Section 29 Entry 0001. Date: 2003 March 19 Wednesday.
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In the course of my frantically busy life in Japan, I've learnt this key lesson about time management: if you see a window of opportunity, drive right through it. If you have the chance, just go, go, go, go, without stopping. So, with another window of opportunity temporarily open - today is another rare day with a light schedule - I've decided to keep on going, and add more stuff to the website. Today I've been looking through my archives, and I've added a poem about torture and torturers, a poem called "Men Without Amnesty".

This poem was written (and first published) back in 1977, and it was written without any political purpose in mind. It is a product of my teenage years, written at a time when I was taking a look round the planet on which I found myself living, and thinking, "Gee, what an interesting place!"

This poem certainly wasn't written with America in mind, and in fact I can't remember who the torturers of 1977 were.

Why I chose to pull this poem out of the archives (rather than the one about how "The dogfish is a finny beast," for example, or the one about how "The Waitemata glitters in the sun") is because George Bush has dragged the subject of torture into the forefront of my mind.

My first viewing of George Bush's ultimatum speech (live) was disrupted by problems with the cable TV service (or, possibly, with problems with our TV, which for some months now has required occasional kicks to persuade it to keep working). However, I've been able to see the whole speech since, and, on top of that, I've downloaded the entire text of this "Get out of Dodge or die" speech.

This is what George Bush says about torture when he speaks directly to the Iraqi people:-

In free Iraq there will be no more wars of aggression against your neighbors, no more poison factories, no more execution of dissidents, no more torture chambers and rape rooms. The tyrant will soon be gone. The day of your liberation is near.

I have no doubt that the invading forces will indeed discover torture chambers and rape rooms in Iraq, and that the testimony of the survivors will convince history (and rightly so) that Saddam Hussein deserved his death.

However, the overthrow of Saddam Hussein will not abolish torture from the Planet of Collective Insanity. Why not? Because America practices torture, and George Bush has so far shown no interest whatsoever in overthrowing his own regime.

It seems, judging from uncontested news reports which have been widely available for some time now, that the United States is holding prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, detaining them without trial and subjecting selected victims to torture ranging from the moderate (cold, darkness and sleep deprivation) to the severe. (The severe? During the interrogation of the al-Qaida operative Abu Zubaydah, someone in the American chain of command made a decision to withhold painkillers from the prisoner, who had been shot several times. And, regardless of what the decision-making mind might reason, the afflicted body is going to suffer the consequences of that decision as torture.)

It also seems - again, the uncontested news reports have been publicly available for some time - that selected prisoners of the American regime are secretly deported to countries which use torture, and which are friendly to America. Exactly what happens to these people when they end up in the hands of the security services of the said countries has not been documented, but presumably they do not spend their time watching Mickey Mouse movies.

Morally, there's no difference between, on the one hand, biting a hundred chunks out of someone's body, and, on the other hand, throwing someone into the piranha tank so the piranhas can do the biting. But the attitude of the Bush regime seems to be that it's okay to organize torture, although ideally this torture will be committed outside America by people who are not Americans.

So America has now become a nation which tortures. And, additionally, the United States has shown no interest in restraining its good buddies when they use torture.

A couple of days ago, I quoted from an article from Nicholas D. Kristof, an article about Iraq and Turkey with the headline "Kurds are about to be betrayed - again". This article was published in the International Herald Tribune - on page 8 of the IHT for 2003 March 15-16, as published in Japan. (link to quote from Kristof's article on this website.)

My interest at that time was in the history of the Iran / Iraq / Turkey region, and, specifically, in the Treaty of Sèvres, which Kristof makes mention of.

However, the Treaty of Sèvres is peripheral to Kristof's article, which is focused on the barbarous treatment of the Kurds by the Turks.

While I was reading this stuff, I seriously thought about quoting some of it on my website. It is, after all, relevant to the approaching war. But a certain squeamishness held me back. I just didn't want to quote stuff about some Kurdish guy being anally raped with a stick. But George Bush has given me good reason. But, even so, I still don't want to got there.

It occurs to me that one way round the problem is simply to provide a link to Nicholas D. Kristof's article headlined KURDS ARE ABOUT TO BE BETRAYED - AGAIN.

Which brings us to a question: If the United States is going to make war on the basis of torture chambers and rape rooms, then why doesn't the United States make war on Turkey?

The answer, of course, is that Turkey is America's friend in the region. Consequently, for the moment, it is politically convenient to overlook the fact that this good friend has some unpleasant habits.

[Saddam Hussein supported by America]

In a similar way, back in 1982, Iraq's Saddam Hussein was a convenient friend, so it was convenient for America (as personified by Ronald Reagan) to support America's good buddy Saddam in his war agaist Iran.

Details of the Reagan regime's support for Saddam Hussein, with the headline "1982: U.S. provides billions in aid to Saddam Hussein for weapons to kill Iranians":-

www.bowlingforcolumbine.com/library/wonderful/iraq.php"

This page starts:-

In 1982, the Reagan Administration removed Saddam Hussein's Iraq from the list of states supporting terrorism, despite credible information stating that Iraq was, in fact, still supporting terrorism. The decision came as Iraq was on the brink of losing its war with Iran which had begun in September 1980. At the same time, according to the 1995 sworn affidavit of Howard Teicher, a member of Reagan's National Security Council, Reagan pushed the United States directly into the Iran-Iraq war.

(If you're interested in writing a novel about how power in high places really works, the sworn affidavit of Howard Teicher looks like a good place to go for inspiration.)

One link leads to another, and this could go on all day. But the main point of today's exploration of the George Bush speech is this:-

In talking about "torture chambers and rape rooms," George Bush seems to be claiming that he's dropping bombs from the moral high ground.

But there is a problem with this claim. Morality, like truth, is a tool which George Bush uses only selectively. Right now, it is convenient for George Bush to denounce the torture for which Saddam Hussein is responsible. So that is what he does. Right now, however, it is convenient for George Bush to look the other way as Turkey continues to persecute the Kurds. And right now, when George Bush looks in the mirror, and sees the leader of a regime which practices torture, he has not one single criticism to make.

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Sidebar: an article on the site of The Boston Globe, www.boston.com, an article dated 3/13/2003, includes the claim that "Arrests and torture of Kurds by Kurdish forces in Turkey are rising sharply, according to human-rights officials in this city, which has the largest Kurdish population." The city in question is Diyarbakir, Turkey, and the article (by Charles A. Radin) is headlined "Possibility of rebellion seen for Turkey's Kurds". It seems that one possible consequence of George Bush's decision to destabilize the world may be war in Turkey.

Links to The Boston Globe article about possible Kurdish revolt in Turkey.

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Section 29 Entry 0002. Date: 2003 March 19 Wednesday.
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Quote of the day:-

And let's be honest about U.S. policy aims. Those in the U.S. government pushing for war say they are doing so to promote democracy, to protect the rights of minorities, and to rid the region of weapons of mass destruction.

But is the U.S. threatening to attack Saudi Arabia or a host of other U.S. allies which have similarly un-democratic regimes? How many of us would advocate going to war with Turkey over the brutal repression of its Kurdish minority and of the Kurds in Iraq? And do we expect the U.S. to bomb Israel or Pakistan which each have hundreds of nuclear weapons? Let's remember that leaders in the previous weapons inspection team in Iraq had declared that 95% of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction capabilities were destroyed. And let's not forget that in the 1980s, when Iraq was actually using chemical weapons against the Kurds and the Iranian army, the U.S. had nothing to say about it. On the contrary, at that time President Reagan sent a U.S. envoy to Iraq to normalize diplomatic relations, to support its war with Iran, and to offer subsidies for preferential trade with Iraq. That envoy arrived in Baghdad on the very day that the UN confirmed Iraq's use of chemical weapons, and he said absolutely nothing about it. That envoy, by the way, was Donald Rumsfeld.

Edna Ross sends a Letter from Iraq - an American photojournalist's letter home. The "letter" is part of "web diary" article published on The Sydney Morning Herald site. The link to the article is here.The link goes to a page which is a long article made up of several bits and pieces - if you want to find the Edna Ross opinion piece, which makes the case against the George Bush war, search inside the article for "Edna Ross". (With some browsers, ctrl-f will pop up a search box.)

In Edna Ross's analysis, the reason for the war is oil. But in my opinion the the war stems from George Bush's sense of insecurity, which I've written about - George Bush explained: aggression triggered by insecurity. I figure that George (like a large segment of the American public) is just plain scared. This body bag that George is holding? The one that has Saddam Hussein's name on it? It's a security blanket, that's what it is.

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Section 29 Entry 0003. Date: 2003 March 19 Thursday.
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Got an e-mail today from a guy who found my website when using Google as a makeshift spellchecker (coincidentally, it was only yesterday that I figured out that you could use Google for that) in an effort to check out the word (or, perhaps, the non-word) incalcitrant.

I wrote about incalcitrant back in November of last year. Glancing back at the entry, I find myself thinking, "Yeah, those were the days." A different world, back then.

Back then, it wasn't entirely clear that George Bush was going to war in Iraq, or that the war in Iraq (which may start today) may quite possibly be one in a series (with either Iran or North Korea next).

I'm leaving for work shortly, taking a little radio with me. I've got the radio on right now, tuned to 810 AM, and the American military has been treating me to a dose of NPR, National Public Radio, coming from the States.

This morning on NPR there was some talk about the Kurds, and a member of the Great American Public phoned in to air his opinion.

A couple of days ago I learnt of the Treaty of Sevres, and the caller said, you know what? We could chop up the landscape as the Treaty of Sèvres proposed. If we carved up the land to make Kurdistan, then the Kurds would give us military bases in the area, no problem.

And I'm thinking: Isn't America interesting!

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Section 29 Entry 0004. Date: 2003 March 20 Thursday (Wednesday in America).
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A bright sunny day here in the Tokyo-Yokohama area. Spring is definitely on the way, and one happy sign of spring is that the computer which is sitting on my lap as I sit in the train is starting to feel warm. Another sign of spring is that the TV news is starting to track the blooming of the cherry blossom which signals the arrival of the outdoor drinking season. (However, because I haven't been paying attention, I'm not sure how close we are to that annual alcoholic ritual.)

Today, during my lunch break, I switched on my radio, expecting to heard that "Baghdad is in flames, and a million people are burning to death in the ruins," but in fact there was no news apart from some US missile strike against some isolated target of opportunity.

In the afternoon, on the train from location A to location B, I listed to Saddam Hussein, courtesy of the Al-Jazeerah TV network, courtesy of some news outfit in the States which was being rebroadcast locally on the 810 AM frequency.

This frequency usually broadcasts the local programming of the American military radio station Eagle 810 - sports, rock music and so forth - but now it's rebroadcasting nonstop news coverage directly from America. (As I write this, the source is AP Network News.)(It was the same after 9/11.)

... and now I'm at home, with the sky darkening, and the evening news on Japanese TV bringing me scenes from Baghdad, and the ongoing war commentary on AP Network News speaking from the radio.

Spread out on the dining room table is today's paper (specifically, the English-language edition of The Asahi Shimbun, which in Japan is bundled with the International Herald Tribune) and it carries the surprising news that many local government bodies in Japan (516 or more local assemblies and more than half the prefectural governments) have spoken up to criticize the central government's support of the George Bush war in Iraq.

Why this is surprising is because, as a rule, Japan is not a "stand up and be counted" country. However, while Japan's Prime Minister Koziumi is prepared to support America's war (verbally), the Japanese population is pretty solidly opposed.

Today's paper, for example, carries an opinion piece by Katsumoto Saotome with the headline "As new war looms, remember the Tokyo raid".

This is the raid of 1945 March 10, in which an American bombing raid on a densely populated civilian area of Tokyo killed 100,000 or so people, most of them civilians.

The writer says:-

America's war on Iraq is imminent. I believe more strongly that ever that now is the time to resurrect our memories of the Tokyo raid and come to a true understanding of where Japan should stand on this issue.

The writer's comments include this:-

I was 12 when I survived the March 10 inferno.

By and large, then, the Japanese population is opposed to the war, even though the Japanese government has given the war its (verbal) support.

Apparently there are (or shortly will be) some increased security measures at the airports in Japan, but there's no real sense of menace here. Indeed, today, from my subjective perspective, Japan felt totally safe, even though I did spend a paranoid thirty seconds or so last night wondering "What if Kim Jong Il takes this opportunity to nuke Tokyo to show the Americans that they really do have to negotiate with him?"

It will be interesting to see what happens here in Japan if the focus of war shifts to this region, as it may well do once George Bush is finished in Iraq.

It seems probable that, once done with Iraq, George Bush is going to go on to attack either Iran or North Korea (if not both). If Iran, then it's going to be a distant event which will probably not have major repercussions right here in Japan. However, if the next target is North Korea, then presumably the political climate here in Japan will heat up, though with what ultimate consequences I cannot begin to imagine.

It occurred to me this morning that it is also possible that America's next war will be not with Iran and not with North Korea either, but with Turkey.

At the moment, I'm figuring the probabilities as an 80% chance of war with North Korea (this year or next), a 19.75% probability of war with Iran, and a 0.20% chance of war with Turkey (with 0.05% left to cover the possibility of war with Syria, Mexico, Venezuela, Canada, China, Russia, Nigeria, Zimbabwe or Cuba.)

My war with Turkey scenario (which was cooked up by my irresponsible imagination without any volitonal input from my controlling will) runs like this:-

1. Turkey invades the north of Iraq to seize the oil fields in or near Kurd-controlled areas. War with the Kurds follows, and war with the Kurds in the north of Iraq provokes a general Kurdish uprising in Turkey itself, which leads to savage reprisals on Turkey's part.

2. The scenes on TV (the scenes of Turkish reprisals) are so bad that the political heat becomes unbearable, and George Bush sends in American troops to stabilize the situation in the parts of Iraq which are near the Turkish border.

3. The spectacle of American troops protecting Kurds from Turkish troops destabilizes the political situation in Turkey, and radical anti-American Islamic elements come to power. Simultaneously, the Cyprus situation destabilizes, and there is fighting between Greek and Turkish troops on the (always tense) border between Greece and Turkey.

4. Someone says to George Bush, "You know, the Kurds deserve their own state, and the Treaty of Sevres said they should get one. If we carved up the landscape to make Kurdistan, then the Kurds would give us military bases in the area, no problem."

5. George Bush discovers that the Turks have been raping and torturing Kurds, and declares war on Turkey in order to liberate Kurdistan, which (coincidentally) possesses oil.

This scenario is admittedly unlikely, but then the war which is happening right now is contrary to common sense. William Pfaff has this to say today in the International Herald Tribune (on page 8 of the paper as published in Japan, beneath a headline "Diplomatic blunders led to war"):-

The failure of the United States to win international support for its position on Iraq is due in part to the weakness of its case. Few saw Iraq in its present condition as a threat to anyone, much less to the United States. Washington had no serious evidence linking Iraq to Al Qaeda.

I thoroughly agree with that, so I was amazed by the person in the street interviews that AP Network News was carrying today. The "pro" people tended to quote 9/11 as the justification for the war. I really could not believe it.

The military history of the war has yet to be written, but, on the domestic level, the Bush regime has obviously scored a pretty stunning propaganda triumph.

Another item in the International Herald Tribune is an article headlined "The Kurds: a catastrophe waiting to happen". Right now, I'm very glad I'm not a Kurd.

Right now, AP Network News has just announced that Iraq has fired a Scud missile into Kuwait. And there's an orange alert showing on Japanese TV. The orange alert is for hayfever sufferers: if you're anywhere in or near the Tokyo-Yokohama area, tomorrow is going to be a pretty mean hayfever day.

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Section 29 Entry 0005. Date: 2003 March 21 Friday.
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Added a poem called camouflage. Also some very short poems. Also added a poem Test Pattern.

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