Meanwhile, Around the World

EDITORIAL, 12 Dec 2016

#458 | Johan Galtung

Quite a lot is happening.  NYT (11 Dec 2016): President-Elect Trump made Carrier keep 1,000 factory jobs in Indianapolis, not “trading” to Mexico; and canceled the Boeing contract for a new Air Force One.

Three Trump Upper Class challenges:  Solidarity with the working class; a foreign policy based less on war and more on negotiation; and a new tax code (USA has the longest in the world, feeding highly paid law firms with loopholes). Trump wants jobs, and infrastructure.

There are also non-events: no Trump apologies to the groups he offended grotesquely in the campaign: non-whites, women, immigrants particularly Mexicans.  And the old campaigner Trump is still alive.

Trumps’s focus on USA-Russia cooperation from the American to the Bolshevik revolutions, and now on the coming century, is brilliant and intellectual in an anti-intellectual USA. While US media and their copycats all over are still fighting the election for Clinton.

Ian Buruma “The End of the Anglo-American Order”, The New York Times Magazine (29 Nov 2016), praises the post-world war “vision of democracy and freedom”. There is something to that.  But only as long as they voted correctly; not for Allende in Chile, Muslims in Algeria, for Brexit in UK (“U.S. loses direct link to Continent”, NYT 28 Jun 2015), for Duterte in the Philippines (with anti-drug atrocities) leaning away from the USA toward an Asian neighbor, China, for Erdögan in Turkey (with neo-Ottoman warfare) leaning away from the USA toward a European neighbor, Russia.  And worst of all: not for Trump in the USA.

In this lengthy article not a word on the USA, assisted by the UK, killing more than 20 million in 37 countries after WWII. Or on 54% of the US Spending Budget allocated to the military and 46% shared among 11 sectors–none more than 6%.  Very many words on Trump, with incredible arrogance not even checking what he does[i]. Be careful because Trump is smart. We will soon see who outsmarts whom.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, leading US intellectual and Supreme Court associated jurist, addressing the Harvard 1895 graduating class on “The Purpose of War Is to Die for One’s Country”, The Soldier’s Faith:

“–the faith is true and adorable which leads a soldier to throw away his life in obedience to a blindly accepted duty, in a cause which he little understands, in a plan of campaign of which he has little notion, under tactics of which he does not see the use”.

Holmes thinks he understands cause, plan and tactics, but does not understand that he blindly accepts them, willing to use the soldiers’ blindness for his own. Maybe they should have thrown away his life?

120 years later, Hillary Clinton will not throw away US soldiers’ lives but those of the “enemy”, soldiers or civilians, any numbers. One belligerence exchanged for the other; no democracy, nor freedom.  Even The Nation endorsed her, blind to her massive privatized killing.

Move to The Hague, “The ICTY[ii]‘s Surprise Ruling: Hague Tribunal Exonerates Slobodan Milosevic for Bosnia War Crimes Ten Years Too Late” (18 Jul 2016) seems to have passed unnoticed. Karadzic, not surprisingly, sentenced to 40 years, but the exoneration was too contrary to Western media pre-judgment.

Move to “Panama: The Hidden Trillions” (The New York Review of Books, 17 Oct 2016).  The conclusion of 400+ journalists working on 2.6 terabytes of information is very clear: “We pay tax, but they don’t pay tax. The burden of taxation has moved inexorably away from multinational companies and rich people to ordinary people”.

Fast forward to “Palestinians Demand UK Apology for Balfour Declaration (Al Jazeera 1 Nov 2016)–as parliamentary petition.  With 100,000 signatures the British Parliament must consider debating the subject.  The “Jewish Homeland” Declaration has a prescient clause:

“–understood that nothing shall be done that prejudices the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status of Jews in any other country”.

Both premises are broken. Does the UK have enough wisdom to apologize and yet stand by an Israel compatible with international law; 242, &c?

Move to Palmyra, reconquered by IS?  Could Trump negotiate, rather?

Move to Saudi Arabia, to Mohammed Alyanya “Don’t Link ‘Wahhabism’ to Terrorism” (NYT 19 Oct 2016). Wahhabism, like Salafism, praised Islam as practiced by the Prophet as Medina ruler; the overwhelming majority is not violent. We add: in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia violence is more mundane, to preserve a Kingdom split down the middle.

Move to Ukraine: Arve Meisingset – “Massiv feilinformasjon om Ukraina”–Massively Wrong Information On Ukraine” (NY TID 17 Nov 2016). The coup against the Orthodox-Ukraine President was on 22 Feb 2014; on 1 Aug Paul Picard, head of the OSCE observers in Don-bass, Donetsk said he had seen no Russian troops or weapons. The Uniate (Catholic) policy is ethnic cleansing, and many left for Russia. The fighting in Ukraine is in the Orthodox part, headed by Uniate-Ukraine president Poroshenko, now only supported by 5.9% of the voters.

Fast forward to USA-Russia.  The Russians fear that NATO at its border is a secret Operation Barbarossa (Hitler’s failed invasion 22 June 1941) because (points made by many, among them Leo Semashko):

  • Deployment of NATO nuclear weapons on Russia’s Western border.
  • Obama’s intent to spend US$1 trillion on nuclear arms next decade.
  • A US doctrine which allows the first use of nuclear weapons.

All waiting for Hillary Clinton.  But then came Trump. They hate him.

Afghanistan: Robert Fisk, “The invasion of Afghanistan 15 years ago was an arrogant, wretched adventure that caused a migrant crisis“, The Independent 7 Oct 2016. Geopolitical Futures, Kamran Bokhari: “Afghan Government Staring at the Abyss” 10 Oct 2016–“Kabul is unlikely to defeat the Taliban even after investing 15 years and over a $ 100 billion”. Better not talk about it. (NYT, 21 Sep 2016).

Norway: “We love America-We hate Russia-America hates Russia”, balanced, made elites change their military doctrine to attack Russia. Then “We love America-We hate Russia-America loves Russia”, dissonant. After a period hating Trump-America, Norway will accept Russia, and Störe’s Norwegian Labor Party will win the 2017 elections on that basis.

____________________________________

NOTES:

[i]. For a very knowledgeable overview of Trump’s policies, yet very critical of him as a person, see William Blum, The Anti-Empire Report #147, Nov 30 2016.

[ii]. The International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.

___________________________________________

Johan Galtung, a professor of peace studies, dr hc mult, is founder of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace, Development and Environment and rector of the TRANSCEND Peace University-TPU. Prof. Galtung has published 1670 articles and book chapters, over 450 Editorials for TRANSCEND Media Service, and 167 books on peace and related issues, of which 41 have been translated into 35 languages, for a total of 135 book translations, including ‘50 Years-100 Peace and Conflict Perspectives,’ published by the TRANSCEND University Press-TUP.


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23 Responses to “Meanwhile, Around the World”

  1. Leejah Singh says:

    Dear Mr Galtung

    This sentence: “In this lengthy article not a word on the USA, assisted by the UK, killing more than 20 million in 37 countries after WWII” seem to be quite often repeated (and ferosiously discussed) in this site. I haven’t been able to get to the bottom of it or check its validity. What is the original source for the figure and tabulation?

    • Werner T. Meyer says:

      You are not authorized to link to http://www.indiansceptic.in/ behind your name.

      Yours
      Werner T. Meyer

    • How many people has the US empire killed says:

      Leejah Singh do you know how to use the google SITE search function?
      If no: google it. Then apply it here. Over the pst 8 years, Prof. Galtung has posted this number numerous times and included his references. Three of them are:
      -William Blum
      -John Stockwell
      -James Lucas

      Though obviously Galtung prefers to stick to the maximalist scale he is on to something. And whether the data in the end is 5 or 10 million souls apart, and whether the atrocities are executed directly or indirectly by proxy agents and governments or not, the problem remains: WTF? is going on with this international stance of indifference and impunity towards US sanctioned killing, harming, maiming, subreptitious undermining of autonomy and selfrule all over this planet?

      I am very sceptical of criticism against anything. I am sceptical about scepticism.

      But if you have never read the words “unified combattant command” or have never read let us say 60 pages about their track record, I strongly urge you to do so and THEN come back to discuss this matter. I don’t care whether you pick a pro or contra source. Just read about their work.

    • Kweshun More says:

      Leejah Singh do you know how to use the google SITE search function?
      If no: google it. Then apply it here. Over the pst 8 years, Prof. Galtung has posted this number numerous times and included his references. Three of them are:
      -William Blum
      -John Stockwell
      -James Lucas

      Though obviously Galtung prefers to stick to the maximalist scale he is on to something. And whether the data in the end is 5 or 10 million souls apart, and whether the atrocities are executed directly or indirectly by proxy agents and governments or not, the problem remains: WTF? is going on with this international stance of indifference and impunity towards US sanctioned killing, harming, maiming, subreptitious undermining of autonomy and selfrule all over this planet?

      I am very sceptical of criticism against anything. I am sceptical about scepticism.

      But if you have never read the words “unified combattant command” or have never read let us say 60 pages about their track record, I strongly urge you to do so and THEN come back to discuss this matter. I don’t care whether you pick a pro or contra source. Just read about their work.

      • Leejah Singh says:

        Dear Mr More

        There is no need for you to be angry or dismissive. It does little to impress and even less to convince.

        I asked specifically for the orginal source for the figure because it has been used and discussed so many times, also with indirect sources, but without a clear original source. You may have a better overview than me, but then why not just provide the data and source?

        My interest is if these figures are in fact (maximalist or not) rooted in facts or not. Given that Mr Galtung has a peculiar ideological tendency to minimize non-US (and in general non-Israel/non-West) crimes and maximize the other way around, and given that Mr Galtung is using very specific figures, questions about the validity and quality of his claim cannot be dismissed. In particular I’m interested if this includes figures from the Indian-Pakistan wars (as it seem to do), as it cannot “maximize” the US responsibility without minimizing others. A “maximalist” approach to US crimes will invariably also have a “minimalist” effect with regard to other parties and hence distort the reality.

        There may be certain reasons for ideological maximizing and minimizing a particular parts responsibilites for crimes, but that is still bias, and bias is the enemy of science.

        I don’t really care what you think of scepticism. That is your own problem. I care about science and to minimize fraud, bias and other falsehoods in journalism, history and science in general. If you don’t then don’t bother yourself with it.

      • Kweshun More says:

        A Non Sequitur if I ever saw one:

        Quote: “A “maximalist” approach to US crimes will invariably also have a “minimalist” effect with regard to other parties and hence distort the reality.”

        I get your points. Onlythe man himself can answer your questions.

      • Jon Haas says:

        Lol – what an incredible pile of s***. “Maximalist scale” is just another word for “lie”. Mr galtung is lying but his supporters dont give a damn. For them the man’s ideology trumps reality. No wonder his brainwashed fans hate criticism and scepticism.

      • Thomas Krogh says:

        Kweshun

        “Though obviously Galtung prefers to stick to the maximalist scale he is on to something”

        Wut?? Thats a very novel use of the term “maximalist scale”. Galtung is counting even the poor Hungarians crushed under Soviet tanks in ’56 as US-responsible losses.

        There is a (few) brilliant take-down(s) of Galtungs inane lies here. Enjoy! :-)

        https://www.quora.com/Is-this-statistic-correct-claiming-U-S-has-killed-over-20-million-people-mainly-non-combative-since-WW2

  2. Jon Haas says:

    No Russian troops in Ukraine? Sorry to break it for you mr Galtung but even the Russian themselves admitted it.

    Why are you so uncritical when Russia calls? I don’t think you are on Putins payroll but you really REALLY suck up to him at every given moment…

  3. Jon Haas says:

    leejah

    Mr galtungs figures are from the pro-russian and anti-semitic site globalresearch:

    http://www.globalresearch.ca/us-has-killed-more-than-20-million-people-in-37-victim-nations-since-world-war-ii/5492051

    And as you will see from the list he is counting a long list of wars where the us responsibility is less than obvious. To put it politly. But mr galtung is just doing as every other manipulator gas done down the years. Used lies to bolster his weak arguments. Mr galtung is just another politician with a smiling mask.

    • Frank Tawk says:

      Dear Jon Hass,

      Reading helps greatly I am told! The question of course is whether one is blessed with brain cells.

      Galtung has repudiated both antisemitism and islamophobia regularly.
      https://www.prio.org/utility/Download.ashx?x=531

      • Jon Haas says:

        Oh the famous me galtung use antisemitic and pro-putin conspiracy sites but tries to absolve himself by proclaming he is not really a anti-semite. How very very very convincing.

  4. Jon Haas says:

    Meyer -> which of the links in the sourced Forbes article did you check?

    None? Well then you are a galtung-follower. Ignoring the facts in order to kiss Putin’s ass.

  5. Werner T. Meyer says:

    I am not on speaking terms with this gentleman

    Werner T. Meyer

    • Jon Haas says:

      Of course not. He is exposing mr galtungs lies and that is not kosher. Mr galtung is supposed to be as infallible as his idol mr putin so critical thinking is not permitted.

      • Internet Troll:

        A person, usually operating under a pseudonym, who posts deliberately provocative messages to a newsgroup or message board with the intention of provoking maximum disruption and argument. They are often paid by nefarious sources but sometime are motivated to do so for their own amusement. They often try to provoke dissension and doubt by writing dis-informational comments to the editor and/or other participants in a given discussion.

      • Thomas Krogh says:

        Jon

        Disagreeing or criticizing Galtung will earn you the moniker “troll” on this site.

        And if you dare to diagree and criticize Galtung and provide facts and evidence against him, you will be labelled “paid troll”.

        Get used to it. :-D

  6. Per-Stian says:

    More trolling and name calling than usual this week.

    God Jul.