Article 934 of misc.activism.progressive: Path: bilver!tarpit!ge-dab!crdgw1!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!wupost!mont!rich From: notes@igc.org Newsgroups: misc.activism.progressive Subject: Chomsky: LOOT 5/91 Message-ID: <1991Oct5.081804.27095@pencil.cs.missouri.edu> Date: 5 Oct 91 08:18:04 GMT Sender: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu (Rich Winkel) Followup-To: alt.activism.d Organization: PACH Lines: 260 Approved: map@pencil.cs.missouri.edu The following piece by Noam Chomsky was published in: Lies of Our Times (LOOT), May 1991 and it's reprinted here with their permission. _Lies of Our Times_ is a magazine of media criticism. "Our Times" are the times we live in but they are also the words of the _New York Times_, the most cited news medium in the United States, our paper of record. Our "Lies" are more than just literal falsehoods; they encompass subjects that have been ignored, hypocrisies, misleading emphases, and hidden premises - all of the biases which systematically shape reporting. Published by Sheridan Square Press, Inc. Produced and distributed by Institute for Media Analysis, Inc. Subscription rate: $24 (US); $32 (Canada, Mexico, W. Europe); $36 (Other). Payable to the order of Sheridan Square Press. 11 issues a year (combined July-August issue) of 24 pages each, except December issue is 28 pages -- includes yearly index. Lies Of Our Times, 145 West 4th Street, New York, NY 10012, (212) 254-1061, Fax: (212) 254-9598 ================================================================= Letter from Lexington April 12, 1991 Dear LOOT, "When this war is over," George Bush announced in January, "the United States, its credibility and its reliability restored, will have a key leadership role in helping to bring peace to the rest of the Middle East" (Andrew Rosenthal, "Bush Vows to Tackle Middle East Issues," _NYT_, Jan. 29, A13). With the war over, James Baker flew at once to the region, meeting with Israel and the Arab allies: the six family dictatorships that manage Gulf oil production, the bloody tyrant who rules Syria, and Egypt. In a "watershed event," they "endorsed President Bush's broad framework for dealing with the Middle East," Thomas Friedman reported (_NYT_, March 11). Even critics were impressed. Anthony Lewis wrote that the President is "at the height of his powers" and "has made very clear that he wants to breathe light into that hypothetical creature, the Middle East peace process" (_NYT_, March 15). Helena Cobban found "great inspiration" in Bush's statement that "The time has come to put an end to the Arab-Israeli conflict," words "spoken with commitment by an American president at the height of his powers" and forming part of his "broad vision of Middle East peace-building" (_Christian Science Monitor_, March 12, p. 18). John Judis praised James Baker as the hope for peace, a dove who "has stood for multilateral and diplomatic solutions" and has "emphasized that the U.S. would have to work on resolving the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians" (_In These Times_, Feb. 27). The _New York Times_ editors saw "a rare window for peace." "The P.L.O's Iraqi debacle...could bring forward acceptable negotiating partners" among the Palestinians, permitting "direct bargaining between Israel and representative Palestinians" (March 11) -- "representative" being a code word for "acceptable to us." The _Washington Post_ agreed that talks between Israel and the Arab states were preferable to an "unprepared and unwieldy international conference," and offer "the best way to make sure that the Palestinians, once they locate representative and plausible spokesmen, will receive their regional due" (editorial, _WP weekly_, March 11-17). The _Wall Street Journal_ announced that although "Bush Hopes for a Solution," "the PLO's Leaders Must Want One as Well" (headline, p. 1, March 6). The editors of the _Los Angeles Times_ admonished the Palestinians that they "will have to do better than" Arafat, even if he is "their sincere choice." They must abandon the "leadership that has habitually opted for no-compromise dogmatism at the expense of conciliation, frequently using assassination to silence moderate opposition voices within Palestinian ranks" (Feb. 26). The next day, Israel arrested yet another leading Arab advocate of Palestinian-Arab dialogue, Dr. Mamdouh al-Aker, subjecting him to torture as usual and keeping him from his attorney for a month (_Mideast Mirror_, 27 March) -- the real story about "moderate opposition voices" for many years, regularly suppressed in favor of convenient fictions, such as the "no-compromise dogmatism" of those who have been far closer to the international consensus on a political settlement than Washington-media rejectionists for 15 years. It did not pass without notice that a few problems remain. After hailing the "watershed event," Thomas Friedman added that "The Arab ministers clearly differed with Mr. Baker on one very important detail: how to make peace with Israel." They called for "an international conference under the auspices of the United Nations" while "Mr. Baker, by contrast, said an international conference would not be appropriate at this time." "On secondary issues, such as the Palestinian-Israeli dispute, [the Arab states] still prefer the safety of the Arab lowest common denominator -- at least for now." The official Arab statement after the "watershed event" reveals another "detail," recorded without comment (Excerpts, _NYT_, March 12): the Arab allies "demand the full and unconditional implementation of Security Council Resolution 425" of March 1978, the first of several calling for Israel's immediate withdrawal from Lebanon. The plea was renewed by the government of Lebanon in February 1991, ignored as usual while Israel and its clients terrorize the region and bomb elsewhere at will (see my "Letter from Lexington," August 1990). In the real world, the Arab allies have some company in calling for an international conference. The matter arises regularly at the UN, most recently in December 1990, when the call for such a conference passed 144-2 (US, Israel). In the preceding session, the Assembly had voted 151-3 (US, Israel, Dominica) for an international conference to realize the terms of UN Resolution 242, along with "the right to self-determination" for the Palestinians (UN Draft A/44/L.51, 6 Dec. 1989). A Security Council resolution in similar terms had been offered by Syria, Jordan, and Egypt as far back as January 1976 with the support of the PLO and indeed initiated by it according to Israel. It was vetoed by the US. Europe, the USSR, the Arab states, and the world generally have been united for years on such a political settlement, but the US will not permit it. The facts are unacceptable, thus eliminated from history. For twenty years, the US has backed Israeli rejectionism. For that clear but inexpressible reason, the peace process remains a "hypothetical creature." There is one simple reason why an international conference is "unwieldy": participants will support "the right to self-determination" for the indigenous population. Friedman observed further that Washington is exploring the idea event'" hosted by the US and USSR. Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir would find this preferable to an "open-ended, gang-up-on-Israel international conference" (_NYT_, March 28, A6). Judis detected Baker's benign hand in this move towards peace. In the real world, Washington is willing to allow the Soviet Union to co-host a ceremonial "event" on the assumption that in its current straits, it will follow orders. But as Kissinger warned years ago, Europe and Japan must be kept out of the diplomacy; they are too independent. The President of the European Community and its official in charge of Middle East affairs recently reiterated the EC position expressed in the UN Resolutions, declaring that "The outside powers should not let Israel get off the hook once again"; Israel should withdraw from Lebanon and the occupied territories, and reach a settlement with Syria on the Syrian Golan Heights (annexed in defiance of a Security Council resolution and a General Assembly vote of 149-1). But, they added, the EC would have no major role in the diplomatic process, a US monopoly (Jacques Poos, Eberhard Rhein, _Mideast Mirror_, 28 March). In their own quaint way, the media acknowledge these realities. The _New York Times_ has mentioned that the US is alone in the world in endorsing Israel's Shamir plan. But "the Soviet Union has moved away from a policy of confrontation with the United States and now indicates that it prefers partnership with Washington in the diplomacy of the region," the _Times_ later added hopefully under the headline "Soviets Trying to Become Team Player in Mideast." This "shift away from confrontation" brings the Soviet Union "closer to the mainstream of Mideast diplomacy" (Joel Brinkley, _NYT_, Sept. 8, 1989; Alan Cowell, _NYT_, Dec. 12, 1989). To translate from Newspeak: The Soviet Union may join Washington off the spectrum of world opinion, becoming a "team player" in "the mainstream." "The team" is the United States, "the mainstream" is the position occupied by "the team," and the "peace process" is whatever "the team" is doing. Since 1989, the official "peace process" has been the Baker plan, which, as Baker announced loud and clear, is identical to the Shamir plan, more accurately, the coalition plan of Israel's two major political blocs, Labor and Likud. Palestinians will be limited to discussing its modalities, with the PLO excluded. The current pretense is that when "The Palestinians supported Iraq during the gulf war and endorsed its missile attacks on Israel, Mr. Baker's response was to freeze the Palestine Liberation Organization out of his talks" (Friedman, _NYT_, April 14, "Week in Review," 1). All of Baker's conditions were explicit long before the gulf war. The Baker-Shamir-Peres plan had three "Basic Premises." First, there can be no "additional Palestinian state," Jordan already being one; there is no issue of Palestinian self-determination, whatever the foolish and irresponsible world may think. Second, no PLO; Palestinians may not choose their own representatives. Third, "There will be no change in the status of Judea, Samaria and Gaza other than in accordance with the basic guidelines of the Government" of Israel. The plan then calls for "free elections" under Israeli military occupation with much of the Palestinian leadership in prison. The outcome, as Israeli officials have made clear, is that Palestinians may be allowed to set local tax rates in Nablus and collect garbage in Ramallah. Unlike US commentators, the semi-official Egyptian press finds little "inspiration" in the Bush-Baker rhetoric. Any hopes evaporated after Baker's March visit, when he underscored traditional US rejectionism (_al-Ahram_, cited in _Mideast Mirror_, 27 March). There were no grounds for optimism in the first place, given that the great power that has long barred any meaningful peace process has now established that "what we say goes," as the President put it a few days after "staking out the high ground." A central task of the educated classes is to fix clearly the bounds of opinion. At one extreme, we have Yitzhak Shamir, who holds that the "land for peace" formula of UN 242 has already been satisfied. At the other, we have the opposition Labor Party, which sees advantages for Israel in "territorial compromise" along the lines of Labor's Allon plan, leaving Israel in control of the useful land and resources but without responsibility for most of the Arab population. The US is an honest broker, merely seeking peace and justice, trying to steer a path between "the conditions the Arab nations and Israel have put on their possible participation in any peace conference" (Friedman, _NYT_, April 13). The world is off the spectrum entirely. One technique is to attribute to "good Arabs" positions held by the Washington-media alliance. Thus in Friedman's version of history, in Jerusalem in 1977 President Sadat "offered the Israeli people full peace in return for a full withdrawal from the Sinai desert" (_NYT_, April 14, "Week in Review"). This was Menahem Begin's position, while Sadat reiterated the international consensus. And now, Friedman writes, "The Arab countries have been demanding that Israel commit itself to an interpretation of 242 that leaves open the possibility of trading land for peace" (_NYT_, April 10, 1991). As he knows, they reject this US-Israeli formula, joining the world in an interpretation of 242 that calls for political settlement on the internationally recognized (pre-June 1967) border. Palestinians and authentic Israeli doves have commonly regarded the Labor-US "territorial compromise" variety of rejectionism as "much worse than the Likud's autonomy plan" (Shmuel Toledano, endorsing the observation of Palestinian moderate Attorney Aziz Shehadah, _Ha'aretz_, March 8, 1991). The reasons are well-known, but must remain as deeply buried as the true history. Washington's rejectionist stance must be adopted as the basis for reporting and discussion, while its advocates are lauded as doves who intend to breathe light on the problems of suffering humanity. The US and Israel can then proceed with the policy articulated in February 1989 by Defense Secretary Yitzhak Rabin of the Labor Party, when he informed Peace Now leaders that the US-PLO dialogue was only a means to divert attention while Israel suppresses the Intifada by force. The Palestinians "will be broken," he assured them, reiterating the prediction of Israeli Arabists 40 years earlier: the Palestinians will "be crushed," will die or "turn into human dust and the waste of society, and join the most impoverished classes in the Arab countries." Or they will leave, while Russian Jews, now barred from the US by policies designed to deny them a free choice, flock to an expanded Israel, leaving the diplomatic issues moot, as the Baker-Shamir-Peres plan envisions. New excuses will be devised for old policies, which will be hailed as generous and forthcoming. Failure will be attributed to the "no-compromise dogmatism" of the extremists who fail to adapt to Washington's "broad framework for dealing with the Middle East," which is by definition right and just. Sincerely, Noam Chomsky Article 947 of misc.activism.progressive: Path: bilver!tous!peora!masscomp!usenet.coe.montana.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!wupost!mont!rich From: notes@igc.org Newsgroups: misc.activism.progressive Subject: Chomsky: LOOT 9/91 Message-ID: <1991Oct7.225657.29939@pencil.cs.missouri.edu> Date: 7 Oct 91 22:56:57 GMT Sender: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu (Rich Winkel) Followup-To: alt.activism.d Organization: PACH Lines: 269 Approved: map@pencil.cs.missouri.edu The following piece bt Noam Chomsky was published in: Lies of Our Times (LOOT), September 1991 and it's reprinted here with their permission. _Lies of Our Times_ is a magazine of media criticism. "Our Times" are the times we live in but they are also the words of the _New York Times_, the most cited news medium in the United States, our paper of record. Our "Lies" are more than just literal falsehoods; they encompass subjects that have been ignored, hypocrisies, misleading emphases, and hidden premises - all of the biases which systematically shape reporting. Published by Sheridan Square Press, Inc. Produced and distributed by Institute for Media Analysis, Inc. Subscription rate: $24 (US); $32 (Canada, Mexico, W. Europe); $36 (Other). Payable to the order of Sheridan Square Press. 11 issues a year (combined July-August issue) of 24 pages each, except December issue is 28 pages -- includes yearly index. Lies Of Our Times, 145 West 4th Street, New York, NY 10012, (212) 254-1061, Fax: (212) 254-9598 ================================================================= Letter from Lexington Aug. 12, 1991 Dear LOOT, Honest journalism is a demanding craft, but the respectable variety, a very different genre, has its burdens as well. The aftermath of the Gulf war provides many illustrations. Here is a small sample. One essential talent is a tolerance for contradiction. Thus Patrick Tyler observes that "gaps remain in the Administration's goal of stemming the Middle East arms race, even as Washington has become the dominant arms supplier in the region" (July 28, 1991, p. A12). Here we see the familiar conflict between facts and Truth, facts being what happens in the world, while Truth has a more august status, emanating from power itself. That the Administration's goal is to stem the Middle East arms race is Truth, established by assertion from on high. Washington's exploitation of the opportunity to sell high tech weapons is mere fact, too insignificant to undermine Truth. Washington's inspiring benevolence is another Truth that totters uneasily alongside recalcitrant fact. Confronting the problem head on, Tyler writes: "Though Mr. Bush has made it plain that he will not tolerate needless suffering among Iraqi women and children, widespread disease and malnutrition have been documented in the country, but have not yet been addressed." The last phrase is a euphemism. The translation into English reads: "but the U.S. and its British puppy dog are blocking efforts to deal with the civilian catastrophe. The contradiction between fact and Truth would be overcome if Mr. Bush were just unaware of the vast and growing civilian suffering. Pursuing that heroic option, Tyler reports that the embargo is "hurting the Iraqi people far more than is perceived in Washington" (_NYT_, June 24, 1991, p. A1). True, "severe malnutrition and spiraling disease" may have a "devastating effect on the civilian population," but Mr. Bush hasn't been told. The dilemma is now resolved: when he learns about the effects of his sanctions, he will move resolutely to help "Iraqi women and children," in accord with the principles that he has "made plain." The astute reader will have noticed that the contradiction can be overcome in a different way. It is only _needless_ suffering that Our Leader will not tolerate. Utilitarian suffering is quite another thing. In th case in question, the suffering serves a useful function: to hold the population hostage for political ends (what is called "terrorism" when done on a far lesser scale by some official enemy). The suffering is therefore justified on realistic, pragmatic grounds. The reasoning is explained by _Times_ chief diplomatic correspondent Thomas Friedman: Iraqi generals will be induced to topple Mr. Hussein, "and then Washington would have the best of all worlds: an iron-fisted Iraqi junta without Saddam Hussein." In short, by punishing Iraqi women and children, Washington will be able to restore the happy days when Saddam's "iron fist...held Iraq together, much to the satisfaction of the American allies Turkey and Saudi Arabia," not to speak of the boss in Washington, who had no problem with the means employed (_NYT_, July 7, 1991, "News of the Week in Review", p. 1). It wil be quite proper, then, to "have sat by and watched a country starve for political reasons" (UNICEF's director of public affairs Richard Reid. That is what will happen, Reid predicts, unless Iraq is permitted to purchase "massive quantities of food" -- though it is already far too late for the children under two, who have stopped growing for six or seven months because of severe malnutrition, he reports (Kathy Blair, _Toronto Globe & Mail_, June 17, 1991, p. A1). It is also too late for the 55,000 children who had died by May (Patrick Tyler, _NYT_, May 22, 1991, reporting the Harvard medical team study that predicted another 170,000 child deaths by the end of the year), and for countless others in a country facing "widespread starvation," a critical shortage of drugs and a collapsing medical system, quadrupling of diarrhoeal diseases, outbreaks of typhoid and cholera in cities with raw sewage flowing in streets and into rivers, and the other forms of utilitarian suffering reported by the recent UN Secretary-General's mission (_Guardian Weekly_ (London), Aug. 4, 1991, p. 9). If we are lucky, Bush's ex-pal may lend a helpful hand. The _Wall Street Journal_ observes that Iraq's "clumsy attempt to hide nuclear-bomb-making equipment from the U.N. may be a blessing in disguise, U.S. officials say. It assures that the allies [read: U.S. and U.K.] can keep economic sanctions in place to squeeze Saddam Hussein without mounting calls to end the penalties for humanitarian reasons" (_WSJ_, July 5, 1991, p. 1). No annoying noises, then, from the P.C. crowd as we cheerfully "watch the country starve for political reasons." The Bush-_Times_ conception of "the best of all worlds" is not universally shared. London banker Ahmad Chalabi, a spokesman for the Iraqi democratic opposition, describes the outcome of the war as "the worst of all possible worlds" for the Iraqi people (_Wall Street Journal_, April 8, 1991). This apparently contradiction is also readily resolved. The worst of all possible worlds for the Iraqi people may well be the best of all worlds from the perspective of offices in Washington and New York. Right-thinking people may agree with Chalabi that "the tragedy in Iraq is awesome," meanwhile recognizing that the important concerns are those spelled out by the State Department spokesman at the _Times_. "Before Mr. Hussein invaded Kuwait," Friedman writes, "he was a pillar of the gulf balance of power and status quo preferred by Washington," employing his "iron fist" with our approval and generous assistance. He made a false move on August 2, 1990, "but as soon as Mr. Hussein was forced back into his shell, Washington felt he had become useful again... That is why Mr. Bush never supported the Kurdish and Shiite rebellions against Mr. Hussein, or for that matter any democracy movement in Iraq" (_op. cit._). That is also why the _Times_ -- in fact, the media generally -- have scrupulously avoided the Iraqi democratic forces (though the _Wall Street Journal_ deserves credit for allowing them a few openings well after the splendid triumph). These silly folk had the bad taste to oppose Washington's plans throughout; much like the Palestinians, they fail to recognize "the hard realities of the region" (Serge Schmemann, _NYT_, Aug. 3, 1991, p. A1), and thus deserve their fate. They were calling for democracy in Iraq when Saddam's "iron fist" was providing Washington with "the best of all worlds." They opposed the ruinous U.S.-U.K. war and urged pursuit of the diplomatic track that was barred by Washington and virtually suppressed by the media. And finally, compounding their sins, they are again calling for democracy in Iraq while Washington seeks to install some clone of Saddam Hussein, but one who understands that "what we say goes," in the President's fine words. Speaking abroad, Chalabi observed in mid-March that Washington "is waiting for Saddam to butcher the insurgents in the hope that he can be overthrown later by a suitable officer," an attitude rooted in the US policy of "supporting dictatorships to maintain stability." The Bush administration announced that it would continue to refuse any contact with Iraqi democratic leaders: "We felt that political meetings with them...would not be appropriate for our policy at this time," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher stated on March 14 (_Mideast Mirror_ (London), March 15, 1991). The Department is true to its word. Alan Cowell reports that Iraqi exiles in Syria say "there has been no reply" to their letter requesting a meeting with James Baker, "and the embassy's doors remain closed to them," as in Washington, London, and elsewhere (_NYT_, April 11, 1991, A11). The traditional U.S. opposition to democratic forces poses a constant challenge for the vigilant defenders of Truth. In the present case, the respectable commentator must play down the U.S. military tactics: to create maximum long-lasting damage to the civilian society for the political end of restoring the "iron fist"; and to massacre defenseless conscripts (mostly Shi'ite and Kurdish peasants, apparently) hiding in holes in the sand or fleeing for their lives while elite units were released to do their necessary work and U.S. forces were spared any danger of combat. Reporting from northern Iraq, American correspondent Charles Glass described how journalists watched as "Republican Guards, supported by regular army brigades, mercilessly shelled Kurdish-held areas with Katyusha multiple rocket launchers, helicopter gunships and heavy artillery," while they tuned in to listen to Stormin' Norman puffing on about how "We had destroyed the Republican Guard as a militarily effective force" and eliminated the military use of helicopters (_Spectator_, London, April 13, 1991) -- not the stuff of which heroes are manufactured, therefore finessed, though the story could not be totally ignored at home. Striving manfully to reconcile fact with Truth, _Times_ Middle East correspondent Alan Cowell attributes the failure of the rebels to the fact that "very few people outside Iraq wanted them to win." Here the concept "people" has its standard meaning in respectable journalism: "people who count." The "allied campaign against President Hussein brought the United States and its Arab coalition partners to a strikingly unanimous view," Cowell continues: "whatever the sins of the Iraqi leader, he offered the West and the region a better hope for his country's stability than did those who have suffered his repression" (_op. cit._). These "Arab coalition partners" are a merry crew: six family dictatorships, Syria's Hafez el-Assad (indistinguishable from President Hussein), and Egypt, the sole Arab ally with a degree of internal freedom. We therefore look to the semi-official press in Egypt to verify Cowell's report of the "strikingly unanimous view." His article is datelined Damascus, April 10. The day before, Deputy Editor Salaheddin Hafez of Egypt's leading daily, _al-Ahram_, commented on Saddam's demolition of the rebels "under the umbrella of the Western alliance's forces." The U.S. stance proved what Egypt had been saying all along, Hafez wrote. American rhetoric about "the savage beast, Saddam Hussein," was merely a cover for the true goals: to cut Iraq down to size and establish US hegemony in the region. The West turned out to be in total agreement with the beast on the need to "block any progress and abort all hopes, however dim, for freedom or equality and for progress towards democracy," working in "collusion with Saddam himself" if necessary (_al-Ahram_, April 9, 1991; quoted in _Mideast Mirror_ (London), April 10). There was, indeed, some regional support for the U.S. stance. In Israel, many commentators (including leading doves) agreed with retiring Chief-of-Staff Dan Shomron that it is preferable for Saddam Hussein to remain in power in Iraq (Ron Ben-Yishai, interview with Shomron, _Ha'aretz_, March 29; Shalom Yerushalmi, "We are all with Saddam," _Kol Ha'ir_, April 4, 1991). Others welcomed the suppression of the Kurds because of "the latent ambition of Iran and Syria to exploit the Kurds and create a territorial, military, contiguity between Teheran and Damascus -- a contiguity which embodies danger for Israel" (Moshe Zak, senior editor of _Ma'ariv_, _Jerusalem Post_. April 4, 1991). But all this was unhelpful, therefore suppressed.] Another task is to show that despite the outcome, it was indeed a Grand Victory. Tacit U.S. support for the slaughter of the Kurds posed some difficulties, which would have been even more severe had the media deigned to report the testimony of Western doctors and other observers on Turkish bombing of hundreds of Kurdish villages and the hundreds of thousands of Kurds in flight, trying to surve the cold winter while aid was barred by the government and Mr. Bush hailed the Turkish leader Turgut Ozal as "a protector of peace," joining those who "stand up for civilized values around the world." But the tragedy of the Shi'ites, who appear to have suffered much worse destruction and terror under the gaze of the heroic Schwartzkopf, was readily put to the side; they are, after all, mere Arabs. This task too was accomplished. In its anniversary editorial, the _Times_ editors dismissed the qualms of "the doubters," concluding that Mr. Bush had acted wisely: he "avoided the quagmire and preserved his two triumphs: the extraordinary cooperation among coalition members and the revived self-confidence of Americans," who "greeted the Feb. 28 cease-fire with relief and pride -- relief at miraculously few U.S. casualties and pride in the brilliant performance of the allied forces" (_NYT_, Aug. 2, 1991). Surely these "triumphs" far outweigh the "awesome tragedies" in the region. One can appreciate the mood of the nonpeople of the world, rarely reported here. It is captured by Cardinal Paulo Evaristo Arns of Sao Paolo, Brazil, who writes that in the Arab countries "the rich sided with the U.S. government while the _millions_ of poor condemned this military aggression," and throughout the Third World, "there is hatred and fear: When will they decide to invade us," and on what pretext? Sincerely, Noam Chomsky Article 944 of misc.activism.progressive: Path: bilver!tarpit!fang!att!att!linac!pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!wupost!mont!rich From: notes@igc.org Newsgroups: misc.activism.progressive Subject: Chomsky: LOOT 10/91 Message-ID: <1991Oct8.092306.2228@pencil.cs.missouri.edu> Date: 8 Oct 91 09:23:06 GMT Sender: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu (Rich Winkel) Followup-To: alt.activism.d Organization: PACH Lines: 253 Approved: map@pencil.cs.missouri.edu The following piece by Noam Chomsky was published in: Lies of Our Times (LOOT), October 1991 and it's reprinted here with their permission. _Lies of Our Times_ is a magazine of media criticism. "Our Times" are the times we live in but they are also the words of the _New York Times_, the most cited news medium in the United States, our paper of record. Our "Lies" are more than just literal falsehoods; they encompass subjects that have been ignored, hypocrisies, misleading emphases, and hidden premises - all of the biases which systematically shape reporting. Published by Sheridan Square Press, Inc. Produced and distributed by Institute for Media Analysis, Inc. Subscription rate: $24 (US); $32 (Canada, Mexico, W. Europe); $36 (Other). Payable to the order of Sheridan Square Press. 11 issues a year (combined July-August issue) of 24 pages each, except December issue is 28 pages -- includes yearly index. Lies Of Our Times, 145 West 4th Street, New York, NY 10012, (212) 254-1061, Fax: (212) 254-9598 ================================================================= Letter from Lexington Sept. 8, 1991 Dear LOOT, The important events of late August in the Soviet Union have elicited some curious coverage and commentary. The U.S. was a distant and passive observer, and Washington basically had no policy, simply watching events run their course. That picture, however, is not acceptable. The required version is that the U.S. is a benign if sometimes stern guardian of international order and morality, guiding errant elements along a constructive path. George Bush, in particular, has been assigned the image of Great Statesman, with extraordinary talent for diplomacy and global management. The picture is about as plausible as the tales of Ronald Reagan, the Great Communicator, who initiated a modern revolution -- a construction quickly put to rest when this pathetic figure was no longer useful, and it could be conceded that he hadn't a thought in his head and was scarcely able to read his lines. With regard to Reagan's successor, the evidence for his consummate skills, to date, reduces to his unquestioned ability to follow the prescriptions of an early National Security Policy Review of his administration, which advised that failure to defeat "much weaker enemies...decisively and rapidly" would be "embarrassing" and might "undercut political support," understood to be thin (Maureen Dowd, _NYT_, Feb. 23, 1991). To reconcile reality with preferred image, there were some gestures towards Bush's allegedly critical role in bringing the August crisis to a successful conclusion. But the efforts were pretty feeble, and lacked spirit. Some, however, deserve credit for trying. Take regular _Boston Globe_ columnist John Silber, the president of Boston University and a likely aspirant to high political office ("Democrats' disarray boosts Bush's apparent invulnerability," _BG_, Sept 1, 1991). Silber repeats the standard doctrine that "the president's skill in dealing with the demise of communism heightens the disarray of the Democratic Party." In particular, "President Bush's handling of the failed coup in the USSR has been masterly. His well-publicized telephone calls to Boris Yeltsin put the United States firmly on the side of the democratic resistance, a position cemented by the shrewd decision to send Ambassador Strauss to Moscow immediately, with instructions to ignore the junta." In the face of such brilliant and imaginative moves on the diplomatic chess board, what can the opposition do but wring its hands in despair? The lack of policy was evident from James Baker's briefing after the coup had collapsed ("Baker's Remarks: Policy on Soviets," _NYT_, Sept. 5, 1991). The Secretary of State presented a "four-part agenda." Three parts were the kind of pieties that speech writers produce while dozing: we want democracy, the rule of law, economic reform, settlement of security problems, etc. One part of the agenda did, however, have a modicum of substance, the third item, on "Soviet foreign policy." Here, Baker focused on his "efforts to convene a peace conference to launch direct negotiations and thereby to facilitate a viable peacemaking process in the Middle East." As _Times_ diplomatic correspondent Thomas Friedman explains in an accompanying gloss, the Soviet Union should "work together with the United States on foreign policy initiatives like Middle East peace." What is of interest here is what was missing. "Soviet foreign policy" does indeed have a role in the Bush-Baker Middle East endeavor. The Soviet role is to provide a (very thin) cover for a unilateral U.S. initiative that may at last realize the U.S. demand, stressed by Kissinger years ago, that Europe and Japan be kept out of the diplomacy of the region. Baker's phrase "direct negotiations" is the conventional Orwellian term for the leading principle of U.S.-Israeli rejectionism: the framework of the "peace process" must be restricted to state-to-state negotiations, effectively excluding the indigenous population and any consideration of their national rights and concerns. They offer no services to U.S. and, accordingly, have no meaningful rights. That is the core principle of the rigid rejectionism that the U.S. has upheld for 20 years in virtual international isolation (apart from both major political groupings in Israel), and now feels that it may be in a position to impose. These matters, however, fail the test of political correctness, and therefore are given no expression in the mainstream. As noted earlier in these columns, even the basic terms of the Baker-Shamir-Peres plan, to which negotiations are restricted, have fallen under this ban. With the USSR gone from the scene, another foreign policy goal may be within reach: "replacement of the Castro regime with one more devoted to the true interests of the Cuban people and more acceptable to the U.S.," a goal that we must achieve "in such a manner as to avoid any appearance of U.S. intervention." These are the words of the March 1960 planning document of the Eisenhower administration that set in motion the subversion and economic warfare sharply escalated by John F. Kennedy and continued by his successors (Jules R. Benjamin, _The United States and the Origins of the Cuban Revolution_, Princeton, 1990, 207). If Washington is to achieve its longstanding goals in the required manner -- avoiding "any appearance of U.S. intervention" -- the ideological institutions must play their part. Crucially, they must suppress the record of aggression, vast campaigns of terror, economic strangulation, cultural quarantine, intimidation of anyone who might seek to disrupt the ban, and the other devices available to the superpower overseer dedicated to "the true interests of the Cuban people." Cuba's plight must be attributed to the demon Castro and "Cuban socialism" alone. They bear full responsibility for the "poverty, isolation and humbling dependence" on the USSR, the _New York Times_ editors inform us (Sept. 8, 1991), concluding triumphantly that "the Cuban dictator has painted himself into his own corner," without any help from us. That being the case, by doctrinal necessity, we should not intervene directly as some "U.S. cold warriors" propose: "Fidel Castro's reign deserves to end in home-grown failure, not martyrdom." Staking their position at the dovish extreme, the editors advise that we should continue to stand aside, doing nothing, watching in silence, as we have been doing for 30 years, so the naive reader would learn from this (quite typical) version of history. The enhanced ability of the U.S. to achieve its goals without deterrence or interference is not exactly welcome news in most of the world. But we are unlikely to hear very much about the trepidations of the Third World over "the breakdown of international military equilibrium which somehow served to contain U.S. yearnings for domination" (Mario Benedetti, _La Epoca_, Chile, May 4, 1991). Nor were we informed of Third World reactions when Dimitri Simes, senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, observed in the _New York Times_ that the "apparent decline in the Soviet threat...makes military power more useful as a United States foreign policy instrument...against those who contemplate challenging important American interests" -- the "threat" being the deterrent to U.S. military power and the support afforded targets of U.S. subversion and violence ("If the Cold War Is Over, Then What?," _NYT_, Dec. 27, 1988). The fears, however, are very real, particularly after the U.S.-U.K. operations in the Gulf. They will be readily understood by anyone who can escape the doctrinal straightjacket. The improved conditions for U.S. subversion and violence do not, however, offer the right note to sound on the occasion of the demise of the official enemy. For reflections on more exalted themes, we may turn to _New York Times_ correspondent Richard Bernstein, who muses on the "New Issues Born From Communism's Death Knell" (_NYT_, Aug. 31, 1991, p. 1). For more than 70 years, Bernstein explains, "the fiercest arguments and the sharpest conflicts among intellectuals" have been "about Marxism-Leninism and social revolution, about the nature of the Soviet Union and about the existence of Communism as a major ideological force in a bipolar world." "The most obvious power exercised by the Soviet Union over the Western mind," he continues, "was its extraordinary power of attraction, its capacity to instill idealistic visions of a new world in which exploitation would be swept away by a tide of revolution." After the appeal of the USSR itself faded, "the debate took on new forms": "from the 1960's to the 1980's, an argument raged...about...countries like China, Ethiopia, Cuba and Nicaragua, which seemed to many on the left to embody the revolutionary virtues admittedly tarnished in the Soviet Union itself." Throughout, the Cold War conflict "had the effect of polarizing the domestic debate" in the U.S. between these two ideological extremes, Harvard Professor Joseph Nye observes. But with "the debate about Communism" losing "its force and centrality," Bernstein asks, "what issues will consume left and right, liberals and conservatives, in the future?" Perhaps the newspapers and journals of opinion will expire, now that the all-consuming issues are dying away, no longer "raging" in their pages. Let us put aside the accuracy of this account of "the left"; and, for the sake of argument, let us also accept the picture of "the arguments and conflicts" that have "polarized the domestic debate" for over 70 years. We now ask a simple question. How has this central debate of the modern era been reflected in the _New York Times_, the Newspaper of Record, dedicated to the highest standards of journalistic integrity, free and open to all shades of thought and opinion? The question has, in fact, been investigated, beginning with the classic 1920 study of _Times_ coverage of the Bolshevik revolution by Walter Lippmann and Charles Merz, who demonstrated that it was "nothing short of a disaster...from the point of view of professional journalism," merely vulgar jingoism and subservience to the state both in editorial policy and in the news columns that this policy "profoundly and crassly influenced." Moving to the present, there has been extensive study of _Times_ coverage of the "raging" issue of Nicaragua, demonstrating that the Lippmann-Merz critique remains quite accurate. News coverage was, as usual, "profoundly and crassly influenced" by the doctrine of service to state power that defines the editorial stance. Even columns and op-eds were restricted, with startling uniformity, to the politically correct doctrine that the Sandinista curse must be expunged and Nicaragua restored to the "regional standards" of such more acceptable models as El Salvador and Guatemala. In the years between, the record is much the same as in these two extraordinary cases. Not every topic has been investigated. Thus, I do not know of studies of _Times_ coverage of the "raging debate" over the revolutionary virtues of Ethiopia or of _Times_ expositions of the "extraordinary power of attraction" of Marxism-Leninism and its "capacity to instill idealistic visions" of revolution and utopia. Even if we translate these rhetorical flights to something resembling reality, however, we know exactly what we will discover about just how open the Newspaper of Record has been to debate, discussion, even inconvenient fact. In brief, for more than 70 years the _New York Times_ (hardly alone, of course) and state-corporate power have marched in impressive unison. Now, hearing "Communism's Death Knell," it is permissible to concede that there were some burning issues, though not to present them in a sane and meaningful form. And it must pass entirely without notice, not even a faint flicker of recognition, that the real issues have been virtually excluded from the doctrinal system. It's an intriguing performance. The "death knell" of Soviet tyranny has indeed sounded, though what takes its place may also not be too pleasant to behold. But Stalinist values remain alive and well, and the cultural commissars have no end of work ahead of them. Sincerely, Noam Chomsky