Melbourne academic Robert Manne rightly calls for a neutering of Murdoch empire power in Australia: The company’s domination of our newspaper market poses a real and present danger to the health of Australian democracy … Unquestioning support for American foreign policy led the paper to conduct an extraordinarily strident campaign in favour of an invasion…
Showing all posts tagged Iraq
How 9/11 showed a West unsure of who it wanted to kill
This week’s New Statesman editorial: Above all, the doctrine of liberal intervention, even on so-called humanitarian grounds, was gravely undermined by the misadventures in Iraq and Afghanistan. Mr Blair’s dream of a new, interdependent world order turned out to be no more than the delusion of a western triumphalist who believed that history was moving…
Anybody care that countless billions wasted in Iraq and Afghanistan?
American multinational KBR has its tentacles everywhere, including in Australia. The US-based Project on Government Oversight laments the over-reliance on suspect corporations with little or no accountability. This is the definition of disaster capitalism: At least one out of every six dollars spent by U.S. taxpayers on contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past…
Thank you Washington for watching Australian public and democratic protests
The infiltration of American (non) intelligence in Australia is almost comical; it certainly hasn’t brought any more love to the fading super-power. FireDogLake reports: Pro-Cuba, pro-Serbian, pro-Palestinian, pro and anti-Kosovo Independence, Sri Lankan, antiwar and socialist demonstrations were closely monitored by the US Embassy in Canberra, Australia in 2008 and 2009, a secret cable posted…
Book reviews can save lives
A fascinating piece of history written by Australian academic Scott Burchill: In August 2004 I was asked by The Age to review [Australian journalist] John Martinkus’ new book ‘Travels in American Iraq‘ (Black Inc, 2004). It was a very good account of life after the invasion and Martinkus was clearly more sympathetic to the occupied…
When you say “liberating” Afghanistan, you mean privatising the lot?
The future of warfare, led by America and the West, is fueled by unaccountable corporations: At least one in every six dollars of U.S. spending for contracts and grants in Iraq and Afghanistan over the past decade, or more than $30 billion, has been wasted. And at least that much could again turn into waste…
Remind me how we’re writing the recent history of NATO bombing in Libya?
Charles Glass in the London Review of Books: The Libyans are lucky that Muammar Gaddafi did not hold out longer. If he had, there might not be much of the country left. Nato long since ran out of military targets, and it had to hit something to get the ragtag rebels into the royal palace…
How America has no clue about the wars it is fighting, part 75432
From Wired: It’s no secret that the U.S. Army has a language barrier to overcome in Iraq and Afghanistan. A decade of war has led an English-constrained military to seek all kinds of quick fixes, from translator gadgets to private contractors — something Defense Secretary Leon Panetta lamentedthis week. But more galling is the fact…
The tangled web of so-called freedom in Libya
So here’s how it works. Find a dictator, love him then hate him, bomb him to smithereens and look for unique business opportunities. Asia Times: Think of the new Libya as the latest spectacular chapter in the Disaster Capitalism series. Instead of weapons of mass destruction, we had R2P (“responsibility to protect”). Instead of neo-conservatives,…
KBR is company that needs investigation and yet officials love ’em
KBR is a leading contractor that operates in America, Australia and across the world. Its human rights record is constantly found wanting time and time again and yet governments continue giving them contracts. That’s privatisation on crack. Read this and weep: The skirmishing has not yet subsided in the high-profile suit brought by Jamie Leigh…