrospect” by Russell Campbell, including a whole section on those Anzac Day protests. You can buy DVDs of it from http://www.filmshop.co.nz/productspage/documentaries/rebels-in-retros pect/ It is in stark contrast to the public relations bullshit in which Anzac Day is cocooned now, not to mention the whole glorification of New Zealand’s long and sorry military history as the most willing junior servant of whoever was the dominant imperialist power at the time. My blood boiled when Becky and I were among the crowd at the 2016 All Blacks/Springboks test in Christchurch and we were all asked to stand when two uniformed military personnel para-
ded NZ flags, “to honour all those who have died fighting for our country” as part of the four year long propaganda exercise that is the centenary of WW!. What was that about keeping politics out of sport? The human cost has been enormous in this tiny country. When I was in Wellington in 2016 I paid my first ever visit to the National War Memorial and when I stood at the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior, I remembered my late father telling me that there was a mathematical chance that it could contain his Uncle Charlie (my great uncle) who was among those who disappeared without trace in the vast slaughter house that was the Battle of the Somme during WW1. The memory of that most criminal of imperialist wars was kept alive in my family – my father, who was born after his uncle’s death but before the war’s end, was given the middle name of Charles. Charlie Gaskell – just one of the tens of millions of victims of WW1, thousands of whom were young New Zealand men like him. ■
PEACE RESEARCHER PRINTER RETIRES - Murray Horton
W
e tend never to mention the people who do the actual work for ABC and Peace Researcher. These are not Committee members or volunteers but commercial enterprises with which we have a business relationship and pay the going rate. But we’ve had very productive dealings with these people going back decades, they provide a service that has often gone above and beyond, and they have become mates. I want to single out Keith Miskimmin. PR has been printed at a major central Christchurch institution since 2003 and for all of that time Keith was the head printer. He retired earlier in 2016, aged in his late 60s. He’d also been printing Foreign Control Watchdog since 1997. So I’d been dealing with Keith for nearly 20 years. For all of that time he was extremely good at his job, PR was produced very fast (sometimes on the same day) and always as a good quality job. Ours was a business relationship, which is as it should be. We never discussed politics or anything of concern to ABC (I have no idea
what he thinks about any of that) but we always had a good old yarn about rugby or cricket. We went through a lot together in those decades – regular changes of equipment and one prospect of outsourcing the institution’s printing (didn’t happen).
I’d worked with since 1997. Special mention must be made of Alan Armstrong, who retired a couple of years ago, and Susan Sell who, having been there longer than either of the men, is now the head printer. I look forward to continuing to work with Sue for years to come.
Like everyone else in Christchurch we were both deeply affected by the 2010/11 catastrophic earthquakes. For the first five days after the February 2011 killer quake, we had no power, water or toilet at our home. Every stage of the food cycle, from cooking to excretion, was a problem. So, the weekend after the quake Becky and I went to the city’s biggest mall to have something to eat. The food court was even more jam-packed and deafeningly noisy than usual – half the city seemed to have the same idea as us. But above the roar of the crowd I heard somebody shout my name. It was Keith and we were both delighted to see each other alive and well.
Photocopying
For a while there he had to work inside the fenced off central city, with soldiers manning the cordon. But that didn’t stop him printing Watchdog as usual, just a couple of months later. The printery survived the quakes but the land underneath it was definitely compromised – I was once invited to witness the floor shaking several metres away after a couple of packets of paper were dropped on it.
Keith Miskimmin and his retirement cake. Photo (and cake) by Susan Sell .
Nor did I regularly deal with Keith only in connection with Peace Researcher and Watchdog. I also used to edit a third newsletter – the Philippines Solidarity Network of Aotearoa’s (PSNA) Kapatiran (Solidarity), which Keith printed for around a decade before I decided, in 2009, that producing the two newsletters that are actually part of my paid work was all that I can manage. Of course Keith did not do it single handed – he headed a team, all of whom
While I’m handing out plaudits I must mention the separate business that has handled all of ABC’s (and CAFCA’s) photocopying since the 80s, plus any copying that PSNA has needed doing. In particular, I must mention Ray Leonard, with whom I worked since the 90s and who retired a couple of years ago. Ray always went that extra mile, regardless of whether we gave him lots of big jobs (I’m thinking of all the paper I took around the country on my 2014 national CAFCA/ABC speaking tour). As with Keith, Ray was a bloke’s bloke – every time I saw him we had a very detailed and animated discussion about rugby. The quakes badly affected that Sydenham business - the September 2010 one flattened their building (they became a poster boy for that quake in the media). Undeterred they moved across the street and carried on. After the February 2011 quake the street, Christchurch’s main one, was closed off and patrolled by soldiers in armoured cars – customers could only access the building from the rear. Becky and I were in there one time, during the chaotic early days after that quake, when an officious Army officer came in demanding to see the written proof that they were allowed to be open. He was sent away with a flea in his ear. Ray has gone but Jeff, Andre and Ella continue to provide excellent service. To those who have retired Keith Miskimmin, Alan Armstrong and Ray Leonard - I say a heartfelt thank you for your decades of service to ABC and Peace Researcher, CAFCA and Watchdog. More than that, it has been decades of friendships. Good mates, good memories. Sadly now though, whenever I get any printing or copying done, I’ve got nobody to talk to about rugby. ■
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PROTESTING WAR Working Pre-Emptively For Peace - Dennis Small
Wayne: “Tell me why doesn't evolution select against human monsters?” A host of answers flooded Grace's head. Including: ‘Where would we get our politicians?’” (“The Murderer's Daughter”, Jonathan Kellerman, Headline Publishing Group, 2015, p379). “Stupidity and greed will kill off humans”; Stephen Hawking makes terrifying prediction: www.express. co.uk, 28/6/16. “Apart from the appalling fact that the West is contemplating all-out war against Russia, there is the plain fact that it has expanded NATO in contravention of the solemn undertaking given to the Soviet Union at the end of the Cold War”, Jonathan Power, Transnational Foundation for Peace & Future Research, 7/7/16: https://www.trans cend.org/tms/2016/07/cheating-mos cow-nato's-dangerous-expansion/. “Civilisation has given us enormous successes: going to the Moon, technology. But then this is the civilisation that took us to debt, environmental crisis, every single crisis. We need a civilisation where we say goodbye to these things” (Muhammad Yunus, Nobel Peace Prize winner). “There is no path to peace. Peace is the path” (Gandhi). In 2016 the question presses upon us more insistently and urgently than ever this century as to how to work most effectively and preemptively for world peace. Just using the phrase “world peace”, of course, can evoke a sense of the standing joke about what trite remarks on the subject the contestants in a beauty competition are expected to say. The challenges ahead are indeed both hugely urgent and complex. Our goal has several levels of possible achievement. It should be always kept in mind at the same time that these levels are inti18
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mately interconnected. Above all, the overwhelming imperative is to help mobilise enough people power around the globe in order to prevent the holocaust of nuclear war. We must hold world “leaders” to account as best we can. For us in the West, this must mean positive and concerted action to reduce the dangers of confrontation between the US-led North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) alliance and Russia, and the parallel risks of war with China (for China see e.g., “Anti-China Witch-Hunt Targets Former Australian Foreign Minister”, htt ps://www.wsws.org/en/articles/201 6/09/28/carr-s28.html; [Alleged Chinese] “Bomber Threat To Australian Targets”, Press, 5/9/16). Breaking Free From The Militarist Mindset Any nuclear detonation in conflict between major powers would almost instantly set off a chain reaction of global warfare. The reason is obvious in terms of nuclear strategy and its weaponry. You either use them or lose them and the mad, evil aim is to try and strike first in order to gain most advantage and so supposedly suffer as least retaliation as possible. Under the impetus of the technological imperative (and the profit motive!), the very notion of nuclear deterrence in the sense of mutual assured destruction (MAD) has been systematically undermined. A first strike on an opponent's weaponry means that the deterrent value of a retaliatory strike back as legitimated by MAD has been significantly eroded. Back in 1983, Wayne State University (Detroit, USA) historian and philosopher Ronald Aronson addressed the challenge in human civilisation of “a technology of madness” (“Technological Madness: Towards A Theory Of The Impending Nuclear Holocaust”, The Menard Press, 1983).
Of course, the theoretical fantasies of a successful first strike remain in the realms of science fiction. And this was the very psycho-pathology that Ronald Aronson so presciently dissected several decades ago – the embrace of totally destructive “terrorism” acted out “in a scientific fantasy-universe”, with the purported goal of solving a political problem! (ibid. see especially pp20-23). The human power to dominate has not only created a huge rupture with the natural world but also with the social world. It has become horribly self-destructive. Most unfortunately, however, the military personnel locked into the psycho-pathology of nuclear war gaming, along with their equally mad politicians, are those calling the shots. Against a background of rising tension between the US and Russia, “The Arsenal” on 60 Minutes (Prime TV, 26/9/16) gave some chilling insights into the deranged and perverted mentality of the military personnel in America's nuclear strategic command system. They are quite prepared to do their duty and blow up the world. There are over 1,000 nuclear missiles on hair-trigger alert. At the peak crisis of a seemingly imminent incoming missile attack, command headquarters has only a few minutes to decide on what to do. In the chaos of any serious clash of conventional forces, the military imperative and pressures to ratchet up the scale could quickly become overwhelming. As a consequence, the US would be involved in war simultaneously with both Russia and China. Crazily enough, the US is squaring off for anticipated probable war, or even in self-fulfilling prophetic terms, inevitable war, with both Russia and China. Social Darwinist competition is running rampant on the curve of evolutionary overshoot! Russia certainly fears the worst if Hillary Clinton wins the American Presidency
(“‘If It’s Hillary Clinton It’s War’, Says Vladimir Putin To Frightened Russian People”, The Inquisitr: www. inquisitr.com, 20/6/16; “The Kremlin Really Believes That Hillary Wants to Start A War With Russia”, Foreign Policy:, http://foreignpolicy.com/201 6/09/07/the-kremlin-really-be lievesthat-hillary-clinton-will-start-a-warwit h-russia-donald-trump-vladimir-puti n/). At the same time, Global Zero warns that almost half Americans think that rival Presidential candidate Donald Trump is likely to start a nuclear war. Both candidates have been accusing each other of an inclination to press the red nuclear button, opening the gates of Hell. We have now reached a bizarre, frightening stage in world history. It can indeed be stated categorically here that the world is inexorably on the path to nuclear destruction, given current conditions and trends. We have to somehow break free away from this dead end track if humankind (let alone so many other species) can survive. Both the Ukraine and South China Sea theatres, along with the Korean Peninsula, loom menacingly as potential flash-points (refer to John Gallagher's “Korean Nuclear Standoff” elsewhere in this issue; see too, “North Korea's Latest Nuclear Test Proves The Status Quo Isn't Working”, www.globalzero.org, 9/9/16). Even the Syrian situation, already a terrible tragedy for its people, could turn absolutely toxic in the sense of a nuclear-prone confrontation. Potential flash-points are indeed mounting up and compounding the risks, even between other countries, e.g., India versus Pakistan over Kashmir. America, as well, wants to fight any nuclear war as much as possible on the soils and waters of other countries. One big positive plus on our side is the phalanx of excellent activist international organisations, including a number of prominent American peace and anti-nuclear groups, working hard for a sane future. Besides Global Zero, they include World Beyond War (www.wo rldbeyondwar.org>who); Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (https://ww w.wagingpeace.org); RootsAction (h ttp://www.rootsaction.org/); and the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN: www.ican
w.org). Unfortunately, they are virtually ignored by the warmongering mainstream media. We need to step up our joint campaigning to have regular impact. Resisting The Roots Of War Below the level of preventing nuclear holocaust, there are a number of subsidiary objectives. Among the most important of these is the objective of making peace as much as possible in the Middle East by addressing the root causes of conflict, and countering - or at least significantly reducing - the continuous blowback from the perniciously counter-productive “War on Terror” (“The Futility Of The Long US War In The Middle East”, Paul Pillar, http://nationalinterest.org/blog/paulpillar/the-futility-the-long-us-war-themiddle-east-11421, 6/10/14; “Turmoil In The Middle East Seems Constant, And US Military Intervention Only Makes It Worse”, Huffington Post, http://www.huffingtonpos t.com/ivan-eland/turmoil-in-the-middl e-eas_b_7637314.html, 22/6/15; “The US War On Terror Has Cost $5 Trillion and Increased Terror by 6,500%”, http://www.theantimedia.or g/us-war-terror-5-trillion, 14/9/16; “Middle East Turmoil And Beyond: Political Blowback In Action”, Dennis Small, Peace Researcher 43, May, 2012, http://www.converge.org.nz/a bc/pr/43/pr43-008.htm). As Glenn Greenwald makes clear, the policies and deeds of the AngloAmerican axis expressing “violence and savagery” are far greater than those it so hypocritically denounces - “a testament to how powerful and self-blinding tribalism is a human drive” (“How Many Muslim Countries Has The US Bombed Or Occupied Since 1980?”, The Intercept, 11/6/14, https://theintercept.com/20 14/11/06/many-countries-islamic-wo rld-u-s-bombed-occupied-since-198 0/). The Western media faithfully reflect this self-serving tribalism. Syria is “at least the 14th country in the Islamic world that US forces have invaded, or occupied or bombed” since 1980 (ibid.). US State terrorist bombing is today wide-ranging (“The United States Is Bombing Six Countries”, The Ben Williams Library, www.benwilliamsli brary.com>blog. This site provides a damning overview of the American
militaristic record). In 2016, the US is actually bombing seven countries: Afghanistan; Iraq; Syria; Pakistan; Libya; Yemen; and Somalia. Directly targeted American depredations are supported by its allies like Israel and Saudi Arabia in continual proxy warfare. Disruptive chaos has ensued. A recent American aid deal for Israel will supply US$38 billion worth of military equipment and logistics over the next ten years for the creation of further mayhem and chaos (Press, 16/9/16). Currently, contiguous Iraq and Syria are the two principal countries subject to major internecine and interconnected conflict, along with smaller countries like Lebanon and Libya. Syria is especially stressed and afflicted, torn between conflicting militias, foreign intervention (as determined by geopolitical aims), jihadist extremism, and ruthless regime repression - all resulting in awful casualties and suffering. Yemen is another severely afflicted country. Terrorism flourishes, above all, vicious State terrorism. The Syrian regime is waging war with both “barrel” and incendiary bombs, chemical weapons, massacres, diabolically targeted attacks on hospitals and medical facilities, indiscriminate slaughter of civilians, as well as starving civilians blockaded in Aleppo and elsewhere. The anti-regime forces, incorporating a host of jihadists of one stripe or another, as well as a range of other insurgents, are also guilty of many war crimes, with terrorist bombings, massacres and mass executions, starvation sieges, etc. Most tragically, the toll on the nation's children continues to be heart-rending. The United Nations (UN) has confirmed chemical attacks by both sides: chlorine gas by the Assad regime, and mustard gas by jihadists. Yet the conflict is still wrapped in a fog of propaganda and flawed comprehension (see e.g.: “The Stench Of Raw Propaganda”, www.paulcraigroberts.org, 12/8/16). Consequently, misinformation is pervasive internationally, along with all the various sources of reasonably accurate and relatively reliable information. Getting at the truth as near we can is constantly fraught with challenges. Peace Researcher 52 November 2016
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In mid-August 2016 Republican Party Presidential candidate Donald Trump stirred up the US Establishment with another allegedly outrageous statement, i.e. that President Obama and Hillary Clinton were jointly responsible for the creation of Islamic State (IS). This claim was immediately rubbished by the big American TV networks, which put the blame on President George W. Bush's plan to reduce the number of troops in Iraq, yet one more error in the endless series of Anglo-American so-called “mistakes” in the “War on Terror”. An obviously revealing implication of this media assumption is that to really reinforce imperialism you need a permanent standing army in the occupied country! But hey, let's not spoil the mainstream storyline (which was, of course, parroted by the NZ media, especially the TV channels)! Trump is certainly a horribly obnoxious and flaky politician but even he can say something of real import as in this particular case. While Obama and Clinton didn't actually create IS, there is certainly plenty of evidence now that they facilitated and abetted it in a number of ways. This is another narrative, of course, that the mainstream media want to suppress as much as possible. Covert Action Activities Writing back in early 2012, I made some observations about the unfolding situation in Syria (“Middle East Turmoil And Beyond”, PR 43, May 2012, op. cit.). One of my observations was that: “With its overthrow of Saddam Hussein, the US has unleashed a whole problematic range of dynamic factors in the region's Sunni-Shiite equation, among other scary prospects – including some that now may also be unfolding” (ibid.). Certain Western media had already drawn attention to what appeared to be the increasing involvement of foreign jihadists like Salafi adherents in the civil war. They had voiced concern about this development. But there should have been an even deeper concern relating to the activities of Western agents. Indeed, what has emerged – while yet murky in so many aspects – is how the West has 20
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further helped create a terrible situation for the people of Syria by its support for jihadists, and thus the creation of the conditions for the rise of IS and similar groups. In my article, I noted how a French TV documentary crew got excited when they saw some rebel Salafist fighters, given that Salafis are often considered Muslim extremists (ibid.). It later emerged how Salafis have been to the fore in the rise of IS. “A 'declassified secret US intelligence report, written in August 2012'” both predicted and effectively welcomed “the prospect of a 'Salafist principality' in eastern Syria, and an al Qaeda-controlled state in Syria and Iraq. The Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA) document identifies al Qaeda in Iraq (which became ISIS) and fellow Salafists as the 'major forces driving the insurgency in Syria' – and observes that 'Western countries, the Gulf States and Turkey' were supporting the opposition's efforts to take control of eastern Syria… A year into the Syrian rebellion, the US and its allies weren't only supporting and arming an opposition they knew to be dominated by extreme sectarian groups; they were prepared to countenance the creation of some sort of 'Islamic state' … 'as a Sunni buffer to weaken Syria'”, and so offset “'Shia expansion'” and influence beyond Iraq and Iran (“Now The Truth Emerges: How The US Fuelled The Rise Of ISIS In Syria And Iraq”, Seumas Milne, Opinion, Guardian, https://www.theguardia n.com/commentisfree/2015/jun/03/ us-isis-syria-iraq, 3/6/15). The very hawkish US General Wesley Clark asserts that IS is very much an American artefact (see e.g.: “General Wesley Clark Explains ISIS Was Created By US Allies”, YouTube, https://www.youtu be.com/watch?v=ojcoKnTGf4s, 22/2/15). In Clark's view: “Our friends and allies (like Saudi Arabia and Turkey) funded ISIS to destroy Hezbollah” (ibid.). Most tellingly, he also freely acknowledges that oil is central to conflict in the Middle East. In order to illustrate the generally very biased treatment of the Syrian conflict by the mainstream Western media, I shall actually at this point draw on the writings of one of the West's most prominent and yet also
reasonably fair-minded commentators, Gwynne Dyer. Dyer is wellknown for his regular newspaper columns, books and commentaries, including incisive critiques of Western interventions in the Middle East region (e.g. “Ignorant Armies: Sliding Into War In Iraq”, 2003; & “The Mess They Made: The Middle East After Iraq”, 2007), along with important treatises on global problems (e.g., “Future Tense: The Coming World Order”, 2004; & “Climate Wars”, 2008). So Dyer is certainly no typical media hack. But, despite all this, as reflects his military background, Dyer still ascribes significantly to the conventional Western viewpoint. In a recent comment on the Syrian conflict, he explored the ramifications of closer coordination between the US and Russia (“The US And Russia Agree On Syria”, Greymouth Star, 6/8/16). After setting the scene with America's claim “for years that it was determined to see the overthrow of Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian dictator (and his minority Shiite Alawite sect regime), and was at the same time working to destroy his mortal enemy, IS”, Gwynne Dyer says that the US has finally realised that Assad's regime “is the lesser evil compared to a takeover of all of Syria by the Islamic fanatics” (ibid.). Dyer maintains that: “The Obama Administration fell into this now obviously hopeless strategy (of support for rebel extremists) back in the days of the 'Arab Spring' in 201011” (ibid.). He goes on to observe: “As the opposition fell increasingly into the hands of Islamist extremists in 2012-13, the prospect of a peaceful, democratic successor regime vanished” (ibid.). At this stage, we can totally reject Dyer's portrayal of the American aim of a “democratic successor regime” for Syria. This has been the biggest bullshit American lie. Propaganda about imposing democracy at the point of a foreigner's gun is an Orwellian absurdity, yet constantly peddled by the AngloAmerican Establishment and media with a straight face. The hypocritical, transparent camouflage of a democratic commitment to the Middle East is a cover completely blown by the bloody, repressive record of American imperialism right up to the
facilitative of the growth of IS but Sunni Turkey, also now committed to conservative Islam and rivalry with Iran, cunningly aided the extremist organisation by funnelling foreign Islamist fighters and arms across its borders. It was not until Russia started bombing these supply lines, including the crucial export of Syrian oil by IS into Turkey, that this particular double game blew apart. As Turkey turned against IS, it has suffered a savage backlash from the terrorist group, as well as the continuing Kurdish insurgency within its borders.
present day. These days, not only does the Anglo-American axis help the totalitarian oil kingdom of Saudi Arabia repress its own Shiite minority, but the fundamentalist Wahhabi regime is brazenly allied cheek by jowl with the axis in a coalition against Assad. Western Hypocrisy & Repression Even so, much of Gwynne Dyer's own critiques on Iraq since the illegal 2003 invasion reveal the workings of Western hypocrisy and repression. The Anglo-American axis simply wants a regime change tailored to its own geopolitical and imperial ambitions. If the dictator Assad has proved to be abominable in the violent repression of his own people, the American-orchestrated intervention has generated systematic chaos. Yet Dyer sticks to the mandatory media myth that the US & co. has simply been guilty of “error” (ibid.). The US went on, he contends, to “a forlorn attempt to build a 'third force' that would defeat both Assad and the Islamists” (ibid.). Instead, the Islamists perversely came to prevail amongst the ranks of these insurgents as well. So Dyer begins his analysis of what went wrong by acknowledging that the US from the origins of the so-called “Arab Spring” backed extremist rebels in Syria, and then goes on with the tale about trying to build a “third force”. But most obviously, the US strategy and its accompanying propaganda was all crap from the very start!
For sure, these particular insurgents - as already noted above - had more than a little Anglo-American help! What Dyer omits to tell is how the US most malignly played a double game in supporting a host of Islamist jihadists, who comprised so many of the armed militants within this so-called “democratic third force” (e.g.: “Now The Truth Emerges: How The US Fuelled The Rise Of ISIS In Iraq And Syria”, op. cit.). The first thing to take note of in this regard is that, as earlier also indicated, a major driving impetus behind the armed resistance and uprising against Assad's rule has been the Anglo-American client Gulf State bloc spearheaded by Saudi Arabia. The central Arab kingdom and Qatar were to the fore in the recruitment and support of dedicated Sunni Islamist fighters for the Syrian civil war. Rivalry with Shiite Iran loomed large in this strategy. Secondly, refugees fleeing to Syria in the tumultuous aftermath of the US-led invasion of Iraq came to include al Qaeda-affiliated Islamist warriors, including the Islamic State of Iraq or IS; and IS adopted another of its various names there. By 2013, it had become known as ISIL (Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant). Evidence has recently come to light of the direct support for IS from both Saudi Arabia and Qatar in the creation of IS (see http://www.thecanary.co/201 6/10/11/new-clinton-email-revealsdir ect-support-for-isis-from-two-powerf ul-western-allies/. Not only were the Gulf States
In terms of the wider conflict, even standard Western news reports can be revealing. For instance, Hama was under siege by “rebels” in early September 2016. It was reported: “The rebel offensive is being led by an ultraconservative Islamist group, Jund al-Aqsa, and several factions from the Western-backed Free Syrian Army” (Press, 3/9/16). The Free Syrian Army has been the main American front militia operating in the civil war. Callously, and once again with cold calculation, the US has used the people of Syria - as it used the people of Afghanistan in the past (and currently in a different way!) - as a stamping-ground for jihadist warriors. Here in Aotearoa/NZ, I have come across no mention of US support for extreme jihadists on our propagandistic TV channels, except a brief reference to a Russian charge about American backing for al Qaeda linked “rebels” (One News at 6 pm, TVNZ, 1/10/16). If the US were to withdraw support, both direct and indirect, from these Islamist fighters in Syria, then the “rebellion” would plummet both in extent and intensity. There might even be hope of some relatively civilised peaceful dialogue, negotiation, accommodation, and eventually reforms. The contradictions of the terroristic American “War on Terror” continue to compound and deepen (for background, see: “The Terrorist ‘War On Terror’”, PR 26, October 2002, Murray Horton, http://www.converg e.org.nz/abc/pr26-63.htm). Growing Challenges Conflicts continue to spread and become even more entangled. By July 2016, the US was openly bombing Peace Researcher 52 November 2016
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again in Libya, targeting IS purportedly at the behest of the new purported “unitary” government there. By September, anti-IS militias, facilitated by American bombers and Special Forces, had captured the enemy stronghold of Sirte. But multiple fractious divisions and uncertainties remain in Libya and elsewhere. Egypt is once more effecttively under brutal military rule with Anglo-American facilitation and support for authoritarian control (so much again for democracy!).
The Anglo-American axis, in particular - in order to keep up its political pretences - has to posture about safeguarding democracy in Turkey, along with its purported concerns and “crocodile tears” for the Syrian people. As previously noted, President Erdogan's brand of conservative Islam has already had volatile ramifications with Turkey's double game of supporting IS and jihadists in Syria against Assad backfiring in terrorist activities on its own soil. Turkey, Russia & The Kurds
In the usual propagandistic fashion, the Western media spotlight has moved away from a Westernbacked repressive regime, which is currently trying to stamp out several violent Islamist opposition groups. Instead, the media focus is almost totally of late directed on Syria, and especially the city of Aleppo, where Russian intervention has disrupted the goals of the Anglo-American axis, including those of Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States: i.e. the goals of installing a pro-Western Sunni regime; to further surround and isolate Russia, and to offset Iranian Shiite gains in Iraq and Yemen (“Putin Causing US Angst In Syria”, Press, 9/8/16). The present Egyptian regime has banned the Muslim Brotherhood, which was both the driving force of the overthrow of the Mubarak dictatorship during the protests of the Arab Spring uprising in 2011, and later the main victorious party in the ensuing democratic elections. The violent opposition that has since emerged since the effective reinstatement of military rule includes a branch of IS, especially active in the Sinai. We have already cited the case of Turkey and the growing complexity of regional conflicts. Turkey, right on the borders of Europe, is now deeply divided and getting even more unstable, with a Kurdish insurgency, IS terrorism, military unrest (viz. the failed coup attempt in July 2016), and authoritarian repression. Crosscutting ties and conflicts are both multiplying and ramifying in a very complex and confusing fashion. The West pontificates about human rights. But the West is really worried about the potential for disruptive dangerous division and instability right on the borders of Europe, with the spill-over of jihadist extremism.
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Momentously, following Erdogan's accusations of American backing for the recent military coup attempt and the Gulen (Hizmet) movement, Turkey has made a rapprochement with Russia vis-a-vis the Syrian civil war and apparently some other matters. By August 2016, Turkey had decided to cooperate with Russia against IS, and was very soon doing the same with the US. American Vice-President Joe Biden visited Turkey that month (post the Army coup attempt) in obvious competition with Russia to try and safeguard, as well as extend, US influence in the region. Yet another source of tension, however, inheres in the fact that the US has been supporting the Syrian Kurdish rebels against Assad. In stark contrast, Turkey sees these particular militias (the YPG) as linked to the PKK Kurdish leftist rebels in Turkey, who are again up in arms against the Erdogan regime. The US has long helped Turkey repress this Turkish minority and the PKK (damningly documented back in 1997 by John Tirman in “Spoils Of War: The Human Cost Of America's Arms Trade”, The Free Press). So both Turkey and the US have told the Kurds in Syria to back off some of their hard-won territorial claims there. It should be noted that the Kurds, too, have been accused by human rights groups of ethnic cleansing by ejecting Arabs, Turkmen, and other such groups from captured villages and towns (“Amnesty International Accuses Kurdish YPG Of War Crimes”, Al-Monitor: www.al-monito r.com>originals>2015/10; “Kurdish Fighters 'Carry Out Ethnic Cleansing' In Syria”, Al Jazeera English: www.aljazeera.com>news>2016/2).
The YPG has been the driving force in the US-backed, so-called Syrian Democratic Forces (ibid.). Actual hostilities have already taken place between the YPG and the Turkish military and its allied militias (e.g., “Turkey Fires On US-Backed Kurdish Militia In Syria Offensive”, Reuters: www.reuters.com>article, 25/8/16). The big American TV networks, while acknowledging US tensions with the YPG, had earlier highlighted their fight against IS, with an especial focus on the YPG's large contingent of female fighters (10,000) in its YPJ affiliate. But Turkey is now intent on keeping the Syrian Kurds west of the Euphrates River, a distant echo of the Romans versus the Parthians (in the 1st Century Before Common Era [BCE]) as imperial wars roll on. A major problematic issue in Syria, ironically enough, is that the US wants Russia to stop “its own bombing of US-backed opposition forces. Russia has complained of increasing overlap between the opposition and terrorist groups on the ground, and said it was up to the US to separate them before a deal could be struck. US failure to do so has allowed the Russians to claim they are only targeting terrorists of the Front for the Conquest of Syria – or Jabhat Fatah al-Sham, the al Qaeda affiliate formerly known as Jabhat al-Nusra – and IS” (from a Washington Post article reproduced in the Press, 6/9/16). Oh dear, what a tangled web we have woven indeed! - and most unfortunately at the expense of the suffering of Syria's civilians, including vulnerable women and children. Western aid to refugees fleeing countries torn apart by Western geopolitical ambitions remains as pitiful as ever, although Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel has set an inspiring example. Far more is spent on space research and other such lofty aims, let alone wars, weaponry, and related military expenditures, by this self-proclaimed superior civilisation. As all the cross-cutting ties and shifting alliances in the Middle East cauldron continue to demonstrate, uncertainty - other than the guarantee of more chaos and mayhem! - is the operative word for the region and contiguous areas while the big powers continue to
play their brutal manipulative games (for more relevant background on Syria see: Patrick Cockburn, “End Times For The Caliphate?”, London Review of Books, 3/3/16, www.lrb.c o.uk). Meanwhile, more malevolent, selfserving warmongering on Syria is served up by the likes of American Republican Party Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham (“Gulf May Arm Rebels Now Syria Truce Is Dead, Say US Officials”, Press, 28/9/16). The Saudis, facilitated by the US, may soon supply the Syrian rebels with MANPADS, i.e. “shoulder-fired missiles to defend themselves against Syrian and Russian warplanes” (ibid.). After all, this weapon proved deadly against the Russians “in Afghanistan 30 years ago” (ibid.). So IS, al Qaeda, & co. can look forward to the prospect of using this weaponry against American aircraft as well. The Yanks have found yet another brilliant way of escalating nuclear big power confrontation! Perversely enough, the Washington office of Human Rights Watch only blames Putin for the current bloody mess in Aleppo and elsewhere (ibid.). The Bloody Mess Of AngloAmerican Machinations By the end of August 2016 the Iraqi Army and its Shiite militias had “liberated” the town of Qayyarah from the repressive grip of IS. Reporter John Irvine of ITV triumphantly announced to us that the “barbarians” had been driven out (Newshub Live at 6 pm, 31/8/16). Irvine, notoriously enough, was the first Western reporter in Iraq in 2003 to greet the invading US-led forces. For some time, Irvine trumpeted the success of the invasion and how things would soon improve in Iraq. Irvine was guilty of the worst kind of media prediction and propaganda, proclaiming that: “A war of three weeks has brought an end to decades of Iraq misery” (quoted in: Media Lens, The Great Iraq War Fraud”, www. medialens.org, 13/7/16 – this is an excellent overview of the lies and manipulations of the corporate media). As a leading cheerleader for AngloAmerican imperialism, Irvine is selfservingly blind to his own “barba-
rism”, and the horrible ongoing misery that he and his mates have inflicted on Iraq and its inhabitants. “… [A] report last year by Physicians for Social Responsibility estimated the Iraq death toll as around one million” (ibid.). The American simplistic cowboy myth of the “good guys” versus the “bad guys” is indeed gobsmacking in its malign perversity but again just par for the course for the Western mainstream media (ibid.). Most symbolically, the modern Vandals of IS had set the oil wells near Qayyarah on fire. As the real geopolitical reason for the 2003 Anglo-American invasion, oil is dark with the blood of the people of the Middle East, Central Asia, and Africa. The burning oil wells smothering much of the town of Qayyarah in a black ominous fog certainly carried their own symbolic sinister message. Ironically, one of the facts that Irvine reported was that the Iraqi Army was now checking out the male inhabitants for any “sleeper” cells or IS agents. Shiite militias have already committed atrocities in “liberating” other parts of Iraq from IS. A full-scale siege of Mosul by the Iraqi Army and its allied militias, as supported by AngloAmerican airpower and Special Forces operatives, is under way. The current situation is pregnant again with the threat of Iraqi Shiite repression of the Sunni minority and so the turn of the circle, or screw of the vice, once more. Meantime, Saudi Arabia, in leading the assault on Yemen as proxy for the Anglo-American axis, has inflicted a dire humanitarian crisis on its victims. The Orwellian evil unleashed and perpetrated by the Anglo-American axis has radiated out in various ever-evolving forms of political blowback (e.g., “Reaping The Fruits Of The War On Terror In Yemen”, Counterpunch, www.count erpunch.org>2015/11/03; “Middle East Turmoil And Beyond”, op. cit.). By September 2016 a more positive significant change had seemed to be taking shape in Syria with the US and Russia agreeing on a ceasefire, however fragile, and a strategy to target both al Qaeda and IS. But this ceasefire soon proved tragically unsuccessful, after the US and its deputy Australia (mistakenly or deliberately?) bombed a contin-
gent of Russian-backed Assad regime troops engaged in fighting IS. The NZ Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) may have contributed to the targeting of Assad's troop as an operative agency within the so-called “5 Eyes” intelligence network, also known as ”The Club”. This momentous event was followed by another very unfortunate and contentious incident, a vicious attack on a UN aid convoy near Aleppo with the Americans in turn accusing the Russians of committing this particular atrocity. Such charges and counter-charges are now being regularly exchanged in a bitter geopolitical struggle and related conflicts - all in a compounding horrible mess of human misery. But there is no doubt that the Russians have now joined the Western UN Security Council members – the US, Britain, and France – in the big power club of war criminal states active in the Middle East, jointly sharing the attribution of “barbarism”. At the same time, besides the Chilcot Report (into Britain’s involvement in the 2003 invasion and occupation of Iraq), the official British documentation of past “mistakes” goes on. A British report has detailed: “a botched intervention in Libya that caused [my emphasis] the rise of IS in North Africa” (“Inquiry Faults Cameron For Rise Of ISIS”, Press, 15/9/16). It condemned the British government for not using diplomacy better; for “post-conflict plans to stabilise Libya” that amounted to “fanciful rot”; and for losing “billions of pounds” worth of weaponry and ammunition, “which had 'increased terrorism' across the region” (ibid.). Foreign Western forces are being increasingly drawn into the mayhem and disorder of the Middle East, and further afield in Africa and Central Asia, and all the political blowback that this entails (for background refer to “Middle East Turmoil And Beyond”, op. cit.). Vicious warmongering media like the Murdoch empire are constantly spoiling for a fight, for more murderous mayhem, vociferously baying for blood (“More Media War-mongering: Signs Of Things To Come. Part 1”, Dennis Small, Peace Researcher 41, July 2011, http://www.conver ge.org.nz abc/pr/41/pr41-006.htm).
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NZ Herald, 25/7/16
Yet the world refugee problem is unprecedented with over 65 million people displaced (both externally and internally). The human suffering in the war zones is immense (“Body Count Report Reveals At Least 1.3 Million Lives Lost to US-Led War on Terror”, Global Research, Centre for Research on Globalization: www.glo balresearch.ca,31/3/2015). Nobel Peace Prize winner and drone warfare President, Barack Obama, malignly postures about his State terrorist crimes, the large number of civilian casualties, and the political and “terrorist” blowback (“US 'Downplays' Drone Figures”, Sunday Star Times, 3/7/16). NZ’s PM John Key is an enthusiastic fellow State terrorist for illegal drone warfare, supported by the local media. Meanwhile: “More than 10,000 people have died crossing the Mediterranean to Europe since 2014, according to the UN” (Press, 23/9/16); and Key and his mates keep on warning us about the “threat” of a flood of boat-people reaching our shores.
train Iraqi soldiers in the fight against IS (for background see: “Good Dog Johnny: Iraq War Is The Price Of Belonging To ‘The Club’”, Murray Horton, Peace Researcher 49, June 2015, http://www.conve rge.org.nz/abc/pr/49/pr49-003.html). Even the mainstream media have tossed around the term “mission creep” in regard to this decision announced in June 2016.
In spite of previous repeated disavowals of any such intentions, the NZ government has decided to extend the stay of NZ troops in Iraq for a couple of years, ostensibly helping
Lately, there has even been talk of a likely Special Air Service (SAS) commitment from NZ to Libya. There could, in fact, already be NZ SAS units operating in the Middle
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In the wake of the US-laid “beartrap” set long ago by the Carter Administration for the Soviets in 1979, the interminable warfare in Afghanistan goes on with a widespread resurgence of the Taliban, and now also IS-affiliated groups. The latter carried out a savage suicide attack on a Shiite Hazara gathering in Kabul in July 2016. NZ's former deployment of an Army unit to Hazara-occupied Bamyan Province was not even mentioned in any media reports that I saw or heard. Sadly, NZ's previous protective role for the Hazaras has now proved to be a problematic legacy.
East/North Africa region, screened by the traditional cloak of State secrecy relating to this sort of deployment. In recent years, NZ has reverted back to its former mercenary role within the American empire. Instead, it should be trying its best to help establish the conditions for a more peaceful world. This goal must incorporate both the principles of social justice and environmental sustainability. During its stint at chairing the UN Security Council the NZ government did help to highlight the humanitarian plight of the Syrian people, even if according to conventional Western expectations and American contrivance. Back In ANZUS*! *The Australia, New Zealand, US military treaty that was the foundation of all New Zealand’s defence and foreign policy from its inception in 1951 until the US, under President Ronald Reagan, kicked us out in 1986. It remains in force today, but only between the US and Australia. Ed The Obama Administration and the NZ government have agreed that a US warship visit is welcome and will take place later during November
2016 during our 75th anniversary naval celebrations. This has been greeted with warm acceptance - not only by the NZ political Establishment to the cheers of the Americanindoctrinated media - but also by some of the leading lights of the national anti-nuclear and peace movement. So far as the latter are concerned the visit by a demonstrably non-nuclear vessel bears witness to the sanctity of our nuclear free zone and related legislation. It signals a victory for Aotearoa/NZ and its nuclear free stand. But others in the peace and antinuclear movement still strongly oppose a visit by an American warship whatever its exact status and purported role. This writer is one of those who is strongly opposed. I think that there is indeed a host of reasons why Aotearoa/NZ should refuse such a visit (except if involved in humanitarian relief work in the Pacific Islands), and similarly refuse any such visit from the other major world nuclear powers, i.e. China and Russia. Any vessels other than military can be welcome. We should stand aside from the big nuclear weapon nations and instead act, whenever and wherever we can, in a neutral, positive peacemaking role as much as possible. Mediation and humanitarian work should be our watchwords, as well as committed opposition to wars, preparation for wars, and warmongering. This policy position should include not welcoming warships. Emblematic of the trend to suicidal neo-fascism was the declaration of National Party MP David Bennett, the screaming skull of Parliament, that anyone who impedes a warship is a “terrorist”. Bennett evidently embraces American nuclear State terrorism in all its forms. Being nuclear free means staying clear of nuclear military alliances and entanglements. Ominously enough, NZ's acceptance of an American warship visit is being portrayed by the media as the final move back into a de facto ANZUStype military pact. When the decision was announced, Tracy Watkins, Political Editor of Fairfax Media, was quick to welcome it in “an increasingly uncertain world” (“Naval Ship Visit Restores Common Sense To NZ-US Relations”, Press,
21/7/16). The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists (BAS) has recently put the Doomsday Clock forward to just three minutes to midnight. Yet Tracy Watkins and the rest of the mainstream media are effectively cheerleaders for the Pentagon's crazy, evil plans for war against both Russia and China. Such suicidal madness is just routine propaganda for the Western and NZ media. The “killer ape's” planetary dominance is certainly programmed to end in unprecedented hellish Social Darwinist violence unless humans can somehow collectively come to their senses, and demonstrate real intelligence for long-term survival and sustainability. What some of us have come to marvel at within our touted Western civilisation is how conventional mainstream society accepts - indeed is conditioned to accept! - the bizarre and horrific prospect of imminent self-destruction as the culmination of a brief, sudden spurt of cultural “progress” (a mere blink of an eye even in biological time!). The quite weird surreal nature of it all can be mind-numbing. “The enormous increase in science fiction since the 1950s has diversified horror fiction even more than might at first be supposed… In a chaotic world, which many see to be on a disaster course, through the cracks, 'the faults in reality', we and our writers catch other and vertiginous glimpses of 'chaos and old night', fissiparating images of death and destruction” (“The Penguin Dictionary Of Literary Terms and Literary Theory”, 4th ed., JA Cuddon, Penguin Books, 1999, in entry on “horror story”, p399). Corporate globalisation, spearheaded by the inroads of free trade, has driven divisions both within and between countries as evolutionary overshoot reaches its peak. The Brexit outcome, along with the rise to prominence of polarising, antagonistic Rightwing politicians like Donald Trump, has exemplified such trends even in the societies of the Anglo-American axis. Above all, the touted “borderless world” is resolving back into the very grim geopolitical realities of land and placebased conflict fissures reflecting national, ethnic, class, and religious fault-lines. These fault-lines are so
often taking the form of the West against the rest. The Ukraine Nuclear Trip-Wire: Europe And The World On The Brink Again In July 2016 John Key visited Europe and attended the centenary commemoration in Paris for the Battle of the Somme, in which a large number of New Zealanders were killed during World War I (WWI). A contingent of the NZ Defence Force marched there on Bastille Day (14th July). We were exhorted repeatedly while these commemorations proceeded to remember this patriotic “sacrifice”. Eerily and ominously enough, many of the same signs that heralded the advent of WWI are evident enough today. Writing in May 2016 the exceptionally fine investigative journalist, John Pilger, observed that: “The 2016 (US) election campaign is remarkable not only for the rise of Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders but also for the resilience of an enduring silence about a murderous, self-bestowed divinity”, despite the fact that a “third of the members of the UN have felt Washington's boot, overturning governments, subverting democracy, imposing blockades and boycotts” (“Silencing America As It Prepares For War”, www.john pilger.com>articles, 27/5/16). Pilger goes on to note that: “Today, (Nobel Peace Prize winner) Obama runs an unprecedented worldwide campaign of terror and murder by drone”; that he has actually “built more nuclear warheads than any other American President”; and that he is engaged in the ever ongoing modernisation of “America's doomsday arsenal, including a new 'mini' nuclear weapon, whose size and 'smart' technology, says a leading general, ensure its use is 'no longer unthinkable'” [just as Trump advocates!] (ibid). Pilger emphasised the chilling fact that: “On Obama's watch, a second Cold War is under way”, with “the greatest military build-up on the borders of Russia since WWII” (ibid.). Ukraine has become the cockpit of West/East confrontation. The Western media portray the Russian President as a “pantomime villain”, with the Chinese leadership now being Peace Researcher 52 November 2016
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increasingly recast in a similar, matching mould. In May (2016) Romania got an operative “NATO 'missile defence base' that aims its first strike American missiles at the heart of Russia, the world's second nuclear power” (ibid.). Pushed along by the US, NATO forces have ringed both Russia and China with military bases and weaponry as much as possible. The risks for all of humankind are ratcheting up on a steep and frightening curve. In the modern era, the tribalism of earlier times gave way to the rise of the nation State and so a kind of super-tribalism expressed in ideological nationalism. Corporate-driven globalisation has resulted in a political blowback that again reinforces the nation State. Revealingly enough, the academic study of international relations has considered aggressively manipulative interState competition the natural type of behaviour at this level of human social organisation. “Sometimes called the 'power-politics' school of thought, political realism (my emphasis) in one form or another has dominated both academic thinking on international relations and the conceptions of policy-makers and diplomats, certainly since Machiavelli contemplated the subject” (“Penguin Dictionary Of International Relations”, Graham Evans & Jeffrey Newnham, Penguin Reference, 1998, in entry on “Realism”, p465). Machiavellian Meddling In Ukraine Coup It was yet an astonishing Machiavellian spectacle to see the Obama Administration, in collaboration with the West's major media organs, blatantly orchestrate a coup against a democratically elected Government in the Ukraine - all under a transparent camouflage of anti-Putin and anti-Russian propaganda, i.e. transparent enough to those with knowledge of the typical workings of American duplicity and realpolitik. A string of American political figures including Senator John McCain in December 2013 and Secretary of State John Kerry in early March 2014 - even openly visited the Ukraine to cheer on the coupmakers, both before and after the Central Intelligence Agency-backed putsch. 26
Peace Researcher 52 November 2016
Indeed, the US-orchestrated takeover was brazenly blatant with a whole range of American agents involved (see e.g., “Chronology Of The Ukrainian Coup”, Counterpunch, www.counterpunch.org>201 4/03/05; “Exposing The US Corporate Interests Behind Ukraine Coup”, Allternet, www.allternet.org> news-amp-politics). The opponents to this coup, located mostly in eastern Ukraine, were then cast in the role perversely enough of undemocratic rebels! In the very face of desperate non-violent protests there by ordinary civilians pleading for peace (as even shown repeatedly on Western TV!), the new Ukrainian regime instead sent in its tanks, armoured vehicles, troops, and war-planes to wantonly kill and destroy. Ever since, there has been a most dangerous standoff between Russia and the West with simmering intermittent violence in this border region. In implementing the coup, a wide range of Western forces were marshalled, as if in the case of yet another victim “Third World” nation. They came from the European Union (EU), the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), transnational corporations (TNCs), and various pseudo non-government (NGO) front groups. The last mentioned have been long involved in one form or another in the NATO subversion of Ukraine and other former Soviet republics in Eastern Europe. They included a number of front civic action groups sponsored
by American billionaire George Soros' Open Society Foundation. Key arms of American foreign policy like the Agency for International Development (AID) and the notorious National Endowment for Democracy (NED) have been vigorously at work within the Ukraine. NED is an organisation specifically set up during the Reagan era to complement the CIA's terrorism and dirty work with “soft power” machinations. It functions in aid of Rightwing politicians, policies, and in this way cultivates markets for US corporate penetration and countries/societies for geopolitical influence. These outfits have certainly proved major manipulators and funders of Western-aligned change within Ukrainian society, generating, connecting, and then networking closely with local groups. All this realpolitik manipulation has divided yet another society, cost thousands of lives, caused immense suffering, and brought the world again to the nuclear brink. We urgently need to help foster to the fore voices and actions for moderation and mediation. An essential part of this aim must include continuously contesting the lies and misrepresentations of Western warmongering propaganda (“More Media Warmongering”, op. cit.). It can be well argued that the USengineered coup in the Ukraine deposed a corrupt pro-Russian government only to replace it with a corrupt and unashamedly brutal go-
vernment. Putin's Russia has been demonstrably defensive in what it has done in the Ukraine while the West has been obscenely open and malevolent in its subversion and perversion of democratic principles, and support for the ruthless suppression of dissent at the cost of thousands of casualties. Whereas the US can blatantly, malignly, and illegally invade and bomb far away from its shores for supposed security reasons, Russia is condemned because it moves to defend military bases on its very borders and to prevent the installation of hostile forces. The realpolitik hypocrisy in this particular case is gross to the point of utter farce. Putin certainly has his own self-serving propaganda, authoritarian control, and geopolitical manipulations but these are far outweighed by the hypocrisy and malevolence of the West, in both this particular case, and in general across the planet given American global reach. Putin, the poster boy villain of the Western media, may be ruthless but his body count to date is far, far less than recent American leaders and their fellow State terrorists.
CAFCA/ABC Organiser Account Financial Report For Year Ended 31 March 2016 - James Ayers, Organiser Account Treasurer
Presented to Campaign Against Foreign Control of Aotearoa Annual General Meeting, 26/9/16
Income Pledges Donations Interest Other
2016
2015
$26,051.10 $11,918.15 $2,700.14 $0.00
$26,307.20 $10,267.96 $2,758.63 $36.00
Total Income Expenditure Contractor Phone Internet Printer Other
$40,669.39
$40,040.00 $307.13 $208.37 $87.25 $0.00
$39,369.79
$37,344.00 $702.90 $0.00 $88.00 $55.25
$40,642.75
$38,190.15
$26.64
$1,179.64
$28,271.14
$27,091.50
Add surplus (deficit)
$26.64
$1,179.64
Closing total funds
$28,297.78
$28,271.14
Represented by Term deposit Kiwibank 00 Account Westpac Total organiser a/c funds
$21,437.24 $6,860.54 $28,297.78
$20,494.49 $7,776.65 $28,271.14
Joining Hands In Peace Action American flag-waving patriotism lauds the “sacrifice” of their servicemen and women who have died in war. But the American war machine and covert action intervention is increasingly rebounding on the domestic scene. The NZ political Establishment is largely locked into this syndrome too. But, as we have noted earlier, there is an impressive array of American peace and antinuclear NGOs working hard within their own country and internationally for a better world. We need to join hands with them and others around the globe in more effective campaigning and public awareness projects. Endnote: Thanks are due to John Gallagher for some very useful information he researched off the Internet. John has an excellent international peacemaking Website at: http://www.village-connections.com/ blog/. ■
Cash surplus (Deficit)
Summary Opening Funds
Notes Organiser (Murray Horton) is now contracted at the Living Wage. Regular pledgers are approximately 55 and stable. Slight increase in one-off donations in past 12 months.
Peace Researcher 52 November 2016
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KOREAN NUCLEAR STANDOFF IN CONTEXT OF INTERNATIONAL RIVALRIES Can Nuclear-Free New Zealand Help Out? - John Gallagher (with some input from Dennis Small)
As I write, Korean Peninsula tensions are again on the boil. North Korea conducted another nuclear test (on September 9th), its’ second this year and its fifth altogether (the previous being in 2006, 2009, 2013 and January 2016). This test followed two weeks of war games near its borders by 50,000 US and 25,000 South Korean forces that ended on September 2nd. These war games included mock pre-emptive attacks on North Korean nuclear and missile sites (“US-South Korea Joint Drills Include Simulated PreEmptive Strikes On North's Nuclear And Missile Sites”, http://www.ibtime s.co.uk/us-korea-joint-drills-includesimulated-pre-emptive-strikes-north s-nuclear-missile-sites-1579264#). The North, in turn, constantly threatened to launch a pre-emptive strike on the event, including while testfiring a ballistic missile from a submarine on 24th August into Japanese waters, to which Japan reacted strongly (“UN Security Council Weighs Condemnation Following Latest North Korean Missile Test In Sea Of Japan”, http://www.japantim es.co.jp/news/2016/08/25/national/p olitics-diplomacy/unsc-weighs-cond emnation-following-latest-north-kore an-missile-test-sea-japan/#.V9tt5Jh 9600). Counterproductive United Nations And US Pressures Severe US-driven United Nations (UN) sanctions have been placed on North Korea five times in the last ten years since its first nuclear test in 2006 (ibid). While causing much deprivation for North Korea’s people, they have had nil deterrence effect on nuclear tests while deepening the regime’s paranoia and power. The US itself has also applied a policy of continual military threats while branding the regime part of an “axis
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of evil” and a rogue or pariah state. The US also refuses to negotiate positively until North Korea “give(s) up its nuclear weapons programme first” (“Nuclear Test Offer Unlikely To Succeed”, Press, 25/4/16). This produces a catch-22 situation given that North Korea claims it adopted its nuclear programme because of the war games and a generally “aggressive” US posture, while it would negotiate for a peaceful future if the US gave up this stance (along with South Korea). Continually under such pressures, North Korea regularly threatens nuclear attacks on South Korea and on the US itself, for which it is continuing to develop its nuclear weapons and delivery capabilities. South Korea is also in turn threatening now “to reduce Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, 'to ashes' if Kim Jong-un's regime shows any signs that it is planning to carry out a nuclear attack” (http://www.telegra ph.co.uk/news/2016/09/11/seoul-thr eatens-to-reduce-pyongyang-to-ash es/). The US has given similar warnings. But China's ire is also being raised. The US is setting up a missile monitoring and defence system called THAAD (terminal high altitude area defence) in South Korea, which it says is intended to monitor North Korea. However, this system will also enable the US to surveil half of China and the southern part of Russia’s Far East region (“Uncle Sam's Hidden Agenda Behind THAAD Deployment” http://news.xinhuanet. com/english/2016-07/31/c_1355529 80.htm). China will be concerned that the US is here making use of the North Korean situation as a cover to monitor it more closely. The sober assessment of the US intelligence community is that even North Korea would only use nuclear
weapons in very extreme circumstances (“The Changing Military Balance In The Koreas And Northeast Asia”, Anthony H. Cordesman and Aaron Linn, Center for Strategic and International Studies, 25/3/15, http s://csis-rod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs -public/legacy_files/files/publicaton/1 50325_Korea_Military_Balance.pdf). Unchecked and unresolved, however, Korean Peninsula tensions could build up into major (nuclear) power confrontation and even war between the US and China. For instance, China is not likely to tolerate a nuclear attack on North Korea, or a full-scale attack that could occupy territory up to its border with North Korea, without going to the regime's aid. The US could alternatively, in conjunction with the UN and, ideally, China, adopt a whole range of measures to defuse this situation rather than perpetuate one in which each side keeps exchanging raucous, and often nuclear, threats in response to the other. Attempts At Diplomacy – The Six-Party Talks Six-Party Talks involving China, Japan, North Korea, Russia, South Korea and the US began in 2003 when North Korea withdrew from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. These talks aimed to provide a multilateral forum to achieve the denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula. Five rounds of talks produced little progress, and the parties have not met since December 2008, when the talks stalled over verification issues “(Six Party Talks” at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six-part y_talks). NZ played a constructive liaison role that helped briefly to restore communication between North Korea and the US when this had broken down towards the end of these
requires – or, at least, would certainly be greatly helped by - a more general thawing of tensions between the US and China and Russia, including a general willingness to engage in serious conversations that genuinely seek to develop solutions. Otherwise, conversely, a significant worsening of tensions in any one region, especially including the highly volatile Korean Peninsula, could make it more difficult to prevent other situations from also further deteriorating and then even getting out of control.
ultimately failed talks. I shall return to this further below. The Six Party Talks ended formally in 2009 when a UN Security Council Presidential Statement of April 13, 2009 condemned a (failed) North Korean satellite launch. North Korea responded angrily, declaring on April 14, 2009 that it would pull out of Six Party Talks and that it would resume its nuclear enrichment programme in order to boost its nuclear deterrent (ibid.). This development was followed by further nuclear tests and the present diplomatic impasse. Deep Historical, Cold War Roots That Still Persist To understand and address these tensions effectively they need to be seen in their deeper historical and wider contemporary contexts. They are historically unique and remarkable given that they first emerged at the very beginning of the Cold War some 66 years ago in 1950. Then North Korea invaded the South and Communist China came in to assist the North against a UN force in which the US was the principal actor. After reaching a stalemate, an armistice was signed in 1953 (for both relevant background here and the problems that arise from the US forcing isolation on the North, see "Blowback: The Costs And Consequences Of American Empire", Chalmers Johnson, Time Warner Paperbacks, 2000/02). So much of the North's paranoia
stems from American mass bombing during the 1950-53 Korean War (see "Bombing Civilians: A Twentieth Century History", ed. Yuki Tanaka & Marilyn B. Young, The New Press, 2009). In the past, the US has razed North Korea to the ground in “a barbaric air war” (ibid.). A full and permanent peace treaty has yet to be signed between the two Koreas. Tensions have outlasted the Cold War itself, which ended 27 years ago in 1989. Both sides use the security phobia for internal control. Back in 1983, “Kim Dae Jung, the (then) political leader of South Korean democratic forces” pointed to “many, many instances in which the (South) Korean government has exploited the security danger to justify repression” (“On Korea”, Kim Dae Jung, World Policy Journal reprint, Vol.1, No.1, Fall 1983, p217 & 228). This syndrome can still operate. The totalitarian North is not the only culprit here. Now Part Of A New Rolling Snowball Of International Crises? Tensions are now intensifying in a context of a cluster of emerging wider and deepening geostrategic and political crises that began with the US' “War on Terror” response to the September 11 attacks in New York, and have been followed in 2011 by its “Pivot” into the Asia-Pacific region. To resolve any one of these areas of tension effectively probably
To briefly transverse the wider geopolitical backdrop to the Pivot: in response to the September 11, 2001, attack on its soil by Islamic terrorists the US and NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organisation) sent forces into Afghanistan, and then Iraq, as well as intervening in Libya and supporting interventions in Syria. As a result, millions of refugees have flooded into Europe, creating massive and destabilising pressures there, including major terrorist acts inspired by Islamists aggrieved at these interventions. In 2016 Russia also sent bombers, missiles and troops to support Syrian President Assad against the Islamic terrorists in areas where the US and its ally Saudi Arabia are on the ground supporting “rebel” Syrian forces to depose him (http://www.us news.com/news/politics/articles/201 6-02-18/us-asked-russian-not-to-bo mb-near-us-commandos-in-syria). This could entail for the first time ever, Russian planes bombing and killing US military personnel! US defence officials say their country has asked Russia to avoid bombing an area of northern Syria where American special operations forces were working with Syrian rebels fighting the Islamic State group (“John Kerry Meets Vladimir Putin To Discuss New Syria Plan”, http://www.nyti mes.com/2016/07/15/world/middlee ast/john-kerry-vladimir-putin-syria-pl an.html). The net outcome is that for the first time ever, the major former Cold War rivals are - very dangerously both fighting in the same territory where they have not only some (very uneasily) shared goals to fight terrorists, but also directly opposite ones with respect to support for Syria’s Assad regime. By mid-SepPeace Researcher 52 November 2016
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tember, a crisis had indeed erupted with the Russians accusing the Americans and Australians of targeting Assad's army. All the while, be it briefly noted, tensions are also building up between NATO and the Russians along European border areas, most manifestly in Ukraine. The US' 2011 Asia-Pacific “Pivot” & Rising Regional Tensions When the Obama Administration came to feel by 2011 that its heavy Middle East engagements were diverting it from the rise of China, it decided on a “Pivot” to the AsiaPacific region. Since then, tensions have certainly been increasing there, notably in the dispute-ridden South/East China Seas. As an official NZ government inquiry had warned during the post-Cold War period: “The decades-old standoff on the Korean Peninsula has entered an uncertain, twilight stage given the parlous state of the North Korean economy and a regime which seems to be existing on borrowed time… Other security issues between states in the region include a number of overlapping claims for territory. For example, the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea have been the subject of competitive claims on the part of several East Asian countries” ("Enquiry Into 'New Zealand's Place In The World' And 'New Zealand's Role In AsiaPacific Regional Security", Report Of The Foreign Affairs, Defence And Trade Committee, NZ House of Representatives, 1997, p31). In the South China Sea, China lays claim to waters and islands claimed variously also by the Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan, Malaysia and Brunei. China is, indeed, turning some such islands into military or potentially military bases, and creating other, artificial islands. To the east, Japan and China both claim islands situated between them that the former call Senkaku and the latter Daioyu. Ominously, the US has said it would back Japan as its treaty partner in any conflict with China over the islands (“Obama Says US Will Defend Japan In Island Dispute With China”, https://www.theguardia n.com/world/2014/apr/24/obama-injapan-backs-status-quo-in-island-di spute-with-china). The Philippines has succeeded in 30
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getting the UN Court of Arbitration at The Hague to affirm its rights to areas of the South China Sea claimed by both it and China. The ruling also affirmed the application of the UN Freedom of Navigation Convention to these Seas in rejectting China’s extensive “historical” claims in the region (“Philippines Wins Arbitration Case Vs. China Over South China Sea”, http://global nation.inquirer.net/140358/philippine s-arbitration-decision-maritime-dispu te-south-china-sea-arbitral-tribunal-u nclos-itlos).The US, which has not itself signed the Convention, has declared itself neutral on the issue. However, its new interest in these regional issues and its presence as a rival to China, including its willingness to challenge Chinese claims by taking its own warships and planes through disputed China Sea areas, all help give claimants more confidence to press their particular claims. New Kinds Of Conversation Needed? Not since the height of the Cold War has the world seen so many areas of tension and conflict, all presently with little prospect of resolution. Cities and towns across the Middle East are being reduced to rubble, and millions of people fleeing as refugees. Sources of conflict between NATO and Russia continue to accumulate in Europe. Now the US is proceeding with its geostrategic Pivot into an Asian region riven with mounting tensions that involve a nuclear-armed China. The Vietnam invasion created one quagmire in the 1970s from which the US extricated itself with considerable difficulty. It now faces the prospect of a string of quagmires stretching from Libya across to Korea. Change for the better is not likely to result from simply trying to sort out, militarily or even diplomatically, the separate problem areas one after another… The accredited venue for dealing with these sorts of issues, the UN, is too overloaded and sclerotic to take on much more than it is already struggling to do. It, too, could do with more help. New kinds of conversation are now urgently needed between all concerned in which overall global and
regional problems, the consequences of continuing to deal with them as at present, and other more effective ways of moving forward, can be clarified and pursued. In other words, positive conversations in which a relatively much better informed “big picture” that works could be constructed by participants. All this could be usefully supported by relevant academic experts and study programmes. Can Nuclear-Free NZ Help? - Infrastructure for New Conversations So I have sketched out in www.villa ge-connections.com blogs a new infrastructure that could support such conversations in antipodean Wellington. As the capital of a “nuclearfree New Zealand”, which is almost unique as a relatively stable, developed country remote from the world’s trouble spots, Wellington could be an ideal mediation venue. It also has diplomats in numerous embassies, including from the US, Russia, China, South Korea, Japan, and various countries from the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN). Even North Korea has consular representation there. New Zealand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT), as well as its political decision-makers, also operate from this location. Furthermore, there are specialists in international relations at Victoria University and from other universities represented in the capital. Such diplomats, relevant academics and others, along with students and scholars from various parts of the world, could be very usefully networked in what could develop into an antipodean “Diplomatic Village” of very productive conversations and study programmes. To achieve the best results, such conversations could be pursued at various levels. At a basic level, socialising among diplomats and relevant academics in an environment relatively free of politics and disputed issues could be encouraged and facilitated. The aim of this would be to help them just to get to know each other and to enjoy talking together more or less regardless of where they come from, who they are, or what sort of ups and downs their countries might be having with
one another at a given time. Australia already has a “Canberra Diplomatic Club” that could provide some ideas for Wellington to look at. This club has a Facebook page (https:// www.facebook.com/canberra.dipclu b/). Such convivial social connecting could then make it easier to pursue more structured and focused conversations on topics of common interest when these were wanted, including the resolution of issues of difference. Officials, politicians and relevant academic specialists might also help stimulate or facilitate conversations and help set up seminars on various topics in which a range of countries and their diplomats might be interested. Relevant academic courses and research programmes on topics of shared interest could be conducted in which participation by diverse local and international scholars and students, some on special scholarships, could be encouraged. A convivial and productive “Diplomatic Village” might thence emerge where ongoing conversations both social and focused, small-scale and large, could take place between any and all who were represented or able to be in Wellington. Such interactions could include exchanges between and with representatives of major powers like the US, China,
and Russia. Over time, relatively in tandem, broader diplomatic understanding and frameworks conducive to the solution of both wider and individual issues could emerge, along with better ways of resolving them by parties directly involved. As Winston Churchill so famously said: “To jaw-jaw is better than to warwar!” Conversations That Could Engage North Korea? The synergies of such ongoing, multi-level conversations, social as well as substantive, informal and formal, could help to draw in and engage a nation that often feels so excluded from such fare like North Korea. While it has consular representation in Wellington, its nearest ambassadorial representation is in Jakarta. With the kinds of conversation proposed here, North Korea might well see some point to setting up an embassy in Wellington to better observe and participate in conversations. Also, a “nuclear-free New Zealand” government that took its nuclearfree status and mission seriously could provide just the right ambience for conversations about a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula, while also addressing local and wider tensions that have to date helped to
keep this from realisation. Indeed, when the NZ public and politicians made their country nuclear-free under the 1984-90 Labour government the goal was not just a nuclear-free government, but a nuclear-free world. To be sure, NZ's nuclear-free status came to be affirmed even by a US President when Barack Obama, after decades of US opposition to it, held his 2010 Washington Nuclear Security Summit attended by our Prime Minister John Key (“Obama Praises New Zealand's Nuclear Efforts” http://www.stuff.co.nz/nation al/politics/3576020/Obama-praisesNew-Zealands-nuclear-efforts; for more context on this see my blog: “President Obama’s Nuclear Security Summit, & NZ Villagers”: http://w ww.village-connections.com/?p=489 3). There is a precedent, from when George W Bush was US President, for NZ to help work towards a nuclear-free North Korea. That was when, in 2007, Helen Clark’s Labour government had been considered suitably placed to liaise between North Korea and the US to help restore broken communications between them. Her Foreign Minister, Winston Peters, visited both Pyongyang and Washington, with the understanding and support also of Chi-
South Korean soldiers patrol heavily fortified border with North
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na (“Peters To Discuss Dismantling N-Plants On First Visit By NZ Minister To North Korea”, http:// www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/ar ticle.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=10475 655). New Zealand As A Peace-Broker NZ could so act because of its nuclear-free credentials, in conjunction with the good relations it had with all the parties involved. This was precisely the kind of peace-brokering envisaged in five remits passed at annual Labour Party conferences when it was in power for six years in the 1980s. These remits proposed a foreign policy based on “positive neutrality”, which sees neutrality as a platform to enable peace brokering work between conflicting parties. So it was interesting to see that even the National government that succeeded Labour in 1990 continued both with its predecessor’s nuclear-free policy and its efforts to help mediate - successfully - in the destructive Bougainville dispute that had raged in the 1980s and 1990s. NZ has also campaigned successfully under the current National government for a seat on the UN Security Council. Notably, the main plank in this successful campaign was NZ’s ability to act, as John Key acknowledged, as an honest broker (“New Zealand Wins Seat On UN Security Council”, http://www.bb c.com/news/world-asia-29654980). Also for more details and possibilities, see my blog: “NZ As Security Council Honest Broker – With (Convivial) Diplomatic Village Support”, http://www.village-connection s.com/?p=7042). So far, NZ has seen such brokering as mainly helping represent the interests and views of smaller nations to others, such as in forums like the UN, although on the Security Council at this particular moment it is trying to get the United States and Russia to cooperate on helping alleviate or resolve the Syrian situation. The kind of infrastructure proposed in this article would help provide an additional platform for it to assist more effectively with communication between larger powers. It should not be too difficult to put this infrastructure in place or make it work: basically, it entails encouraging and facilitating embassy repre32
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sentatives to talk with one another where otherwise they would find it difficult to do so regularly and in depth. Relevant academics and student programmes involving students from different parts of the world could help bring wider and more informed perspectives, and generate more productive options. Such programmes might cost some money, but they would also help give NZ a lot of more of the much-valued wider, high-level access to world decision-makers and their decisionmaking tables that would benefit its economy amongst other things. There are signs of growing international interest in better multi-diplomatic approaches to the Korean situation (http://www.globalzero.org/bl og/north-koreas-latest-nuclear-test-p roves-status-quo-isnt-working,9/9/1 6; http://www.globalresearch.ca/nort h-koreas-nuke-test-sparks-calls-fordiplomacy-over-sanctions/5546160, 15/9/16 ). Towards Positive Peace-Making Arguably the world would not have survived the Cold War without neutral nations (Switzerland, Austria, Sweden and Finland) providing permanent, mutually acceptable venues for opposing parties to engage in conversations, negotiations, and mediation to help address issues or prevent crises. There is no such permanently available centre for such diplomacy in the whole AsiaPacific region, despite its manifest and intensifying problems. So there is a gap for a government of Nuclear-Free NZ that has vision and would like to help broker solutions for problems like the persistent ones on the Korean Peninsula, and for that matter between nucleararmed China and the US. There is now a desperately urgent need to address the issues involved. The alternative would be to be sucked again into helping one oppose and perhaps fight the other to the death in a final, nuclear conflict.
John Gallagher (An Autobiographical Note) John Gallagher worked closely with Larry Ross* throughout the highly successful local authority, “NuclearFree New Zealand” campaign that Larry and the NZ Nuclear-Free Zone committee he founded took to the country in the 1980s. What particularly impressed and inspired John then and ever since was Larry’s complementary concept of New Zealand engaging in peacemaking diplomacy, which Larry called “positive neutrality”. John specialised in research, publicity and lobbying for this at the time, and in today’s online environment he has taken to creating publicity and lobbying by writing blogs and tweeting about how Wellington might function as a “diplomatic village” where such diplomacy could be carried out. *Murray Horton’s obituary of Larry Ross is in Peace Researcher 44, November 2012, http://www.converge.org.nz/abc/pr/4 4/pr44-008.htm. Ed.
Comment By Dennis Small A note here is appropriate in regard to John's peacemaking efforts. For many years, John has been quite unique on the NZ scene with his creative, path-charting efforts to help clarify in some innovative ways how practical international peacemaking programmes could be put in place in NZ. Such work is absolutely vital if humankind is to have a future worth living. ■
MEMORIAL TREE PLANTED FOR MIA TAY - Murray Horton
Mia Tay, who died in 2014, was a member of, and regular donor to, the Anti-Bases Campaign from 1992 until her death. Kate Dewes’ obituary of her appeared in Peace Researcher 48, November 2014, http://www.converge.or g.nz/abc/pr/48/pr48-011.html. As a leading Christchurch peace activist for many decades, Mia was the driving force behind the annual commemoration of the August 1945 US atom bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan. Specifically, she was in charge of the lantern ceremony. To quote from Kate’s obituary of her: “In the mid 1970s, prominent peace researcher Owen Wilkes* returned to Christchurch after attending annual commemorations in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. He had observed the Hiroshima ceremony when the souls of the dead are remembered by floating lanterns down the city's river. Determined to do something similar here, he called together representatives of the Christian Pacifist Society, Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) and Quakers to organise lantern-making with what ‘any self-respecting Kiwi would have in their shed’ - a couple of pieces of wood, some wire, nails and paper. In 1976 Mia organised the first annual lantern ceremony on the Avon River on or around August 6th.There was a procession from the (former) Cathedral to Victoria Square where people put their lanterns on the water. Mia saw it as a public ceremony where ordinary people could be involved in something positive and peaceful. In 2000, during the 25th successive year, the ceremony was filmed live by NHK Hiroshima and shown to millions throughout Japan. Speakers included Mayor Garry Moore, Maori leader Rev Maurice Gray and MPs. In 37 years, Mia never missed the ceremony; after the 2010-11 earthquakes, the closure of Victoria Square forced it to be moved to the World Peace Bell in the Botanic Gardens”. *Peace Researcher 31, October 2005, http://www.converge.org.nz/abc/prcont31.html, is a Special Issue for Owen Wilkes. Ed. Mia died, of cancer, before the 2014 commemoration, which has continued to be held at the Peace Bell, in the Botanic Gardens. In 2016, it was once again filmed for Japanese television, and the ceremony also featured the planting of a memorial tree for Mia, close to the Peace Bell. Kate told me that it took her nearly two years to get approval for that. Mia’s daughter Kim (herself a former peace activist and Waihopai spy base protester in the 1980s) spoke, and a young grandson did the digging. It’s a very suitable place for Mia to be remembered and it is also very near to the riverside memorial park bench and plaque for fellow peace movement leader Larry Ross, which was unveiled earlier in 2016 (see PR 51, June 2016, http://www.converge.org.nz/abc/pr/51/pr51-009.html). Actually, Mia is not the first Christchurch ABC member (or peace activist) to be commemorated with a tree. As part of our January 2006 Waihopai protest, a veritable grove of trees was planted for Rod Donald and Owen Wilkes (both of whom died in 2005) at ABC’s former camp at Onamalutu (see PR 32, March 2006). And, in January 2014, we planted a tree for Bob Leonard (who died in 2013) at our present camp at Whites Bay (see PR 47, August 2014, http://www.converge.org.nz/abc/pr/47/pr47-009.html). Like Larry, Owen and Bob also have a memorial plaque each on a Christchurch park bench. It’s good to honour the memory of friends and valued colleagues, and a tree is a lovely way to do it. ■
ABOUT PEACE RESEARCHER Peace Researcher is published by the Anti-Bases Campaign. The Co-Editors are Murray Horton and Warren Thomson; the Layout Editor is Becky Horton. Our journal covers a range of peace issues with emphasis on foreign military bases and intelligence topics. Contributed articles will be considered for publication based on subject matter and space requirements. We are particularly interested in reports of original research on peace topics in Aotearoa and the wider region of Australasia and the Pacific. Our address is: Peace Researcher PO Box 2258, Christchurch 8140, Aotearoa/New Zealand e-mail:
[email protected] You can read Peace Researcher online at our website, www.converge.org.nz/abc ■
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Mia Tay’s grandson Tay Meng Quan plants memorial tree (held by Mia’s daughter, Kim), Hiroshima Day 2016. See article page 33. Photo supplied by Kate Dewes.
EDITORIAL NOTE: Please be aware that everything in this issue was written before the November 2016 US Presidential election, the outcome of which was unknown when PR 52 went to press.
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