Normalizing Nukes, Pentagon-Style

Rajan Menon

If you’re having trouble sleeping thanks to, well, you know who… you’re not alone. But don’t despair. A breakthrough remedy has just gone on the market.  It has no chemically induced side effects and, best of all, will cost you nothing, thanks to the Department of Defense.  It’s the new Nuclear Posture Review, or NPR, among the most soporific documents of our era.  Just keeping track of the number of times the phrase “flexible and tailored response” appears in the 75-page document is the equivalent of counting (incinerated) sheep.  Be warned, however, that if you really start paying attention to its actual subject matter, rising anxiety will block your journey to the slumber sphere.

Threats Galore

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute estimates that the United States devoted $611 billion to its military machine in 2016. That was more than the defense expenditures of the next nine countries combined, almost three times what runner-up China put out, and 36% of total global military spending. Yet reading the NPR you would think the United States is the most vulnerable country on Earth.  Threats lurk everywhere and, worse yet, they’re multiplying, morphing, becoming ever more ominous.  The more Washington spends on glitzy weaponry, the less secure it turns out to be, which, for any organization other than the Pentagon, would be considered a terrible return on investment.

The Nuclear Posture Review unwittingly paints Russia, which has an annual military budget of $69.2 billion ($10 billion less than what Congress just added to the already staggering 2018 Pentagon budget in a deal to keep the government open), as the epitome of efficient investment, so numerous, varied, and effective are the “capabilities” it has acquired in the 17 years since Vladimir Putin took the helm.  Though similar claims are made about China and North Korea, Putin’s Russia comes across in the NPR as the threat of the century, a country racing ahead of the U.S. in the development of nuclear weaponry.  As the Washington Post’s Glenn Kessler has shown, however, that document only gets away with such a claim by making 2010 the baseline year for its conclusions.  That couldn’t be more chronologically convenient because the United States had, by then, completed its latest wave of nuclear modernization.  By contrast, during the decade after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia’s economy contracted by more than 50%, so it couldn’t afford large investments in much of anything back then.  Only when oil prices began to skyrocket in this century could it begin to modernize its own nuclear forces.

The Nuclear Posture Review also focuses on Russia’s supposed willingness to launch “limited” nuclear strikes to win conventional wars, which, of course, makes the Russians seem particularly insidious.  But consider what the latest (December 2014) iteration of Russia’s military doctrine actually says about when Moscow might contemplate such a step: “The Russian Federation reserves the right to use nuclear weapons in response to the use of nuclear and other types of weapons of mass destruction against it and/or its allies, and also in the case of aggression against the Russian Federation with the use of conventional weapons when the very existence of the state is in jeopardy.”

Reduced to its bare bones this means that countries that fire weapons of mass destruction at Russia or its allies or threaten the existence of the Russian state itself in a conventional war could face nuclear retaliation.  Of course, the United States has no reason to fear a massive defeat in a conventional war — and which country would attack the American homeland with nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons and not expect massive nuclear retaliation? 

Naturally, the Nuclear Posture Review also says nothing about the anxieties that the steady eastward advance of NATO — that ultimate symbol of the Cold War — in the post-Soviet years sparked in Russia or how that shaped its military thinking.  That process began in the 1990s, when Russian power was in free fall.  Eventually, the alliance would reach Russia’s border.  The NPR also gives no thought to how Russian nuclear policy might reflect that country’s abiding sense of military inferiority in relation to the United States.  Even to raise such a possibility would, of course, diminish the Russian threat at a time when inflating it has become de rigueur for liberals as well as conservatives and certainly for much of the media.

Strangelove Logic

Russian nuclear weapons are not, however, the Nuclear Posture Review’s main focus.  Instead, it makes an elaborate case for a massive expansion and “modernization” of what’s already the world’s second largest nuclear arsenal (6,800 warheads versus 7,000 for Russia) so that an American commander-in-chief has a “diverse set of nuclear capabilities that provide… flexibility to tailor the approach to deterring one or more potential adversaries in different circumstances.”

The NPR insists that future presidents must have advanced “low-yield” or “useable” nuclear weapons to wield for limited, selective strikes.  The stated goal: to convince adversaries of the foolishness of threatening or, for that matter, launching their own limited strikes against the American nuclear arsenal in hopes of extracting “concessions” from us.  This is where Strangelovian logic and nuclear absurdity take over.  What state in its right mind would launch such an attack, leaving the bulk of the U.S. strategic nuclear force, some 1,550 deployed warheads, intact?  On that, the NPR offers no enlightenment.

You don’t have to be an acolyte of the Prussian military theorist Carl von Clausewitz or have heard about his concept of “friction” to know that even the best-laid plans in wartime are regularly shredded.  Concepts like limited nuclear war and nuclear blackmail may be fun to kick around in war-college seminars.  Trying them out in the real world, though, could produce disaster.  This ought to be self-evident, but to the authors of the NPR it’s not.  They portray Russia and China as wild-eyed gamblers with an unbounded affinity for risk-taking.

The document gets even loopier.  It seeks to provide the commander-in-chief with nuclear options for repelling non-nuclear attacks against the United States, or even its allies.  Presidents, insists the document, require “a range of flexible nuclear capabilities,” so that adversaries will never doubt that “we will defeat non-nuclear attacks.”   Here’s the problem, though: were Washington to cross that nuclear Rubicon and launch a “limited” strike during a conventional war, it would enter a true terra incognita.  The United States did, of course, drop two nuclear bombs on Japanese cities in August 1945, but that country lacked the means to respond in kind.

However, Russia and China, the principal adversaries the NPR has in mind (though North Korea gets mentioned as well), do have just those means at hand to strike back.  So when it comes to using nuclear weapons selectively, its authors quickly find themselves splashing about in a sea of bizarre speculation.  They blithely assume that other countries will behave precisely as American military strategists (or an American president) might ideally expect them to and so will interpret the nuclear “message” of a limited strike (and its thousands of casualties) exactly as intended.  Even with the aid of game theory, war games, and scenario building — tools beloved by war planners — there’s no way to know where the road marked “nuclear flexibility” actually leads.  We’ve never been on it before.  There isn’t a map.  All that exists are untested assumptions that already look shaky.

Yet More Nuclear Options

These aren’t the only dangerous ideas that lie beneath the NPR’s flexibility trope.  Presidents must also, it turns out, have the leeway to reach into the nuclear arsenal if terrorists detonate a nuclear device on American soil or if conclusive proof exists that another state provided such weaponry (or materials) to the perpetrator or even “enabled” such a group to “obtain nuclear devices.”  The NPR also envisions the use of selective nuclear strikes to punish massive cyberattacks on the United States or its allies.  To maximize the flexibility needed for initiating selective nuclear salvos in such circumstances, the document recommends that the U.S. “maintain a portion of its nuclear forces alert day-to-day, and retain the option of launching those forces promptly.”  Put all this together and you’re looking at a future in which nuclear weapons could be used in stress-induced haste and based on erroneous intelligence and misperception.

So while the NPR’s prose may be sleep inducing, you’re unlikely to nod off once you realize that the Trump-era Pentagon — no matter the NPR’s protests to the contrary — seeks to lower the nuclear threshold.  “Selective,” “limited,” “low yield”: these phrases may sound reassuring, but no one should be misled by the antiseptic terminology and soothing caveats.  Even “tactical” nuclear weapons are anything but tactical in any normal sense.  The bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki might, in terms of explosive power, qualify as “tactical” by today’s standards, but would be similarly devastating if used in an urban area.  (We cannot know just how horrific the results would be, but the online tool NUKEMAP calculates that if a 20-kiloton nuclear bomb, comparable to Fat Man, the code name for the bomb dropped on Nagasaki, were used on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, where I live, more than 80,000 people would be killed in short order.)  Not to worry, the NPR’s authors say, their proposals are not meant to encourage “nuclear war fighting” and won’t have that effect.  On the contrary, increasing presidents’ options for using nuclear weapons will only preserve peace.

The Obama-era predecessor to Trump’s Nuclear Posture Review contained an entire section entitled “Reducing the Role of U.S. Nuclear Weapons.” It outlined “a narrow set of contingencies in which such weaponry might still play a role in deterring a conventional or CBW [chemical or biological weapons] attack against the United States or its allies and partners.”  So long to that.

The Shopping List — and the Tab

Behind the new policies to make nuclear weapons more “useable” lurks a familiar urge to spend taxpayer dollars profligately.  The Nuclear Posture Review’s version of a spending spree, meant to cover the next three decades and expected, in the end, to cost close to two trillion dollars, covers the works: the full nuclear “triad” — land-based ballistic missiles, submarine-launched ones, and nuclear-armed strategic bombers.  Also included are the nuclear command, control, and communication network (NC3) and the plutonium, uranium, and tritium production facilities overseen by the National Nuclear Security Administration.

The upgrade will run the gamut.  The 14 Ohio-class nuclear submarines, the sea-based segment of the triad, are to be replaced by a minimum of 12 advanced Columbia-class boats.  The 400 Minuteman III single-warhead, land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles, or ICBMs, will be retired in favor of the “next-generation” Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent, which, its champions insist, will provide improved propulsion and accuracy — and, needless to say, more “flexibility” and “options.”  The current fleet of strategic nuclear bombers, including the workhorse B-52H and the newer B-2A, will be joined and eventually succeeded by the “next-generation” B-21 Raider, a long-range stealth bomber.  The B-52’s air-launched cruise missile will be replaced with a new Long Range Stand-Off version of the same.   A new B61-12 gravity bomb will take the place of current models by 2020.  Nuclear-capable F-35 stealth fighter-bombers will be “forward deployed,” supplanting the F-15E.  Two new “low-yield” nuclear weapons, a submarine-launched ballistic missile, and a sea-launched cruise missile will also be added to the arsenal.

Think of it, in baseball terms, as an attempted grand slam.

The NPR’s case for three decades of such expenditures rests on the claim that the “flexible and tailored” choices it deems non-negotiable don’t presently exist, though the document itself concedes that they do.  I’ll let its authors speak for themselves: “The triad and non-strategic forces, with supporting NC3, provide diversity and flexibility as needed to tailor U.S. strategies for deterrence, assurance, achieving objectives should deterrence fail, and hedging.”  For good measure, the NPR then touts the lethality, range, and invulnerability of the existing stock of missiles and bombers.  Buried in the review, then, appears to be an admission that the colossally expensive nuclear modernization program it deems so urgent isn’t necessary.

The NPR takes great pains to demonstrate that all of the proposed new weaponry, referred to as “the replacement program to rebuild the triad,” will cost relatively little.  Let’s consider this claim in wider perspective.

To obtain Senate ratification of the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty he signed with Russia in 2010, the Nobel Prize-winning antinuclear advocate Barack Obama agreed to pour $1 trillion over three decades into the “modernization” of the nuclear triad, and that pledge shaped his 2017 defense budget request.  In other words, President Obama left President Trump a costly nuclear legacy, which the latest Nuclear Posture Review fleshes out and expands.  There’s no indication that the slightest energy went into figuring out ways to economize on it.   A November 2017 Congressional Budget Office report projects that President Trump’s nuclear modernization plan will cost $1.2 trillion over three decades, while other estimates put the full price at $1.7 trillion.

As the government’s annual budget deficit increases — most forecasts expect it to top $1 trillion next year, thanks in part to the Trump tax reform bill and Congress’s gift to the Pentagon budget that, over the next two years, is likely to total $1.4 trillion — key domestic programs will take big hits in the name of belt-tightening.  Military spending, of course, will only continue to grow.  If you want to get a sense of where we’re heading, just take a look at Trump’s 2019 budget proposal (which projects a cumulative deficit of $7.1 trillion over the next decade).  It urges big cuts in areas ranging from Medicare and Medicaid to the Environmental Protection Agency and Amtrak.  By contrast, it champions a Pentagon budget increase of $80 billion (13.2% over 2017) to $716 billion, with $24 billion allotted to upgrading the nuclear triad.

And keep in mind that military cost estimates are only likely to rise.  There is a persistent pattern of massive cost overruns for weapons systems ordered through the government’s Major Defense Acquisition Program (MDAP).  These ballooned from $295 billion in 2008 to $468 billion in 2015.  Consider just two recent examples: the first of the new Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carriers, delivered last May after long delays, came in at $13 billion, an overrun of $2.3 billion, while the program to produce the F-35 jet, already the most expensive weapons system of all time, could reach $406.5 billion, a seven percent overrun since the last estimate.

Flexibility Follies

If the Pentagon turns its Nuclear Posture Review into reality, the first president who will have some of those more “flexible” nuclear options at his command will be none other than Donald Trump.  We’re talking, of course, about the man who, in his debut speech to the United Nations last September, threatened to “totally destroy” North Korea and later, as the crisis on the Korean peninsula heated up, delighted in boasting on Twitter about the size of his “nuclear button.”   He has shown himself to be impulsive, ill informed, impervious to advice, certain about his instincts, and infatuated with demonstrating his toughness, as well as reportedly fascinated by nuclear weapons and keen to see the U.S. build more of them.  Should a leader with such traits be given yet more nuclear “flexibility”?  The answer is obvious enough, except evidently to the authors of the NPR, who are determined to provide him with more “options” and “flexibility.”

At least three more years of a Donald Trump presidency are on the horizon.  Of this we can be sure: other international crises will erupt, and one of them could pit the United States not just against a nuclear-armed North Korea but also against China or Russia.  Making it easier for Trump to use nuclear weapons isn’t, as the Nuclear Posture Review would have you believe, a savvy strategic innovation.  It’s insanity.

Microfinance or Debt Trap? What The Poor Don’t Know

Moin Qazi

Microfinance continues to thrive despite being under fire from legions of critics. One plausible reason for the lingering faith in the power of microfinance is that it provides a convenient strategy for investors to demonstrate that they are active fighters against poverty and are trying to save the poor while making a substantial amount of money from them. It is built on a false belief that credit is the most vital need of the marginalised. One of those who has thoroughly studied the phenomenon, Thomas Dichter, says the idea that microfinance allows its recipients to graduate from poverty to entrepreneurship is inflated.

He sketches out the dynamics of microcredit: “It emerges that the clients with the most experience started using their own resources, and though they have not progressed very far—they cannot because the market is just too limited, they have enough turnover to keep buying and selling, and probably would have it with or without the microcredit. For them, the loans are often diverted to consumption since they can use the relatively large lump sum of the loan, a luxury they do not come by in their daily turnover.” He concludes that,“Definitely, microfinance has not done what the majority of microfinance enthusiasts claim it can do—function as capital aimed at increasing the returns to a business activity.”

Microfinance has come under increasing scrutiny in recent months. Stories of astronomical interest rates driving the poor deeper into poverty, compounded by tales of malicious moneylenders intimidating borrowers to the point of suicide, have recently come to light in the international press, exposing fundamental flaws in the design of institutional for-profit microfinance.

Not only are borrowers often innumerate, illiterate and unfamiliar with interest rate calculations, but they frequently have little or no awareness of local demand for goods and services. Consequently, they often fail to establish successful income-generating ventures and therefore cannot repay their loans.

Microfinance, including microcredit, is often considered to be an instrument that promotes empowerment. While it can stabilise livelihoods, broaden choices, provide start-up funds for productive investment, help poor people to smooth consumption flows and send children to school, it can also lead to indebtedness and increased exclusion unless programmes are well designed.

Debt can both unlock you and lock you. Debt is one thing that has both the greatest promise and, perhaps, also the gravest peril. Debt or credit, the cash that we borrow from lending institutions, exists for a reason .Before you apply for it, you should ask yourself if you have a valid reason for it or you are taking it just because people are lining up the way pollsters queue up for freebies. The second question you should ask yourself is whether it is part of your   financial plan .If it is ,are you sure you are going to get a return higher than what you will be paying for it .This financial return should also cover your own effort that will go into generating that return.

According to Naila Kabeer, Professor of Gender and Development at the London School of Economics, women who have some prior experience of entrepreneurship and are not engaged in it for purely subsistence reasons are likely to benefit greatly from microfinance activities, given the barriers they face in accessing formal financial institutions. But for poorer women who are struggling to get their enterprises on a viable basis, financial services on their own are unlikely to be enough and may even end up plunging them into debt. These women would need financial services as part of a larger package of supportive measures which address their human capital deficits, their unpaid domestic responsibilities and perhaps also lack of self-confidence and fear of taking risks

In the world of microfinance, women borrowers are viewed as autonomous individuals who make independent choices in the marketplace. But this is not the reality. Rural women live in extended family structures. These women’s identities are relational, shaped by factors such as marital kinship, ethnic, and tribal allegiances.They negotiate complex kinship and social obligations.

It’s not surprising to learn, therefore, that in most cases men control the loans that women receive. The men may simply use the money for their own purposes; in addition to male control, other problems affect a woman’s ability to repay a loan. In case of a default, they suffer humiliation and public shame which heightens tension both at home and in the community. Such humiliation of women in a public place gives males in the household and in the lineage a bad reputation. In extreme cases, peers may take the defaulter to the police station. For a man, if he is locked inside the police stations for several days, it would mean almost nothing to other people in the village. But if this happens to a woman, it will bring shame to her household, lineage and village.

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The biggest problem is that people who get these small loans usually start or expand a very simple business. The most common business for microfinance is simple retail—selling groceries, where there are often too many people, fierce competition, and where they don’t really earn enough money to get out of poverty.

We need to create more jobs, and microfinance does not help to do that yet. The debt trap is an under-reported problem. Quite a few people invest money, their business does not make money and goes under, and they are stuck with the debt. The interest rate on this debt, even with a microfinance loan, is quite high, so some are never able to repay it. Another reason why they get into a debt trap is that, in theory, you should take a microloan to invest in the business. But in practice, a lot of people use microloans for a wedding, festival, or to buy something. A lot of these people don’t know how to use debt.

There has been a lot of rethinking in the microfinance fraternity. One of their major premises that have been proved flawed is that credit is   the only important financial need that people have. This seems clear and obvious now, and microfinance organizations are now expanding the range of microfinance offerings. While we must still consider the risks and ethical dilemmas as we  continue to aggressively  push   microcredit , the power of entire range of microfinance services  to help us achieve a more equitable world is becoming increasingly clear.

Several MFIs endorse smart microfinance being espoused by the Smart Campaign but it is important that it is practiced on the ground .What is smart microfinance?    Microfinance industry leaders from around the world came together in 2008 to launch a campaign to establish the Client Protection Principles. These principles are: appropriate product design and delivery, prevention of excessive indebtedness, transparency, responsible pricing, fair and

The principles of smart microfinance are globally recognized as the basis of safe microfinance. They build strong, lasting relationships with clients, increase client retention, and reduce financial risk. When they deliver transparent, respectful, and prudent financial services, financial institutions ensure that their clients use financial services well and build a foundation for healthy operation for years to come

The practical question is not whether microfinance should continue, but how it can play to its   strengths without damaging its social conscience. Before pundits and politicians reduce the questions and solutions posed by the occasional crisis down to sound bites and slogans, we must realise just how positive the effects of microfinance can be, for both financial inclusion and livelihood promotion, if handled correctly.

It may appear that the naysayers are ready to sound the bugle and shout out “the king is dead, long live the king”, but microfinance can redefine itself as a leaner, more modest business with a social conscience and a mission-oriented goal, and continue to be profitable. Although, only time will tell.

UK: Hunger strikers at Yarl’s Wood immigration detention centre

Laura Tiernan

Around 120 detainees at Yarl’s Wood immigration detention centre in Bedfordshire, England are entering the fourth day of a hunger strike, protesting “inhumane” conditions at one of Europe’s largest detention facilities.

The mainly women detainees are demanding an end to indefinite detention, describing “systematic torture” by the Home Office and the private security firm, Serco.

In a statement posted yesterday evening on Twitter, the detainees announced, “After an initial three-day hunger strike where the Home Office refused to acknowledge the hunger strike, it is clear that they are not listening to us. On Monday 26/02/18, we will cease to participate in detention, we will not eat, use their facilities or work for them.”

The hunger strikers launched their action with a handwritten statement last Wednesday, condemning the Home Office for “offensive practices” including violation of habeas corpus.

“The majority of detainees are not detained by a judge,” they wrote. Instead, detainees were presumed guilty and deprived of liberty “by a person” (Serco, which runs the facility), whose “vocational success” is based on “how many people they remove”—a situation they described as an “obvious conflict [and] morally bankrupt.”

Indefinite detention, they wrote, amounted to a form of torture: “At any point an officer could turn up and take your room-mate; you’re constantly on edge, not knowing what will happen next.”

“The UK is the only country in the EU European Union with no time limit on detention,” they noted.

Under Rule 35, an amendment to the Detention Centre Rules 2001, introduced in September 2016, vulnerable adults, including victims of torture, should not be detained, or only as a last resort. But Rule 35 is consistently flouted. “Victims of torture, human trafficking, modern slavery, asylum seekers and sick and disabled people continue to be detained,” they wrote.

On Thursday, detainees issued a list of 15 demands, including right of access to a bail hearing within three to five days (a legal right); the ending of indefinite detention and re-detention; no detention of people who came to the UK as children; and an amnesty for those who have lived in the UK for 10 years or longer.

Many of the Yarl’s Wood detainees have British husbands and children they are prevented from seeing, a situation that infringes their Article 8 rights under the European Convention on Human Rights, the detainees explained, including their right to a “private and family life.”

Detainees condemned slave labour in detention, whereby they are forced into menial work for £1 per hour and have called for an end to forced removal by flights from Britain: “We want an end to charter flights and the snatching of people from their beds in the night and herding them like animals.”

On Friday, Labour’s Shadow Home Secretary Dianne Abbott met with a group of about 30 detainees at Yarl’s Wood, along with shadow attorney general and former human rights lawyer, Shami Chakrabarti. The group included a Nigerian woman who had lived in the UK for 30 years, has five British children, and has been detained for seven months, according to the Guardian. Another woman had been detained for nine months.

“These women were clearly desperate. Indefinite detention, with no release date, is just wrong,” Abbott told journalists. “Many of them are released to the community after spending time at Yarl’s Wood, so why do they need to be in detention?”

Abbott is reported to have responded emotionally to the plight of detainees, but this was political theatrics.

The Labour Party has played a central role in erecting the current punitive regime against immigrant detainees. Yarl’s Wood was opened by the Labour government in September 2001, with control handed to private security contractor, Group 4 Falck. It was one of a number of facilities seen as rich pickings by private contractors who swooped in on lucrative contracts offered up by the Labour government of Tony Blair. Group 4 Falck was replaced by Global Services Limited (GSL) in 2004, and by Serco in 2007. G4S, the world’s largest security company, with a declared net annual income of £220 million, presently delivers “healthcare services” at Yarl’s Wood.

Abbott and Chakrabarti were silent on the real history of Yarl’s Wood, where repeated hunger strikes have taken place over the past 17 years, most of these, again, under Labour.

The first hunger strike by 25 Roma detainees occurred just weeks after the facility opened and another, by ethnic Albanian Gjevat Cerkini, began in December 2001. In July 2005, 30 Ugandan women launched a hunger strike protesting cruel treatment by staff and inadequate healthcare, followed by a hunger strike of 100 women just two years later. In February 2010, a hunger strike against indefinite detention saw around 70 women protestors “locked in an airless corridor without water or toilet facilities,” according to a report at the time by the Guardian.

Beyond Labour’s complicity in the conditions faced by detainees at Yarl’s Wood is the broader anti-immigrant chauvinism the party has helped stoke. During the 2015 general election, Labour pledged to “control immigration,” echoing the campaigns of both the Conservatives and UK Independence Party. The party even issued a red campaign mug, emblazoned with the slogan, “Controls on Immigration. I’m voting Labour.”

The Brexit referendum the following year saw both the Leave and Remain camps promote anti-immigrant measures, with Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn making an explicit connection between uncontrolled immigration and the lowering of wages, echoing the nationalist campaigns led by the trade unions.

Labour’s current manifesto (For the Many Not the Few) calls for a “fair” immigration system, “which is based on our economic needs, balancing controls and existing entitlements.” It states, “We will take decisive actions to end the exploitation of migrant labour undercutting workers’ pay and conditions.”

The manifesto makes no call for the closure of Yarl’s Wood and other immigrant detention centres where men women and children are incarcerated for the sole “crime” of having been born in another country.

Yarl’s Wood is part of a broader system of incarceration of immigrants in the UK. According to the Inspector of Prisons, in the year ending December 2016, 28,908 people entered immigration detention. At any time, more than 3,500 people are in immigration detention in the UK. They are held mainly in one of the nine Immigration Removal Centres, three Short Term Holding Facilities or in prisons. On October 3, 2016, prisons held 442 people detained under immigration powers.

There are currently 60 million refugees worldwide—victims of the endless wars and devastation inflicted by the United States, Britain and other imperialist powers on the peoples of the Middle East and Africa. The anti-immigrant measures promoted by governments throughout Europe and the US are aimed at dividing the working class.

The Socialist Equality Party calls for the immediate closure of all immigration detention centres and upholds the right of all workers and young people to live in the country of their choice, with full citizenship rights and access to welfare, housing, healthcare and education.

South Korean president holds talks with top North Korean officials

Ben McGrath 

South Korean President Moon Jae-in met Sunday with a North Korean delegation that traveled across the Demilitarized Zone to attend the closing ceremony of the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics. The three-day visit takes place as the Trump administration in Washington continues to threaten the impoverished North with complete destruction.

The North’s eight-member delegation is led by Kim Yong-chol, a high-ranking military official and chief for inter-Korean affairs. It includes Choe Kang-il, deputy director-general for North American affairs, responsible for negotiating nuclear issues and diplomacy with the United States.

During Sunday’s meeting, the two sides reportedly discussed the prospects for North Korean-US talks. Moon’s spokesman Kim Eui-gyeom told the media: “President Moon pointed out that US-North Korea dialogue must be held at an early date, even for an improvement in the South-North Korea relationship, and the fundamental resolution of Korean Peninsula issues.”

The response from the visiting Pyongyang officials was positive, according to the spokesman, who said: “The North Korean delegation also agreed that North Korea-US relations must develop along with the South-North Korea relationship while noting (the North) has enough intention to hold North Korea-US dialogue.”

White House press secretary Sarah Sanders quickly issued a noncommittal response, saying: “We will see if Pyongyang’s message today, that it is willing to hold talks, represents the first steps along the path to denuclearization.” The Trump administration has insisted that North Korea show signs that it is committed to giving up its nuclear arsenal before negotiations can start. Last Friday, the US imposed a new round of sanctions and Trump again threatened North Korea with war if it did not denuclearise.

Sunday’s meeting was the second between Moon and high-level figures in the Pyongyang regime in recent weeks. The president earlier met with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s sister, Kim Yo-jong who passed on a letter from her brother calling for an inter-Korean summit. However, Moon ruled out an early meeting, saying on February 17 that people expecting talks soon “might be a little too anxious.”

Moon has also emphasized that the South Korea-US relationship remains “as strong and robust as ever,” reflecting fears in US and South Korean ruling circles that Pyongyang is trying to drive a wedge between the allies. Moon stressed that Trump supports him “100 percent.”

For all the talk of peace during the recent Olympic Games, the Moon administration remains firmly tied to the US alliance. It is trying to balance between its commitments to US imperialism and hopes of exploiting economic relations with China and low-paid labor in the North, all while trying to defuse growing social tensions domestically.

However, Washington has pressed Seoul not to hold talks with Pyongyang. Following in the footsteps of Vice President Mike Pence, Trump’s daughter and advisor Ivanka Trump attended the closing ceremony of the Winter Olympics where she pointedly did not talk to North Korean officials. The official purpose of her four-day trip was to reaffirm the “maximum pressure campaign to ensure that the Korean Peninsula is denuclearized.”

Trump’s administration, like those of George W. Bush and Barack Obama, has regularly scuttled any attempts at diplomacy with Pyongyang. On Friday, Trump announced “the heaviest sanctions ever imposed on a country before.” He warned that if North Korea did not bend to Washington’s will, the next “phase” of US aggression would be “very, very unfortunate for the world.” Pyongyang denounced the sanctions as an act of war.

Despite its bluster at times against the United States, Pyongyang’s main aim is to push for a peace treaty with the US to formally end the Korean War, hoping that would allow access to international markets for its young, emerging capitalist class. In the past, North Korea has offered up its workers as a source of ultra-cheap labor, most notably at the Kaesong Industrial Complex on the border with the South.

Far from preparing to talk, the Trump administration is gearing up for a conflict that would not only destroy North Korea but could draw other major powers such as China and Russia into a world war fought with nuclear weapons.

The US rationale for launching a criminal war of aggression on North Korea—a conflict that would likely kill hundreds of thousands, if not millions, in just the opening days—is the unsubstantiated claim that Pyongyang is only “months away” from obtaining long-range ballistic missiles capable of delivering a nuclear warhead. Even if true, North Korea’s limited nuclear arsenal pales into insignificance compared to the thousands of US nuclear weapons and sophisticated delivery systems at Trump’s disposal to inflict “fire and fury” on North Korea.

The US military build-up and threats against North Korea is part of a far broader strategy aimed against China, which Washington regards as its chief obstacle to global hegemony. Trump is continuing the “pivot to Asia” policy, begun under the Obama administration, aimed at undermining Chinese diplomatic and economic influence in the region, and ultimately preparing for war with Beijing.

In April, massive Foal Eagle/Key Resolve war exercises between the US and South Korea are scheduled to take place. They will undoubtedly raise tensions with the North once again. Hundreds of thousands of troops will participate, likely including those tasked with assassinating key North Korean leaders. South Korean Defense Minister Song Young-moo will join his US counterpart James Mattis to announce plans for the war games before the end of next month.

Fighting continues in Syria after another UN ceasefire

Chris Marsden

Fighting continued in Syria over the weekend despite the latest United Nations Security Council ceasefire resolution that is supposed to allow for the evacuation of Ghouta, the eastern suburb of the capital, Damascus.

The draft resolution urging a 30-day ceasefire throughout Syria was delayed from Thursday to Saturday due to Russian objections. Russia argued that the United States had forced delays by opposing amendments allowing for a continued military offensive against Islamist forces loyal to Islamic State and pro-Al Qaeda groups.

Washington has relied on these forces to wage war against the Syrian government of Bashar al-Assad.

Saturday’s resolution calls on UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres to report back to the council in two weeks on whether the terms of the ceasefire have been implemented. However, not only will the Syrian military campaign continue, but so too will fighting throughout the country.

The ceasefire’s failure will again be attributed to the Assad regime and its main backer, Russia and used to demand a military response by the Western powers. But Syria’s terrible fate has been sealed by the escalating proxy war for its territorial division that has emerged from the civil war instigated by the United States.

Syria continued its Ghouta offensive yesterday, taking advantage of the resolution’s failure to state when the 30-day ceasefire, across the whole of Syria, was meant to begin. The Chief of Staff of Iranian Armed Forces, Maj. Gen. Mohammad Hossein Baqeri, has said that Iran and Syria are committed to the UN ceasefire resolution, but the truce does not cover eastern Ghouta and that “mop-up operations” would continue.

Damascus cannot afford to relent on Ghouta and has put the operation under the control of Assad’s brother Maher and top Colonel Soheil Hassan. Not only does it lie close to the capital, but victory there would clear the path for opposition forces to be routed elsewhere.

Newsweek cited reports that Damascus had a plan to evacuate children under the age of 12, men over the age of 60 and all women via recently established safe passages, while planning “to go on fighting ISIS, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham and their allies.”

The ceasefire doesn’t apply to Syria’s offensive against al-Qaeda-linked groups, as all “individuals, groups, undertakings and entities” associated with ISIS or al-Qaeda have been exempted from the truce.

In any event, the Islamist opposition has no intention of leaving Ghouta and likely couldn’t even if it wanted to. As Syria expert Haid Haid wrote in the Middle East Monitor, “there is no ‘convenient’ exile for its inhabitants.”

The collective hypocrisy over the tragedy of Ghouta cannot conceal the fact that Syria is in the grip of a war that has now claimed 400,000 lives and left the entire country decimated. The brutal struggle for strategic dominance over Syria ensures that the UN resolution will be ignored by all concerned.

Russia’s Permanent Representative to the UN Vassily Nebenzia warned, “We will not countenance any subjective interpretation of the resolution that has just been adopted” and insisted that this meant Turkey must end its operation in Afrin, near the Turkish border.

However, Turkey has made clear that it does not accept any such cessation. Referring to the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), linked to the separatist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), Turkey’s Foreign Ministry said Ankara will “remain resolute in fighting against the terrorist organizations that threaten the territorial integrity and political unity of Syria.”

Above all, Washington will continue its seven years of military violence and political skulduggery aimed at taking control of Syria that has had such devastating consequences.

Amid the UN Security Council discussions, President Donald Trump felt obliged to claim that the only US goal in Syria was to defeat ISIS. This directly contradicted statements made last month by US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson that US war aims include combating Iranian influence and bringing down Assad and that its forces will now be stationed permanently.

Tillerson’s statements followed the unveiling of a new US security doctrine acknowledging that great power rivalries, rather than terrorism, are viewed by Washington as its main national security threat. It also followed a request from the Pentagon for $1.8 billion in arms to wage war in Syria and Iraq—20 percent more than the entire arms budget for Middle East operations in 2017.

Tillerson boasted during a February 13 visit to Kuwait, “The United States and the coalition forces that are working with us to defeat [IS] today control 30 percent of the Syrian territory and control a large amount of [the] population and control a large amount of Syria’s oil fields.”

Moves taken in line with the new US posture have accelerated the conflict in Syria and beyond.

The creation of a 30,000-strong border force for Syria including Kurdish YPG militias prompted Turkey’s launch of “Operation Olive Branch” against Afrin on January 20, which also threatened the Aleppo Governate city of Manbij. Ankara feared that the US was announcing its de facto military backing for a future Kurdish state as a base for the re-division of the region in its interests that would threaten the territorial integrity of Turkey.

The US also greenlighted Israeli bombing raids and missile attacks on Syrian military facilities on February 10 that Tel Aviv made clear were targeted at Iranian personnel. Since then, Israel has threatened to launch military strikes on Lebanon, while escalating demands for action by the US against Iran.

Friday also saw the US announce that it will bring forward to May 14, 2018 the planned relocation of its embassy to Jerusalem. This is the most provocative date imaginable, marking the 70th anniversary of Israel declaring independence and what the Palestinians know as the Naqba, or "day of catastrophe."

Washington’s efforts to preserve its global hegemony are now threatening open conflict with Russia in the Middle East and Europe, as well as with China due to US aggression against North Korea.

In bitter exchanges at the UN Security Council, Nebenzia said of the ceasefire resolution, “The aim of fighting with terrorists should not become a disguise for solving this or that geopolitical issue of doubtful legitimacy, which is exactly what the United States is currently doing in Syria… We insist that the so-called coalition stop its occupational ambitions… we see perfectly well that the propaganda scenario surrounding Eastern Ghouta fully corresponds to the campaign launched during the counter-terrorist operation to liberate East Aleppo in late 2016.”

Potential sparks for broader regional war and direct military conflict between the US and Russia are numerous.

In Afrin, Assad has dispatched pro-government militias to back the YPG against an imminent ground invasion by Turkish troops. Here the US finds itself in a position where its Kurdish ally is allied in turn with pro-Assad forces aligned with Russia. The spread of fighting to Manbij could directly involve US Special Forces.

On February 7, the US launched a devastating attack involving Apache helicopters, an AC-130 Spectre gunship, F-15 fighter jets and artillery batteries on a Syrian column in eastern Deir Ezzor. The Russian government admitted last week that the casualties from the US barrage had included dozens of Russian nationals.

The US media has claimed that the bombing was a response to planned advance by Russian mercenary forces on headquarters of the US-proxy Syrian Democratic Forces, made up overwhelmingly of the YPG militia. The Russian mercenaries were said to be employed by Wagner PMC, which reportedly has as many as 2,500 men in Syria.

Details of the incident remain unclear, and Moscow has so far downplayed the clash. But over the weekend, Russia deployed Su-57 fifth-generation fighters to Syria for the first time, sending a signal that it may retaliate against future US airstrikes.

Devious Ways the Predatory US Food Industry Has Us Paying More for Less

Nayvin Gordon

When shopping at the supermarket, do you believe that your dollars don’t go as far as they used to? Guess what?-You are absolutely right! As we cruise through the supermarket here are some of the ways you may pay more for less.

You’re at the ice cream section looking for your favorite ice cream container –there it is and it’s now a new shape-same price, but look carefully and you will see you are getting 2 ounces LESS. Then there is your olive oil can, it looks almost identical, but it is just a tiny bit smaller, same price, but a few ounces less oil.

Now you go to buy mayonnaise, same size, same price but guess what?-It is less dense, you have some kind of whipped mayonnaise, you just bought more air and less mayonnaise. Next is your favorite Yogurt, look it has a new fancy label, same size same price, but inside the yogurt is not as dense as it used to be. Don’t forget your liquid laundry detergent; remember how it used to be thick like honey? Now it’s the same size and price, but the detergent now flows like water.

What about the vegetables? Well the bunch of red chard now has one less leaf for the same price. The broccoli, yes you pay by the ounce, guess what?- You used to have mostly tops, now you have a big long stem that gets weighed in- you just bought less broccoli tops for the same price.

Here we are at the spice isle- yes, garlic powder. They seem to be out of the large container-347 grams for $12, but they do have one that is 248 grams for $10. Guess what, you end up paying $1.45 more, because the cost per gram has gone up from 3.45 cents to 4.03 cents per gram.

Oh yes, I forgot to buy milk, I don’t have enough money for a one gallon container for $4.50 so let’s buy one half gallon of milk for $3.50—wow that’s 28% more expensive! Now we’re at the checkout and I can’t resist my favorite candy bar. Same price but inside, you guessed it, I find, not one bar but two small bars-less chocolate, and the whole peanuts have been replaced with peanut shavings.

Millions of us are living pay check to pay check. 49 million Americans struggle to put food on the table. Meanwhile, the rapacious US food industry earns billions in profits as they put Profits over People. Hunger stalks the world as the corporations drink fine champagne from the skulls of the hungry.

Arming Educators: Trump, Gun Violence And Schools

Binoy Kampmark

It had been in the works.  Instead of engaging in the traditional revulsion associated with a mass shooting, or even digesting the grief of outraged students and grieving parents, US President Donald Trump’s solution to guns violence was elementary.  To target the perpetrator, it was necessary to arm instructors, mount the barricades, and raise the stakes.

His address of February 15 was hackneyed but drew the lines of barriers and defence.  It was a description of a dysfunctional environment, one further bloodied in the wake of the shootings in Parkland, Florida.  “No child, no teacher, should ever be in danger in an American school.  No parent should ever have to fear for their sons and daughters when they kiss them goodbye in the morning.”

A week later, he had met some of the survivors of the shootings at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, adopting the familiar pose as radical agent of change, a person who would do things differently from his impotent or indifferent predecessors.  At the very least, he would do something.

“I listened to their heartbreaking stories. I asked them for their ideas, and pledged to them that we will take action, unlike, for many years, where people in my position did not take action.  They didn’t take proper action.  They took no action at all.  We’re going to take action.”

In fact, he claimed confidently, work was already being done by his administration to target guns – and criminals. Little distinction here is made between the armed gangs he boastfully targets, or the ill individual who prefers to resort to using weapons in a fit of disturbance.  “So we’re working on getting violent offenders off the streets and guns out of the hands of the dangerous criminals.”  He also promised firmer background checks, the removal of such incidents of the problem as bump stocks.

One of the more telling aspects of Trump’s latest approach to guns is his insistence on how best to deal with the “sick guy” behind the trigger.  Nikolas Cruz had “so many sides” befitting a mental patient. But alas, communities in the United States had taken a stance over the years against the mental institution, citing costs and in some cases the liberty of the patient, as reasons for mass closures.

“So, we’re going to be talking seriously about opening mental health institutions again.  In some cases, reopening.  I can tell you, in New York, the governors in New York did a very, very bad thing when they closed our mental institutions, so many of them.”

Not that Trump is particularly enthused by a model of care and compassion.  The sick of the United States are not to be treated in tender fashion but subjected to something amounting to pseudo-incarceration.  “You have these people living on the streets.  And I can say that, in many cases throughout the country, they’re very dangerous.  They shouldn’t be there.”

And what of the school children themselves?  They would be protected by their guardians and teachers at school, not by discouraging the use of weaponry but encouraging competent armed responses.  Arm, for instance, up to 20 percent of teachers.  Security guards, alone, were inadequate.  They did not, like deputy Scot Peterson of the Broward County Sheriff’s Office, “know” or “love the children”.

This arming strategy would also be selective.  On Friday, the President suggested that not all pedagogues would be anointed with the task, merely those “that have great ability with weaponry, with guns, those are the only people I’m talking about.  They’ll protect the students.”  An environment of true, trigger conscious mayhem.

In this regard, Trump’s proposal is not drawn from a crazed air.  Sponsorship programs in various US states exist encouraging gun loading and training for administrators and teachers.  The phenomenon of the armed educator has taken root in very troubled soil.  FasterColorado does just that in Colorado, a confession that guns are less to be controlled than embraced with care.

Laura Carno, co-founder of Coloradans for Civil Liberties, is one figure Trump speaks to.  It was Carno who, in a brainwave of inspiration, brought the Ohio-based Faculty/Administrator Safety Training and Emergency (FASTER) program to Colorado.  The language of the program is not that of schooling but urban warfare.

In the fantastically grim voice of security public relations, “FASTER training enables teachers, administrators and other school employees to stop school violence quickly and administer medical aid immediately.”

Carno’s sociological vision is primitively fatalistic.  The enemy can be defeated – with force.  “We need to talk about fortifying doors.  We need to talk about a lot of things, but we also need to talk about arming staff, because everything can be defeated.”

For Trump, a crude deterrence theory passes muster.  The person behind the gun is a coward who, on knowing that there are no gun free zones, will resist temptation.  Such apocalyptic scenarios remain the stuff of gun policy in US debates, and suggesting a crude irony at work: to keep people safe, they must be reassured they are in gun zones.

With such a stance, the right to bear harms remains unabridged and unchallenged.  What matters is the mentality behind using them.  Given that such individuals are often broken on inflicting carnage, rational appraisals of deterrence seem weak.  What Trump’s America looks like after the Florida school shootings is a more militant, and militarised space rife with suspicion and pathological insecurity.

Spain: Podemos support plummets after rightward lurch

Paul Mitchell 

Four years ago, in January 2014, the pseudo-left Podemos party was founded in Spain on an anti-austerity programme. It declared itself to be an “electoral war machine” aimed at the “caste” of corrupt Spanish politicians. By the end of that year Podemos was regularly polling around 30 percent of the vote to become the country’s number one party.

Since then support for Podemos has plummeted. In all the polls this year Unidos-Podemos (the alliance between Podemos and the United Left) lies in fourth place (16.5 percent) behind the Popular Party (PP), the Socialist Party (PSOE) and Citizens, which are neck and neck on around 25 percent. Of the 5 million people who voted for the party in the 2016 general election only a half say they will do so again. Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias is considered the worst party leader.

Together with its ongoing programmatic lurch to the right, a major factor in the decline of Podemos has been the experience made by workers and middle-class people with the party in numerous town halls and city halls.

In June 2015 the Podemos-led coalition Now Madrid (Ahora Madrid), led by Manuela Carmena, gained power in the capital ending 24 years of PP rule. Similar victories occurred in other major cities including Barcelona, Valencia and Zaragoza—leading to them being dubbed “municipalities of change” or “rebel councils.” There was talk of a “municipalist front” by various Podemos officials that would use “citizen debt audits” to stop the payment of “illegitimate” debts. Many councils, for example, were paying interest on loans of around 6 percent to banks that were getting money from the European Central Bank at 0.25 percent.

The head of finance at Madrid city council, Carlos Sanchez Mato, a leader of the Pabloite Anticapitalistas faction in Podemos, declared, “The way to fulfil our obligations is to cast aside the spending rule battling until the last stand”—a reference to the European Union requirement, incorporated into Spanish law in 2012, that eurozone members limit their debt to GDP at 60 percent and cap budget deficits at no more than 3 percent.

There was little battling, however, when the stand-off came, and the PP government sought to roll back the limited increase in social spending and investment the Carmena administration had carried out. (At the same time Madrid city council was also shelling out huge amounts to pay off the Madrid debt—some €357 million in just one year, 2016—knowing it, or at least a good chunk of it, was “illegitimate”). Last year PP Finance Minister Cristobal Montoro invoked the Budget Stability Law to demand the council cut €238 million (or 7 percent) from its 2017 budget. Montoro added that until the council complied, the Ministry of Finance would take control of its finances.

Carmena duly capitulated. In November, she announced the first cuts of around €173 million and in December that a new Economic and Financial Plan for the capital that had been passed in the Madrid Assembly with the support of PP councillors had been sent to Montoro.

Carmena revealed that there were people in her own administration “that greatly regret what we’ve done by application of the spending rule,” but made it clear that the council would always toe the line demanded of it by the PP: “I would say that we all regret it and we insist that our interpretation of the spending rule is different, but I think we all know that we have to comply with the norm and that we have to fulfil it ...”

To ensure there was no doubt this was official party policy, Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias declared that it “is logical that the municipalities have to comply” and that the Madrid council will remain a “strong” institution that “will continue to be the benchmark for Madrid and Spain.” He assured everyone that Carmena would be the candidate for mayor again in the next election.

Following Iglesias’s endorsement of Carmena, Anticapitalistas Madrid Assembly member Isabel Serra complained, “To think that we won Madrid only for Carmena is wrong,” warning that “Over the years Podemos has become normalised for a good part of the population, because they consider us to be part of the political class.” Serra then declared, “I believe that, in the face of this, a debate is now taking place not only in the city of Madrid, but also in the whole of the state, which has to do with whether Podemos is part of the restoration of the regime, or if Podemos is positioned outside of the restoration.”

Serra’s attempt to cover for Podemos’ betrayal in Madrid—leaving it as an open question as to whether the party supports the state “regime”—is a graphic example of the role Pabloism has played in blocking the revolutionary upsurge of the working class. Time after time, it has apologised for every shift to the right by Podemos even when its own members are attacked.

During the Catalan referendum crisis last November, the Podemos leadership purged the local Podemos organisation where the Anticapitalistas were the majority current. Podemos had supported the “new Catalan Republic” declared by the Catalan separatists in October in opposition to the official party line endorsing a unified Spain and a “negotiated referendum” on independence. Iglesias said of the Anticapitalistas, “They are politically outside of Podemos.”

Despite all this, the Anticapitalistas continue to peddle the illusion that Podemos can be “reinvigorated” by “social mobilisation” along the lines of the Indignados movement protesting austerity measures in 2011—of which Podemos, set up by a group of Stalinist academics led by Iglesias—was hailed as the ultimate political expression by the Pabloites. A fresh mobilisation “on the streets,” they now insist, would put pressure on the leadership to return to the party’s founding document (largely written by the Anticapitalistas) and all its words about debt cancellation, nationalisation, and membership control—promises Iglesias and his associates had no intention of ever delivering.

Far from encouraging “social mobilisation,” Iglesias has made it clear Podemos is in the business of supposedly capturing the “institutions”—that is, continuing its integration into the political establishment on the basis of Spanish nationalism. He appeals to the ruling elite to adopt a “new plurinational patriotism,” which Podemos would spearhead, to prevent regional conflict and Spain’s disintegration.

Above all, the invocation of patriotism is aimed at preventing the development of any independent working class movement in response to the crisis of Spanish and global capitalism, expressed in the breakdown of Spain’s two-party system. Iglesias insists: “Podemos’ model implies dropping certain complexes and assumptions of the historic left. In particular, our symbols and narrative cannot be based on left-wing revenge for past defeats. For some of us, who are the grandchildren of those who lost the civil war and the children of anti-Franco militants, this can be painful. But it is something we need to recognize.”

In line with its rightward lurch, Podemos has joined forces with the right-wing Citizens party, which has been the main beneficiary of the Catalan crisis, to press for electoral reform. Just last year Iglesias labelled Citizens the new Falange—a reference to the fascist party that operated under the Francoist dictatorship. Now both parties will take part in “constant dialogue” to change the type of proportional representation system used in Spanish elections that is skewed in favour of larger parties, rural voters and the regions.

Under the proposed system the PP would lose 20 seats and the PSOE five, Podemos would increase its 71 seats to 77 and Ciudadanos from 32 seats to 44. Podemos’ secretary of organisation, Pablo Echenique, insisted that Podemos will not “impose any type of red line” that could prevent electoral reform.

US Federal Communications Commission sets end date for net neutrality

Will Morrow

In the latest step in the drive by the US ruling class to censor the Internet, the Federal Communication Commission (FCC) on Thursday published its order abolishing Internet neutrality in the governmental Federal Register, initiating a 60-day countdown for the law to come into force.

The FCC’s ruling represents a far-reaching attack on the democratic rights of the entire population and public access to the Internet. Beginning April 23, multibillion-dollar corporate behemoths, such as Verizon and AT&T, will be free to restrict access to or completely censor Internet sites as they see fit.

On December 14, the FCC voted by a 3-2 margin to overturn the previous characterization of Internet broadband as a public utility under the 1934 Communications Act. This definition required that Internet Service Providers (ISPs) provide customers with the same level of Internet access, regardless of what they were connecting to. Moreover, ISPs could not selectively block or reduce speeds for specific sites or services, and could not create a multi-tiered system by charging users or content providers for higher traffic speeds.

Since the ISPs will not be forced to treat all content the same, they will be able to block web sites and services at their discretion. The claim, promoted by the FCC and its chairman Ajit Pai, that competition between ISPs for market share will prevent such actions ignores the fact that the telecommunications infrastructure is largely monopolized, with four companies controlling 75 percent of all high-speed Internet service. Over half of American households have only one ISP to “choose” from. These corporations are now being handed an incredible power over global communications.

The ISPs will also be able to establish a class-based system of Internet access, including by offering “packages” of Internet content. They may, for example, introduce a premium “Wikipedia package,” charging customers to access Wikipedia, a repository of humanity’s collective knowledge currently accessed by over 400 million people each day, just as cable television networks charge for news and sports.

The FCC’s order, which it first released on January 4, announces this attack on the freedom of expression with the Orwellian title of “Restoring Internet Freedom.” It declares that it is returning to the “light-touch regulatory scheme that enabled the Internet to develop and thrive for nearly two decades.” In fact, the principle of net neutrality had been in de facto operation ever since the public Internet first emerged in the 1990s, and was formally codified by the FCC in 2015 in the face of lobbying by the private ISPs.

The opening of a 60-day window allows for legal challenges against the change. Among the many suits that have already been announced, the private video hosting provider Vimeo and software maker Mozilla yesterday filed a suit against the FCC. Technology giants Google and Facebook announced last month that they would be supporting a legal challenge.

These corporations have opposed the ruling because it threatens their own business interests. Their concern is that the ISPs will be empowered to prioritize their own content with faster Internet speeds, giving them a business advantage over Facebook, Google, Twitter, Netflix and other content providers.

Some Democratic politicians have similarly joined these companies in opposing the ending of net neutrality. Fifty Senate Democrats supported a resolution to overturn the FCC decision that has little chance of passing Congress. Twenty-two state attorneys general have also joined a lawsuit against the FCC by New York Attorney General and Democrat Eric Schneiderman.

Despite the Democrats’ posturing as defenders of net neutrality, the current chair of the FCC, Ajit Pai, who has led the push for ending net neutrality for years, was appointed by Barack Obama to the commission in 2012, and later promoted by Donald Trump in 2017.

In fact, the Democrats, working with the major technology companies and US intelligence agencies, have been at the forefront of the drive to censor the Internet in the name of fighting “Russian meddling” and “fake news.”

On January 12, Facebook announced changes to its news feed that will deprioritize news content for its more than 2 billion users in favour of “personal moments.” It announced on January 19 and January 29 that it is promoting “local” news and content published by “authoritative sources,” meaning pro-government propaganda outlets like the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, as opposed to alternative and independent publications. In April 2017, Google implemented changes to its search ranking algorithms in order to prioritize “authoritative” websites and blacklists left-wing, antiwar and progressive publications, including the World Socialist Web Site .

The New York Times, which has been at the forefront of the Democrats’ campaign to censor the Internet, made clear the aims of this campaign in its editorial published February 22, “Why Americans could believe the worst from Russian trolls.” Developing the Democrats’ unsubstantiated claims that Russia sought to “meddle” in the 2016 elections, the article argued that the Kremlin was successful because it was able to exploit “homegrown” sources of political opposition and dissent.

The inescapable conclusion flowing from this argument is that political opposition is essentially treasonous, and must be censored and suppressed.

Informal EU summit steps up Middle East war threats, attacks on migrants

Alex Lantier 

Yesterday, European Union (EU) heads of state met for what was billed initially as an informal, technical summit in Brussels on EU financing and election procedures. The content of the meeting was very different, however, and far more ominous. EU Council President Donald Tusk’s report makes clear that the summit’s chief business was to discuss EU preparations for major wars.

“We agreed that the EU will spend more on stemming illegal migration, on defence and security, as well as on the Erasmus+ programme,” Tusk declared. This reference to the EU international study program was simply tacked on, however, to give a false veneer of popularity to a summit whose militarist and anti-refugee agenda has no popular support whatsoever.

It discussed military interventions in the Middle East and Africa, and stepped-up measures to keep refugees fleeing these wars from reaching Europe. This highlighted that the plans laid out at this weekend’s Munich Security Conference—devoted to the EU’s attempts to develop as a militarist power increasingly independent from Washington, and led by a Berlin-Paris axis—dominate the EU’s agenda.

Coming after US and Israeli strikes in Syria have killed Russian and Syrian troops and put the entire region on the brink of all-out war, Tusk attacked Moscow, Tehran and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. He said, “The Assad regime is brutally attacking innocent men, women and children. Its backers, Russia and Iran, are allowing this to happen. We urge them to stop this violence.”

This came just a week after President Emmanuel Macron of France, the former colonial power in Syria, called for restoring the draft in France, and bombing Syria over allegations of Syrian use of chemical weapons.

On Thursday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel echoed Macron’s threats in a debate at the Bundestag. “What we see at the moment, the terrible events in Syria, the fight of a regime not against terrorists, but against its own people, the killing of children, the destruction of hospitals, all this is a massacre which has to be condemned,” she said. Despite the rising danger of war between the major powers in the region, Merkel added that the EU should step up pressure on Assad’s main backers, Russia and Iran.

The summit started, however, with a minute of silence for two French officers killed in Mali on Wednesday and a discussion of EU support for France’s neocolonial war in that country. Emilien Mougin and Timothé Dernoncourt were killed and Colonel François-Xavier Héon was wounded when their armored vehicle hit a roadside bomb near Gao and the border with Niger. In response, French Defense Minister Florence Parly boasted gruesomely that French operations had killed 450 people since the war began in 2014.

EU and international donors, mainly Persian Gulf oil sheikdoms, gave €414 million to the so-called G5 Sahel force—made up of troops from the former French African colonies of Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger— that Paris uses as cannon fodder in the war and to keep refugees from reaching Europe.

To deny refugee fleeing their right to seek asylum in Europe, the EU is also helping Italy finance the construction of prison camps in Libya. In these camps, as a recent Amnesty International report found, refugees are tortured, sexually assaulted, and even sold into slavery. Nigerien President Mahamadou Issoufou, who attended the summit, praised it for the financial aid and pledged that his government and states across the region would try to block immigration. “The Sahel is one of Europe’s frontiers. The Sahel is a shield, a dike that must never burst,” he said.

The EU summit also discussed growing border tensions with Turkey, including with Cyprus over gas exploration off its shores, and with Greece after Greek and Turkish vessels collided off an Aegean Sea islet on February 12. Disputes over the islet, known as Imia in Greek and Kardak in Turkish, nearly led the two countries to war in 1996. The Brussels summit heard reports from Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades and Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and unambiguously sided with Cyprus and Greece against Turkey in the disputes.

Tusk declared, “On behalf of all the EU leaders, I would like to express our solidarity with Cyprus and Greece, and urgently call on Turkey to terminate these activities.” He also threatened to call off a planned summit meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan next month in Bulgaria if Turkey did not cease its activities: “We are ready to cooperate with Turkey and will assess at our March European Council whether the conditions are there to hold the Leaders Meeting with Turkey in Varna on 26 March.”

The summit also discussed Brexit. Tusk bluntly warned that the EU was preparing an ultimatum to Britain over EU-British relations after Brexit, declaring: “I will present the draft guidelines on the future EU-UK relationship at the March summit. Our intention is to adopt these guidelines, whether the UK is ready with its vision of our future relations, or not.”

Conflicts are also rising inside the EU over how to resolve the budget shortfall that will result after Brexit and the loss of Britain’s contribution to the EU budget. Several smaller states including the Netherlands and Austria insisted that the shortfall not be made up and demanding that the EU slash subsidies to agriculture and to poorer regions of Europe.

This summit exposes yet again the bankruptcy of the EU. It is already widely unpopular, due to its role in enforcing austerity since its foundation in 1992, and particularly since the 2008 Wall Street crash. Now, after a quarter century of imperialist wars across the Balkans, the Middle East and Africa have turned tens of millions of people into refugees, it is emerging as a militarist Fortress Europe, that responds to growing conflicts across its periphery by preparing major wars with Syria, Iran or even nuclear-armed Russia.

Expectations that the EU could unify capitalist Europe have collapsed after Brexit, moreover, and the escalating international conflicts are tearing the European powers apart. Nor do leading EU officials bother to maintain the fiction that they seek to maintain European unity. Remarkably, Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel decided to host a separate meeting with selected heads of state the evening before the summit, snubbing other EU states including Britain.

At the Château de Val-Duchesse, Michel invited leaders from Germany, France, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Ireland, Bulgaria, Finland, Luxembourg, Poland, Portugal and Slovakia. In the more informal setting with fewer countries represented, one Belgian official told Express, heads of state “can really speak freely and discuss whatever is on their minds.”

Premier Boyko Borisov of Bulgaria, which holds the rotating EU presidency, told journalists the Château de Val-Duchesse gathering was a “regional leadership” meeting. He said they had spoken on a range of Eastern European conflicts, “ranging from Greece through Macedonia, from Serbia to Kosovo, Turkey, Russia, to the dispute between Slovenia and Croatia about the Piran Bay border delimitation.”

He said the Varna summit with Erdogan would be “heavy,” declaring: “If anybody imagines that it’s only a pleasant task to host [EU Commission President Jean-Claude] Juncker, Tusk and Erdogan for dinner, he is probably a newcomer to politics or has no clue. This is an extremely difficult meeting, extremely loaded with expectations and with tensions... I’m far from imagining that we would find agreement on the questions raised, on all of them or on part of them.”