Cockburn
/ St. Clair's Scorching New History of a Decade of War
Now Available!
Today's
Stories
May
22 / 23, 2004
Paul
de Rooij
Colin Powell, a Political Obituary
May
21, 2004
Ray
Close
The Canards of the Apologists
Christopher
Brauchli
"The Object of Torture is Torture"
Amira
Hass
Darkness at Noon
Jack
McCarthy
Camilo Mejia: Can the Son of a Sandinista Get a Fair Trial from
the US Army?
Bill
Kauffman
Nader v. Bush
Omar
Barghouti
No More Tears for America
Ghali
Hassan
Moral Failure of the "Free World" in Gaza
Christopher
Reed
How the CIA Taught the Portuguese to
Torture
Website
of the Day
Eric Idle on the Bush Administration: Fuck You, So Very Much
May
20, 2004
Andrew
Cockburn
The Truth About Chalabi
Kathy
Kelly
A Visit from the FBI
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
Brown and Bored of Education in India
Tom
Stephens & John Philo
The War Crimes of Bush, Cheney & Co.
Sam
Bahour / Michael Dahan
Genocide by Public Policy
Robert
Ovetz
Ending the Race for the Last Turtle
Billy
Wilson
The Most Important Thing I Learned at School This Year
Website
of the Day
Rafah Today
May
19, 2004
Elizabeth
W. Corrie
Caterpillar Should Do the Right Thing,
Now
Bill
and Kathleen Christison
The US Can't Win
Vijay
Prashad
For Whom the Polls Toll: the Indian Elections of 2004
Ray
Hanania
Israeli War Crimes: Who to Believe, AIPAC or Amnesty Intl.?
Greg
Moses
Man President Kisses Up at AIPAC
Michael
Gillespie
Who is Kenneth deGraffenried?
Josh
Frank
Homes Destroyed; Death Toll Mounts: But Where's John Kerry?
Gary
Corseri
Out of Iraq and Plato's Cave
Kevin
Alexander Gray
If Malcolm Were Alive
May
18, 2004
Neve
Gordon
The Gaza Debacle
Doug
Stokes
Imperial Policing: Why Abu Ghraib
Shouldn't Surprise Us
Bob
Wing
The Color of Abu Ghraib
Vanessa
Jones
Man on a Leash
Thomas
P. Healy
Chemical Trespass: the Body Burden
Zeynep
Toufe
Torture and Moral Agency: the Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations
Kenneth
Roth
Mistreatment of Detainees in US Custody: a Letter to Bush
Elaine
Cassel
Pre-empting the Bill of Rights: The Other War, One Year Later
Website
of the Day
Truth Against Truth
May
17, 2004
Kurt
Nimmo
The John-John Ticket: Kerry Woos McCain
Laura
Santina
Military Conditioning and Abu Ghraib
Mickey
Z.
With Friends Like These: More Election 2004 Madness
Frederick
B. Hudson
Police Terror: Three Mothers Search for Justice
Shakirah
Esmail-Hudani
Inside Abu Ghraib: the Violence of the Camera
Boris
Leonardo Caro
The Revelations of Mr. W.
Alex
Dawoody
Iraq: From Saddam to Occupation
Victor
Kattan
On Watching the Execution of Nick Berg
Ron
Jacobs
Rumsfeld's Sovereignty Shell Game
May
15 / 16, 2004
Alexander
Cockburn
Green Lights for Torture
Douglas
Valentine
ABCs of American Interrogation: Phoenix Program, Revisited
John
Stanton
Kings of Pain: UK, US and Israel
Ben
Tripp
Torture: a Fond Reminiscence
Brian
Cloughley
Where are You Heading, America? Taking a Closer Look at the Patriot
Act
Justin
E. H. Smith
Islam and Democracy: the Lesson from Turkey
Brandy
Baker
Equal Opportunity Torture: Lynddie England, the Right and Feminism
John
Chuckman
Peep Show on Capitol Hill: Sex, Lies and Videotape
Bill
Glahn
RIAA Watch: Goon Squad
John
Holt
Fencing the Sky
Ron
Jacobs
The Power of Patti Smith
Brian
J. Foley
Why the Outrage Over Abu Ghraib?
Robin
Philpot
Re-writing the History of the Rwandan Genocide
Eric
Leser
The Carlyle Empire
Ray
Hanania
From Abu Ghraib to Nick Berg: There's No Such Thing as a Good
War Crime
Jeff
Halper
Dozers of Mass Destruction
Joe
Surkiewicz
Inside the Baltimore Detention Center
John
Whitlow
Iraq Goddamn
Michael
Leon
Invitation to a Beheading: Why Bush Should Watch the Berg Video
Poets'
Basement
Krieger, Ford, LaMorticella, Smith and Albert
May
14, 2004
Dr.
Susan Block
Bush's POW Porn
Ron
Jacobs
Secret History of the War on Drugs
William
Blum
God, Country and Torture
Michael
Donnelly
The People v. Corporate Greed: A Victory on the North Coast
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
India Shines
Stephen
Gowans
Building Democracy in Iraq and Other
Absurdities
May
13, 2004
Dave
Lindorff
Where is Kerry?
Colm
O'Laithian
Torture and Degradation: Revenge American Style?
Saul
Landau and Farrah Hassan
Wal-Mart: Scrooge with Hi-Tech Accounting
Practices
Ralph
Nader
An Open Letter to Bush on the Inhumane Treatment of Iraqi Prisoners
Willliam
James Martin
Deir Yassin Massacre Recalled
Marc
Salomon
Reality TV Bites
Forrest
Hylton
Law 'n Order in La Paz: All Quiet
on the Southern Front?
May
12, 2004
Blanton
/ Kornbluh
Prisoner Abuse: Cheney Warned in
1992
Virginia
Tilley
So, Who's to Blame?
Bruce
Jackson
James Inhofe, the Dumbest Senator
of Them All
Thomas
P. Healy
No Enemies: Making Peace with Bert Sacks
Linda
S. Heard
Racism and Ignorance: a Lethal Cocktail in Iraq
Norman
Solomon
Spinning Torturegate
Lisa
Viscidi
The People's Voice: Community Radio in Guatemala
Jack
Heyman
View from the Bay Bridge: Longshoremen Plan Mass Workers March
on DC
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
Rummy's Reprieve
CounterPunch
Wire
Teamsters Corruption Scandal: Hoffa Exec. Assistant Alleged to
Have Quashed Investigation into Mob Influence
Christopher
Brauchli
Detention Camp, USA
William
S. Lind
Bush's Waterloo?
May 11, 2004
Mark
Engler
On the "Necessity" of Torture
Ray
McGovern
More Troops? A March of Folly
Kurt
Nimmo
Dirty Nukes and Jefferson's Grand Experiment
Mickey
Z.
Less Than Hero
Christopher
Reed
Torture on the Homefront: America's Long History of Prison Abuse
Dennis
Hans
When John Negroponte was Mullah Omar
Bruce
Jackson
Pete Seeger at 85
Mike
Whitney
Killing al Sadr
Simon
Helweg-Larsen
Shrinking the Guatemalan Military
William
A. Cook
The Unconscious Country: Righteous Indignation,
Nakedly Displayed
May
10, 2004
Robert
Fisk
From Hollywood to Abu Ghraib: Racism
and Torture as Entertainment
Wayne
Madsen
The Israeli Torture Template: Rape,
Feces and Urine-Soaked Cloth Sacks
Col.
Dan Smith
The Shame of Abu Ghraib
Joe
Bageant
John Ashcroft, Keep Your Mouth Off My Wife!
Ron
Jacobs
Rummy's Prisongate Blues: Don't Leave Mad; Just Leave
Ben
Tripp
Getting in Touch with Your Inner Savage
Ray
Hanania
Why They Hate Us: Racism, Bigotry and Abuse
Reza
Fiyouzat
"Mishandled" Invasions
Diane
Christian
Images & Abstractions &
Genitals
Website
of the Day
Crushing Iraqi Skulls with Tanks for Sport?
May
8 / 9, 2004
Cockburn
/ St. Clair
Torture: as American as Apple Pie
Adam
Jones
America's Srebrenica: What About the Hundreds of POWs Suffocated
and Shot at Kunduz?
Douglas
Valentine
Who Let the Dogs Out?: Torture, the CIA and the Press
Kurt
Nimmo
Rush Limbaugh and the Babes of Abu Ghraib
Brian
Cloughley
Humpty Dumpty is Falling
Lucia
Dailey
Forbidden Games
Joanne
Mariner
* * * *: Redacting Moussaoui
Mickey
Z.
Please Forgive U.S.? (There Are No Innocent Bystanders)
John
Chuckman
The Thing with No Brain
Doug
Giebel
Someone Knew: There Were No WMDs
Norm
Dixon
How the Bush Gang Exploited 9/11
Sam
Bahour
A Guiding Light Falls on Ramallah
Susan
Davis
Disorderly Conduct as Fine Art
Dave
Marsh
In a Pig's Eye: Alan Lomax, Dead But Still Stealing
Laura
Flanders
Life with Dick and Lynne
Dave
Zirin
Fans Push Spiderman Off Base
Carolyn
Baker
Why I Won't Vote in 2004
Prince
"Ain't No Sense in Voting"
Dr.
Susan Block
Onan for Two: Liberating Masturbation
Poets'
Basement
Smith, Sleeth, Ford, Albert and Saska
May
7, 2004
Human
Rights Watch
10 Prisons; 9,000 Prisoners: US Detention
Facilities in Iraq
Ron
Jacobs
UnAmerican? I Wish It Were So
Robert
Fisk
An Illegal and Immoral War
Ahmad
Faruqui
The 50th Anniversary of Dien Bien
Phu
Alexander
Zaitchik
From Terrell Unit in Texas to Abu Ghraib: Doesn't It Ring a (Prison)
Bell?
Mike
Whitney
The Price of Victory
Norman
Solomon
This War, Racism and Media Denial
M.
Shahid Alam
A Comic Apology
May
6, 2004
Jeffrey
St. Clair
They Did It for Jessica: Smeared with
Shit; Kicked to Death
Kathy
Kelly
May Day in Pekin Prison: Prison Labor
for the War Machine
Werther
The Sunk Cost Fallacy: War as Vegas
Casino Game
Lawrence
Ferlinghetti
Totalitarian Democracy
Robert
Fisk
"Smoke Him": Video Shows Wounded
Men Being Shot by US Helicopter
John
Janney
Torturing the Way to Freedom?
Christopher
Ketcham
Outlaw Heterosexual Marriage Now!
Alan
Farago
Dead Oceans: So Long, Thanks for the Fish
Sam
Hamod
Bush on Arab TV: Worthless and Demeaning
James
Brooks
Sullen Spring
William
S. Lind
On the Brink of Defeat in Iraq
May
5, 2004
Maj.
Gen. Antonio M. Taguba
Complete US Army Report on Abuse of
Iraqi Prisoners
Kathleen
and Bill Christison
Kerry: a Lost Cause for Progressives?
Will
Youmans
Deal with the Devil: a Palestinian
Zionist and the End of the World
Patrick
B. Barr
Terrorists R Us: the Powerful are Exempt from the Label
Lawrence
Magnuson
Nightline's All-American Morgue
Greg
Moses
Pocketbook of Denuded Ideals
Niranjan
Ramakrishnan
Tormenting Prisoners, Torturing
Truth
Lee
Ballinger
Cinco de Mayo and Unity
Gilbert
Achcar
Bush's Cakewalk into the Iraq Quaqmire
Website
of the Day
Operation Phoenix & Iraq
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
Here for More Stories.
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Weekend
Edition
May 22 / 23, 2004
When
War is Swell
Bush's
Crusades and the Carlyle Group
By
JEFFREY ST. CLAIR
Across all fronts, Bush's war deteriorates
with stunning rapidity. The death count of American soldiers
killed in Iraq will soon top 800, with no end in sight. The members
of the handpicked Iraqi Governor Council are being knocked off
one after another. Once loyal Shia clerics, like Ayatollah Sistani,
are now telling the administration to pull out or face a nationalist
insurgency. The trail of culpability for the abuse, torture and
murder of Iraqi detainees seems to lead inexorably into the office
of Donald Rumsfeld. The war for Iraqi oil has ended up driving
the price of crude oil through the roof. Even Kurdish leaders,
brutalized by the Ba'athists for decades, are now saying Iraq
was a safer place under their nemesis Saddam Hussein. Like Medea
whacking her own kids, the US turned on its own creation, Ahmed
Chalabi, raiding his Baghdad compound and fingering him as an
agent of the ayatollahs of Iran. And on and on it goes.
Still not all of the president's
men are in a despairing mood. Amid the wreckage, there remain
opportunities for profit and plunder. Halliburton and Bechtel's
triumphs in Iraq have been chewed over for months. Less well
chronicled is the profiteering of the Carlyle Group, a company
with ties that extend directly into the Oval Office itself.
Even Pappy Bush stands in line
to profit handsomely from his son's war making. The former president
is on retainer with the Carlyle Group, the largest privately
held defense contractor in the nation. Carlyle is run by Frank
Carlucci, who served as the National Security advisor and Secretary
of Defense under Ronald Reagan. Carlucci has his own embeds in
the current Bush administration. At Princeton, his college roommate
was Donald Rumsfeld. They've remained close friends and business
associates ever since. When you have friends like this, you don't
need to hire lobbyists..
Bush Sr. serves as a kind of
global emissary for Carlyle. The ex-president doesn't negotiate
arms deals; he simply opens the door for them, a kind of high
level meet-and-greet. His special area of influence is the Middle
East, primarily Saudi Arabia, where the Bush family has extensive
business and political ties. According to an account in the Washington
Post, Bush Sr. earns around $500,000 for each speech he makes
on Carlyle's behalf.
One of the Saudi investors
lured to Carlyle by Bush was the BinLaden Group, the construction
conglomerate owned by the family of Osama bin Laden. According
to an investigation by the Wall Street Journal, Bush convinced
Shafiq Bin Laden, Osama's half brother, to sink $2 million of
BinLaden Group money into Carlyle's accounts. In a pr move, the
Carlyle group cut its ties to the BinLaden Group in October 2001.
One of Bush Sr.'s top sidekicks,
James Baker, is also a key player at Carlyle. Baker joined the
weapons firm in 1993, fresh from his stint as Bush's secretary
of state and chief of staff. Packing a briefcase of global contacts,
Baker parlayed his connections with heads of state, generals
and international tycoons into a bonanza for Carlyle. After Baker
joined the company, Carlyle's revenues more than tripled.
Like Bush Sr., Baker's main
function was to manage Carlyle's lucrative relationship with
Saudi potentates, who had invested tens of millions of dollars
in the company. Baker helped secure one of Carlyle's most lucrative
deals: the contract to run the Saudi offset program, a multi-billion
dollar scheme wherein international companies winning Saudi contracts
are required under terms of the contracts to invest a percentage
of the profits in Saudi companies.
Baker not only greases the
way for investment deals and arms sales, but he also plays the
role of seasoned troubleshooter, protecting the interests of
key clients and regimes. A case in point: when the Justice Department
launched an investigation into the financial dealings of Prince
Sultan bin Abdul Aziz, the Saudi prince sought out Baker's help.
Baker is currently defending the prince in a trillion dollar
lawsuit brought by the families of the victims of the 9/11 attacks.
The suit alleges that the prince used Islamic charities as pass-throughs
for shipping millions of dollars to groups linked to al-Qaeda.
Baker and Carlyle enjoy another
ace in the hole when it comes to looking out for their Saudi
friends. Baker prevailed on Bush Jr. to appoint his former law
partner, Bob Jordan, as the administration's ambassador to Saudi
Arabia.
Carlyle and its network of
investors are well positioned to cash in on Bush Jr.'s expansion
of the defense and Homeland Security department budgets. Two
Carlyle companies, Federal Data Systems and US Investigations
Services, hold multi-billion dollar contracts to provide background
checks for commercial airlines, the Pentagon, the CIA and the
Department of Homeland Security. USIS was once a federal agency
called the Office Federal Investigations, but it was privatized
in 1996 at the urging of Baker and others and was soon gobbled
up by Carlyle. The company is now housed in "high-security,
state-of-the-art, underground complex" in Annandale, Pennsylvania.
USIS now does 2.4 million background checks a year, largely for
the federal government.
Another Carlyle subsidiary,
Vought Aircraft, holds more than a billion dollars in federal
contracts to provide components for the C-117 transport plane,
the B-2 bomber and the Apache attack helicopter. Prior to 2001,
Vought had fallen on hard times. Just before the 9/11 attacks,
Vought announced that it was laying off more than 1,200 employees,
more than 20 percent of its workforce. But business picked up
briskly following the airstrikes on Afghanistan and the war on
Iraq.
In 2002, Carlyle sold off its
biggest holding, United Defense. The sale may have been prompted
by insider information leaked to Carlucci by his pal Rumsfeld.
In early 2001, Carlyle was furiously lobbying the Pentagon to
approve contracts for the production of United Defense's Crusader
artillery system, an unwieldy and outrageously expensive super-cannon.
Rumsfeld disliked the Crusader and had it high on his hit list
of weapon systems to be killed off in order to save money for
other big ticket schemes, particularly the Strategic Defense
Initiative.
But, as detailed in William
Hartung's excellent new book, How
Much Are You Making in the War, Daddy?, Rumsfeld didn't terminate
the Crusader immediately. Instead, he held off on a public announcement
of his decision for more than a year. By that time, Carlucci
and Baker devised a plan to take United Defense public. The sale
to unsuspecting investors netted Carlyle more than $237 million.
Six months later, Rumsfeld closed the book on the Crusader. By
then the gang at Carlyle had slipped out the back door, their
pockets stuffed with cash. United Defense was able to petition
the Pentagon to compensate them to the tune of several million
for cancellation of the contract. Even when you lose, you win.
So the men behind the Carlyle
Group drift through Washington like familiar ghosts, profiteering
off the carnage of Bush's disastrous crusades, untroubled by
any thought of congressional investigation or criminal prosecution,
firm in the knowledge that the worse things get for the people
of the world, the less secure and more gripped by fear the citizens
their own country become, the more millions they will reap for
themselves. Perpetual war means perpetual profits.
Let's leave the last word to
Dan Broidy, author of The Iron Triangle, an illuminating history
of the Carlyle Group: "It's not an exaggeration to say that
September 11 is going to make the Carlyle investors very, very
rich men."
Jeffrey St. Clair is the co-editor, with Alexander Cockburn,
of the new history of recent American wars, Imperial
Crusades: Iraq, Afghanistan and Yugoslavia, just published
by Verso.
Weekend
Edition Features for May 15 / 16, 2004
Alexander
Cockburn
Green Lights for Torture
Douglas
Valentine
ABCs of American Interrogation: Phoenix Program, Revisited
John
Stanton
Kings of Pain: UK, US and Israel
Ben
Tripp
Torture: a Fond Reminiscence
Brian
Cloughley
Where are You Heading, America? Taking a Closer Look at the Patriot
Act
Justin
E. H. Smith
Islam and Democracy: the Lesson from Turkey
Brandy
Baker
Equal Opportunity Torture: Lynddie England, the Right and Feminism
John
Chuckman
Peep Show on Capitol Hill: Sex, Lies and Videotape
Bill
Glahn
RIAA Watch: Goon Squad
John
Holt
Fencing the Sky
Ron
Jacobs
The Power of Patti Smith
Brian
J. Foley
Why the Outrage Over Abu Ghraib?
Robin
Philpot
Re-writing the History of the Rwandan Genocide
Eric
Leser
The Carlyle Empire
Ray
Hanania
From Abu Ghraib to Nick Berg: There's No Such Thing as a Good
War Crime
Jeff
Halper
Dozers of Mass Destruction
Joe
Surkiewicz
Inside the Baltimore Detention Center
John
Whitlow
Iraq Goddamn
Michael
Leon
Invitation to a Beheading: Why Bush Should Watch the Berg Video
Poets'
Basement
Krieger, Ford, LaMorticella, Smith and Albert
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