What have we learned?
"The cost of a thing is the amount of life which is required to be exchanged for it"
HD Thoreau (1817-62)
The fate of the world has been decided. Bush the Son has outdone Bush the Father with the assistance of the Holy Ghost of most Christian denominations. The Protestant Crusade will continue. The Jabberwockies state that this has been one of the most passionate and polarizing elections since the American Civil War (1861 until 1865). Now the security and prosperity of the USA is guaranteed: a security built on the loss of innocent lives in far off places and a prosperity based on spiralling debt and the devaluation of the dollar.
A week before the election, a study by U.S. and Iraqi researchers, led by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, released a survey of 1,000 households in 33 randomly chosen areas in Iraq. It found that the risk of violent death was 58 times higher in the period since the invasion and that most of the victims were women and children.
Revealing research
"Making conservative assumptions, about 100,000 excess deaths have happened," it claimed, and that "violence accounted for most of the excess deaths, and air strikes from coalition forces accounted for most violent deaths." The researchers excluded Fallujah from their results. Over the next few weeks we shall see whether that death toll increases as the war to enrich Halliburton unravels.
Also in that same week Osama bin Laden vowed to bleed America to bankruptcy and boasted that every $1 his terrorist organization spends on strikes costs the USA $1 million in economic fallout and military spending. He may have been overstating his costs, for it would appear that most of the necessary arms were looted from Iraq. Surface to air missiles from Baquba, northeast of Baghdad, and a further 380 tons of explosives from a complex at al Qaqaa.
I mention this as Bill Bonner (www.dailyreckoning.com) has pointed out that November 2 marks the anniversary of another "war on terror." The International Herald Tribune announced its beginning with this dispatch on Nov. 2, 1954: "Troops Head to Algeria," and went on to say, "the French government last night sent three companies of Republican Security Guards by plane and authorized the immediate dispatch of three battalions of parachutists to Algeria, where a sharp outbreak of terrorism, which seemed to follow a coordinated pattern, struck wide areas of the country early yesterday..."
At that time Algeria was a department of France and considered to be one of France's most beautiful states. Over a million Frenchmen (nicknamed colons) resided there, many of them for generations. However, in the early 50's a vociferous minority of the indigenous population (Muslims) decided that they would like their independence.
The struggle was started off by the Front de Liberation Nationale (FLN), an organization of Algerian nationalists in Algeria and in exile, and then by the Mouvement National Algrien (MNA) whose main supporters were Algerian workers in France. The FLN and MNA fought against each other in France, and sometimes in Algeria, for nearly the full duration of the conflict.
France attempted to pacify the situation and convince the natives that it was liberating them by segregating over 15 percent of the Muslim population into internment camps, within which over 200,000 died of starvation. By 1956 France had over 400,000 troops (around half of its armed forces) encouraging Muslim obedience.
Then in 1958 the French military in Algeria together with the colons staged a revolt as they were unhappy about the way things were going and created a political crisis in France. Charles de Gaulle, considered by all sides as the only man of sufficient stature, was recalled to provide a solution and he became premier with power to rule by decree for six months. During this time yet another new French constitution, further strengthening the presidency, was drawn up.
Invasion fears
This did not deter the extremists on all sides. As the Muslim organizations continued their "terrorist activities" elements of the French army staged another insurrection in April 1961. The leaders of this "generals' putsch" intended to seize control of Algeria as well as topple the de Gaulle regime. Units of the Foreign Legion offered prominent support and the well-armed Secret Army Organization (Organisation de l'Arme Secrete, OAS) coordinated the participation of colon vigilantes. Although a brief fear of invasion swept Paris, the revolt collapsed in four days largely because of cooperation from the resident air force and army. The OAS was later accused of plans to assassinate De Gaulle and this was turned into the best selling book entitled The Day of the Jackal by Frederick Forsyth, which later became a cult movie.
On October 17, 1961, after a peaceful march organized by the FLN, a large number of Algerian civilians were killed in Paris by the police. The exact number of the dead remains unknown but most historians agree on around 200.
The French government decreed that a ceasefire would take effect on March 19, 1962 between it and the FLN and that a referendum would be held in France, in June, on the proposed solution affecting all of the people within Algeria.
During the three months between the ceasefire and the referendum the OAS unleashed a terrorist campaign against the French army and police as well as against Muslims. It was the most wanton carnage that Algeria had witnessed in the eight years of savage warfare. OAS operatives set off an average of 120 bombs per day in March, with targets including hospitals and schools. Ultimately, the terrorism failed in its objectives and the OAS and the FLN concluded a truce on June 17, 1962. In the same month, more than 350,000 colons left Algeria to become the recipients of the Common Agricultural Policy. Within a year, 1.4 million refugees, including almost the entire Jewish community and some pro-French Muslims, had joined the exodus to France. Fewer than 30,000 Europeans chose to remain.
Government backing
Algerian sources claim that the war produced about 1.5 million deaths including the pro-French Muslims (called harkis) who were killed when the FLN settled accounts after independence.
In May 2001 General Paul Aussaresses, a high-ranking French military officer in the Algerian war and coordinator of the intelligence services during the Battle of Algiers in 1957, described in his book Special Services, Algeria 1955-1957 how he and his "death squad" tortured and killed prisoners with the full knowledge and backing of the French government. He claimed that the French government was regularly informed about, and tolerated, the use of torture, summary executions and forced displacements of people. The Justice Minister at the time was Francois Mitterrand who knew and approved of the policy. After the truth was revealed, French President Jacques Chirac stripped the 83 year-old general of his Legion of Honour, one of France's most distinguished awards.
Only in 1999 did France officially call the combat with Algeria a war. It had previously been referred to as "operations to maintain order." Cycles repeat.
HD Thoreau (1817-62)
The fate of the world has been decided. Bush the Son has outdone Bush the Father with the assistance of the Holy Ghost of most Christian denominations. The Protestant Crusade will continue. The Jabberwockies state that this has been one of the most passionate and polarizing elections since the American Civil War (1861 until 1865). Now the security and prosperity of the USA is guaranteed: a security built on the loss of innocent lives in far off places and a prosperity based on spiralling debt and the devaluation of the dollar.
A week before the election, a study by U.S. and Iraqi researchers, led by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, released a survey of 1,000 households in 33 randomly chosen areas in Iraq. It found that the risk of violent death was 58 times higher in the period since the invasion and that most of the victims were women and children.
Revealing research
"Making conservative assumptions, about 100,000 excess deaths have happened," it claimed, and that "violence accounted for most of the excess deaths, and air strikes from coalition forces accounted for most violent deaths." The researchers excluded Fallujah from their results. Over the next few weeks we shall see whether that death toll increases as the war to enrich Halliburton unravels.
Also in that same week Osama bin Laden vowed to bleed America to bankruptcy and boasted that every $1 his terrorist organization spends on strikes costs the USA $1 million in economic fallout and military spending. He may have been overstating his costs, for it would appear that most of the necessary arms were looted from Iraq. Surface to air missiles from Baquba, northeast of Baghdad, and a further 380 tons of explosives from a complex at al Qaqaa.
I mention this as Bill Bonner (www.dailyreckoning.com) has pointed out that November 2 marks the anniversary of another "war on terror." The International Herald Tribune announced its beginning with this dispatch on Nov. 2, 1954: "Troops Head to Algeria," and went on to say, "the French government last night sent three companies of Republican Security Guards by plane and authorized the immediate dispatch of three battalions of parachutists to Algeria, where a sharp outbreak of terrorism, which seemed to follow a coordinated pattern, struck wide areas of the country early yesterday..."
At that time Algeria was a department of France and considered to be one of France's most beautiful states. Over a million Frenchmen (nicknamed colons) resided there, many of them for generations. However, in the early 50's a vociferous minority of the indigenous population (Muslims) decided that they would like their independence.
The struggle was started off by the Front de Liberation Nationale (FLN), an organization of Algerian nationalists in Algeria and in exile, and then by the Mouvement National Algrien (MNA) whose main supporters were Algerian workers in France. The FLN and MNA fought against each other in France, and sometimes in Algeria, for nearly the full duration of the conflict.
France attempted to pacify the situation and convince the natives that it was liberating them by segregating over 15 percent of the Muslim population into internment camps, within which over 200,000 died of starvation. By 1956 France had over 400,000 troops (around half of its armed forces) encouraging Muslim obedience.
Then in 1958 the French military in Algeria together with the colons staged a revolt as they were unhappy about the way things were going and created a political crisis in France. Charles de Gaulle, considered by all sides as the only man of sufficient stature, was recalled to provide a solution and he became premier with power to rule by decree for six months. During this time yet another new French constitution, further strengthening the presidency, was drawn up.
Invasion fears
This did not deter the extremists on all sides. As the Muslim organizations continued their "terrorist activities" elements of the French army staged another insurrection in April 1961. The leaders of this "generals' putsch" intended to seize control of Algeria as well as topple the de Gaulle regime. Units of the Foreign Legion offered prominent support and the well-armed Secret Army Organization (Organisation de l'Arme Secrete, OAS) coordinated the participation of colon vigilantes. Although a brief fear of invasion swept Paris, the revolt collapsed in four days largely because of cooperation from the resident air force and army. The OAS was later accused of plans to assassinate De Gaulle and this was turned into the best selling book entitled The Day of the Jackal by Frederick Forsyth, which later became a cult movie.
On October 17, 1961, after a peaceful march organized by the FLN, a large number of Algerian civilians were killed in Paris by the police. The exact number of the dead remains unknown but most historians agree on around 200.
The French government decreed that a ceasefire would take effect on March 19, 1962 between it and the FLN and that a referendum would be held in France, in June, on the proposed solution affecting all of the people within Algeria.
During the three months between the ceasefire and the referendum the OAS unleashed a terrorist campaign against the French army and police as well as against Muslims. It was the most wanton carnage that Algeria had witnessed in the eight years of savage warfare. OAS operatives set off an average of 120 bombs per day in March, with targets including hospitals and schools. Ultimately, the terrorism failed in its objectives and the OAS and the FLN concluded a truce on June 17, 1962. In the same month, more than 350,000 colons left Algeria to become the recipients of the Common Agricultural Policy. Within a year, 1.4 million refugees, including almost the entire Jewish community and some pro-French Muslims, had joined the exodus to France. Fewer than 30,000 Europeans chose to remain.
Government backing
Algerian sources claim that the war produced about 1.5 million deaths including the pro-French Muslims (called harkis) who were killed when the FLN settled accounts after independence.
In May 2001 General Paul Aussaresses, a high-ranking French military officer in the Algerian war and coordinator of the intelligence services during the Battle of Algiers in 1957, described in his book Special Services, Algeria 1955-1957 how he and his "death squad" tortured and killed prisoners with the full knowledge and backing of the French government. He claimed that the French government was regularly informed about, and tolerated, the use of torture, summary executions and forced displacements of people. The Justice Minister at the time was Francois Mitterrand who knew and approved of the policy. After the truth was revealed, French President Jacques Chirac stripped the 83 year-old general of his Legion of Honour, one of France's most distinguished awards.
Only in 1999 did France officially call the combat with Algeria a war. It had previously been referred to as "operations to maintain order." Cycles repeat.
