CHINESE SKIES, CHINESE SCREENS PAGE 8

APRIL 2006

Liberty, equality, security

POLITICAL AGENDA OF TWO DISASTROUS WARS

Iraq: US intelligence warnings ignored

BY IGNACIO RAMONET

US intelligence agencies have had access since 1946 to vast amounts of information, but no objective, disinterested system shaped US foreign policy. Instead political and commercial interests determined how the world was to be seen, which has led to failure in Vietnam and the sequel in Iraq. The problem has never been knowledge, only policy.

MARK BRUSSE: ‘Volcanic Eruption’ (1990)

BY GABRIEL KOLKO

AGROUP of rightwing “declinologists” (1), prompted by the avian

flu scare, have diagnosed France as an organism in collapse and in

urgent need of treatment. Recent events have confi rmed the pessimism and, by reinforcing

the perception of institutions in meltdown, have contributed to the general malaise. In

2004 the trial of an alleged paedophile ring in the northern town of Outreau turned into a

judicial and media disaster. In February 2005 the National Assembly passed legislation

requiring school courses to recognise the “positive role” played by French colonialism (2).

The decommissioning of the asbestos-laden aircraft carrier Clemenceau was a shambles.

Last November there were riots in deprived suburbs around French cities. The controversy

over the cartoons of Muhammad and the shocking murder of a young Jew, Ilan Halimi,

have reinforced sectarianism. The government has started a backdoor privatisation of the

publicly owned gas utility Gaz de France. The prophets of doom claim to detect a

sense of collective despair, demonstrated in May 2005 when France voted against the

European constitution. According to leading declinologist Nicolas Baverez: “France has

retreated to a cocoon of demagogy and falsehood . . . where politicians refuse to tell the

truth. They are afraid that if they introduce reforms there will be a revolution. But it is

precisely the absence of reform that causes revolutions” (3).

To cure what Bavarez has described as “a sick France in a decadent Europe”, he and

fellow-believers hope and pray for a liberal “readjustment”. Convinced that all that is

needed is to push the right button, they have long demanded the deregulation of the labour

market. The prime minister, Dominique de Villepin — who coined the term declinologist

— is feeling the pressure. Sensitive to Baverez’s accusation that he “stands up to Bush

but rolls over for the trade unions”, he seems to have decided to crash through ruling-class

inertia and reform employment at last. His fi rst prescription, the New Employment

Contract (CNE), was rushed through parliament last summer and came into eff ect on

1 September. It aff ects fi rms with fewer than 20 employees, 66% of French businesses, and

its most striking innovation is the ease with which it can be broken. As labour inspector

Gérard Filoche, points out: “It introduces a

new right of dismissal: you can fi re anybody at any time and for any reason, without following

any formal procedure and without any right of appeal” (4).

It met longstanding demands from employers and encountered only moderate

resistance. So Villepin decided to press on. In February the First Employment Contract

(CPE) was voted through parliament with no real debate. This legislation applies to those

below the age of 26 working for companies with more than 20 employees. As under the

CNE, employers can terminate a contract at any time during the fi rst two years without

any written explanation. Villepin tried to use the November 2005

riots as justifi cation for this extraordinary legislation, on the grounds that there was

an urgent need to encourage employers to take on untrained youngsters. The argument

fooled no one. Opposition, fi rst from students and then from major trade unions, was wide

spread and fi erce. The stakes are political as well as symbolic. The French working-class

movement was forced to look at itself after a major defeat over pensions legislation in July

2003. People have realised that if they give way on the CPE as they did on the CNE, they leave

the way open for the complete dismantling of the labour code, with long-term consequences

in terms of fl exible, insecure employment. Far from being “the sick man of Europe”

that the right detects, France is strong enough to resist the attempted takeover by fi nan

cial institutions. Almost uniquely in Europe, the majority of French wage-earners fi ercely

oppose the government’s attempt to wash its hands of them and let unrestrained globali

sation serve them up to business. This shift in the relationship between political power

and society could mean the end of the welfare state. The CPE is part of a campaign to destroy

the sense of social solidarity central to French identity. That is why there is so much opposi

tion. And why France is in revolt. TRANSLATED BY DONALD HOUNAM

(1) Among others, Nicolas Baverez (author of La France qui tombe ), Michel Camdessus (former governer of the Bank of France), advertising chief Christophe Lambert, historian Jacques Marseille and author Alain Minc: all close associates of the interior minister, Nicolas Sarkozy.

(2) On 4 February President Chirac called for this act to be

rewritten, on the grounds that it “divides France”. (3) L’Express , Paris, 12 January 2006.

(4) www.legrandsoir.info/article.php3?id_article=2473

SCOTT Ritter, previously an officer in United States marines intelligence, in

September 1991 went to work for the United Nations weapons inspection

team charged with the task of confirming whether Iraq retained weapons of mass

destruction or the means of delivering them. US, British and Israeli intelligence fed him

their best information. In the mid-1990s he concluded that Iraq had complied with UN

disarmament criteria. Nevertheless every US administration from

1991 on maintained the myth of Iraqi possession of WMD because their real goal, as Ritter

concluded, was regime change (1). As for ties between al-Qaida and Saddam’s regime and

teaching al-Qaida how to use WMD — which Bush gave as a reason for the Iraq war — Ritter

knew from the end of September 2001 that the exact opposite was true: that the secular

Iraq regime was hostile to Osama bin Laden’s Islamic fanaticism. The US Defence Intel

ligence Agency identifi ed the source of this allegation as a specifi c liar (2).

Crises, imminent dangers, and threats to national security and vital interests have been

intrinsic to US foreign policy since at least 1947. They have mobilised a reticent public

and, more importantly, a Congress that must approve huge sums to implement the policy.

In this context, reality has little place and illusions are crucial. Deliberate exaggerations,

if not complete falsehoods, have been routine since March 1947 when President Truman

enunciated his classic doctrine. He described the crisis then in Greece and Turkey in fore

INSIDE THIS ISSUE

France: ambiguity and hypocrisy of its nuclear policy page 4

Italy: why the centre-left cannot hold if Berlusconi loses page 5

Algeria: a coalition of women protests against the president page 6

Nigeria: the rebellious young demand resource rights page 7

The complete history of Chinese cinema in 21 perfect fi lms page11

boding global terms. Congress and the US public were “not suffi ciently aware”, as the

Undersecretary of State, Dean Acheson, put it, of the essential need to spend money to deal

with what was seen as a protracted crisis encompassing Europe and much of the world.

George Kennan, the key theoretician of the containment of Soviet power, objected

to the doctrine’s tone; even the Secretary of State, George Marshall, thought Truman over

stated the case. Exaggeration and the threat of nefarious danger continue until now, despite

the disappearance of the Soviet bloc (3). From 1947 on, in the words of Willard

Matthias, who was in charge of Soviet estimates in the CIA for many years and retired

in 1973 as a senior offi cial, “there developed a four-decade-long debate between the civilian

and military intelligence agencies over Soviet intentions” (4). Massive arms spending was

dependent on portraying the USSR’s goals as ominously as possible, which meant empha

sising Soviet capabilities rather than intentions. Liberalising tendencies in the USSR

were ignored, the gravity of the SovietChinese schism was grossly underestimated and, as Matthias put it, “after 1968, our rational and balanced approach to making judgments

about the Soviets came under increasing attack” (5). The war in Vietnam, and most

other aspects of US foreign and military policy since 1946, must be seen in this context.

President Richard Nixon had a deep antipathy to the CIA and in 1973 fi red its then

Continued on page 2

Japan: a real army and missiles, but a pacifi st constitution page 12

North Korea: labourers slave in Russia’s far east territories page 13

Europe: local governments declare their own GM-free zones page 14

Mali: citizen’s jury votes against planting GM cotton page 15

Unknown territory: the true confessions of a map-maker page 16