Nexus - 1101 - New Times Magazine-pages

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slogan and bumper sticker of the peace movement. Since the end of this war, it has become clear that the United States and the UK have aggressively sought to maintain direct con- trol over Iraq's oil industry. When looters devastated Baghdad, only the Ministry of Oil was left unscathed since it was protected by US Marines. Since then, hand-picked Iraqi officials have been installed in the ministry, under the supervision of US military and civilian offi- cials, and there is movement towards privatisation of Iraq's oil industry, with France, Russia and China likely to be excluded from rebuilding the industry or securing contracts for future Iraqi oil delivery. Ashcroft's staff in February 2003 and is stamped "Confidential— Not for Distribution". Patriot Act II was widely editorialised against in the US media, but full disclosure on the contents, impli- cations and motivations was underdeveloped. In particular, the Patriot Act II proposes to place the entire Federal government and many areas of State government under the exclusive jurisdiction of the Department of Justice, the Department of Homeland Security and the FEMA NorthCom military command. industry, with France, Ri and China likely to be excluded from 3. US Illegally Removes Pages from Iraq's UN Report rebuilding the industry or securing contracts for future Iraqi oil Throughout the winter of 2002, the Bush Administration pub- delivery. licly accused Iraqi weapons declarations of being incomplete. The almost unbelievable reality of this situation is that it was the 2. Homeland Security Threatens Civil Liberties United States itself that had removed over 8,000 pages of the As reported widely in the mainstream press, the new US 11,800-page original report. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) represents the most This came as no surprise to Europeans, however, as Iraq had extensive restructuring of the US government since 1947—the made extra copies of the complete weapons declaration report and year the Department of War was combined unofficially distributed them to journalists with the Army, Navy, Marines, Coast Guard throughout Europe. The Berlin newspaper and Air Force to create the Department of Die Tageszeitung broke the story on Defense (DOD). The Department of December 19, 2002, in an article by Andreas Homeland Security combines over 100 sepa- Zumach. rate entities of the Executive Branch, includ- At the same time, according to the investi- ing the Secret Service, the Coast Guard and . gation by Michael Niman, the Iraqi govern- the Border Patrol, among others. The DHS Since the end of ment sent out official copies of the report on commands a foal annval budget of US837 Hb its JULES "Secret, was sent the Intemational Atomic billion. become clear that Energy Agency, and another copy went to the prose requires the FBI. CTA and state and the United States othe US convinced Colombia, chair of the local governments to share intelligence and the UK have Security Council and current target of US g g y g reports with the department upon command, without explanation. According to the American Civil Liberties Union, the Department of Homeland Security will be "100% secret and 0% accountable". Meanwhile, the gathering, retention and use of information collected is a centra focus of the Bush Administration's new agenda. Officially established to track down ter- rorists, the DHS can collect information on any dissenter, American citizen or not, violent or not. The classification of threatening that they had to be recent peace marches and protests as removed? What information were "terrorist events" within DOD and FEMA documents is one exam- —_—_ Europeans privy to that Americans were not? ple of the dangerous potential of these mandates. According to Niman, "The missing pages implicated twenty- The USA Patriot Act of 2001 allows the government increased four US-based corporations and the successive Ronald Reagan and and unprecedented access to the lives of American citizens and George Bush, Sr, administrations in connection with the illegal military occupation and financial aid, to look the other way while the report was removed, edited and returned. Other members of the Security Council, such as Britain, France, China and Russia, were implicated in the missing pages as well (China and Russia were still arming Iraq) and had little desire to expose the USA's transgression. So all members accepted the new, abbreviated version. But what was in the missing pages that the Bush Administration felt was so aggressively sought to maintain direct control over Iraq's oil industry. represents an unrestrained imposition on civil liberties. supplying of Saddam Hussein's government with myriad weapons William Safire, a writer for the New York Times, defined the first of mass destruction and the training to use them". Patriot Act as a Presidential effort to seize dictatorial control. No Corporations, agencies and laboratories documented in the origi- member of Congress was given sufficient time to study the first nal report as supporting Iraq's weapons programs prior to Iraq's Patriot Act that was passed by the House on October 27, 2001. In 1990 invasion of Kuwait include: some cases, while driving the Act through Congress, Vice- « Eastman Kodak, DuPont, Honeywell, Rockwell, Sperry, President Cheney would not allow the legislation to be read, and Hewlett-Packard and Bechtel; he publicly threatened members of Congress that they would be ¢ US government agencies such as the Department of Energy, blamed for the next terrorist attack if they did not vote for the Department of Agriculture and Department of Defense; Patriot Act. ¢ Nuclear weapons laboratories such as Lawrence Livermore, The Domestic Security Enhancement Act of 2003 (aka Patriot Los Alamos and Sandia. Act II) poses even greater hazards to civil liberties. The draft pro- Beginning in 1983, the United States was involved in 80 ship- posal of Patriot Act II was leaked by Attorney-General John ments of chemical and biological components, including strains of this war, it has become clear that aggressively sought to maintain direct oil industry. 12 = NEXUS Since the end of the United States and the UK have control over Iraq's www.nexusmagazine.com DECEMBER 2003 — JANUARY 2004