BeezleBlog

Brief Update

2004-07-19T02:15:00.000-05:00

BeezleBlog has been on hold for the last 6 months, mainly because its author has been working intently on a new book. I cannot go into any further detail about it at this point in time.

I sincerely appreciate the supportive e-mails from regular readers, and hope to resume regular blogging soon.

Kissinger and Chile: The Myth That Will Not Die

2003-10-31T16:27:00.000-06:00

Mark Falcoff, political scientist and author of the excellent Modern Chile: A Critical History, has written for this month's issue of Commentary a powerful and authoritative refutation of the falsehoods perpetrated by Christopher Hitchens et al. on the relations of the United States with Allende's Chile. Though not available on the Commentary website, an online version has been helpfully provided by the American Enterprise Institute. Required reading for anyone interested in US foreign policy and modern Latin American history.

Jose Ramos-Horta on Anti-Americanism, Iraq and the Middle East

2003-09-09T00:07:00.000-05:00

A recent interview shows Jose Ramos-Horta is a man worthy of his international reputation.

In from the cold

The idiocy of Ted Rall

2003-08-28T04:30:00.000-05:00

Rall, the twit who thinks Afghanistan was a war for oil, the GOP killed Paul Wellstone, and that crass cartoons attacking widows of WTC victims are funny, speaks (my comments in bold).

TIME TO GET REAL IN IRAQ
Tue Aug 26, 8:04 PM ET

By Ted Rall

Iraqi Resisters are Patriots

Ted Rall

NEW YORK--Nearly 70 percent of Americans tell Newsweek that "the United States will be bogged down in [Iraq (news - web sites)] for years without achieving its goals." Yet 61 percent tell the same poll that invading Iraq was the right thing to do. The reason for this weird disconnect: people think that we're in Iraq to spread democracy and rebuild the Middle East.

The goal was to remove Saddam, thus putting an end to his support for terrorists, amassing of weapons, and oppression of the Iraqi people. All three objectives have been accomplished. There is no disconnect.

They think we're The Good Guys. But the longer we keep patting ourselves on the back, the more we tell ourselves that the Iraqi resistance is a bunch of evil freedom-haters, the deeper we'll sink into this quagmire.

Oh, the -Q- word again. Visions of Vietnam dancing through his head, no doubt. Let's see what he has.

It's time to get real.

Couldn't agree more. We can start by flushing Ted Rall's entire corpus down the toilet.

In war, the side that most accurately sizes up the situation ultimately prevails. In this war in Iraq, our leaders thought the fall of Baghdad meant the end of the conflict.

Untrue. Nearly everyone agreed rebuilding the country would take years.

"Mission accomplished," as the banner behind George W. Bush read on the aircraft carrier. But Saddam understood the truth: the war began with the occupation. Guerilla warfare offered the only way for Iraq's tiny, poorly armed military to resist the U.S.

Precisely. The Baathists cannot win on the field of battle, thus they engage in guerrilla tactics and terrorism. Well spotted, Rall.

The Baath Party planned to provoke U.S. occupation forces into mistreating the population.

Notice what's missing here? That's right: not a -word- about how the Baath party mistreated the population of Iraq for decades.

It worked.

Random bombings and sniper hits have made the American occupiers jittery and paranoid. They've withdrawn into fortified cantonments where they've cut off contact with civilians.

Bald-faced lie. US & British soldiers are interacting with civilians all the time.

...

In Iraq, we are the bad guys.

Finally, Rall shows his true colors.

What about the "terrorists" who bombed the U.N. headquarters

No scare quotes necessary: the attack on the UN headquarters was -by definition- a terrorist attack, killing 2 dozen civilians from the international community and wounding 150 more. To wit:

"The term 'terrorism' means premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents, usually intended to influence an audience... The US Government has employed this definition of terrorism for statistical and analytical purposes since 1983."

- Patterns of Global Terrorism, US State Department, 21 May 2002

and Jordanian embassy in Baghdad, who sabotage oil and water pipelines, who use rifles and rocket-propelled grenades and remote-controlled mines to kill our soldiers? Aren't these "killers" evil, "killing people who just want to help," as another AP writer puts it?

In short: no.

Read that again. Yes, Rall is -actually saying- that those who perpetrated the heinous terrorist massacre at the UN are not evil. It gets worse.

The ad hoc Iraqi resistance is comprised of indigenous fighters ranging from secular ex-Republican Guards to radical Islamist Shiites,

Yes, Baathists and Islamists: two tyranny-loving minorities; a match made in heaven.

as well as foreign Arab volunteers waging the same brand of come-one-come-all jihad that the mujahedeen fought against Soviet occupation forces in Afghanistan (news - web sites). While one can dismiss foreign jihadis as naïve adventurers,

Call me old-fashioned, but I reserve the term 'naïve adventurers' for people like university students backpacking through Europe, not theocratic fanatics bent on Islamic world domination and conquest.

honest Americans should call native Iraqi resistance fighters by a more fitting name: Iraqi patriots.

Odd, then, that these 'patriots' seem to have the support of so little of the population. To wit:

"Every poll taken in Iraq shows the same thing: that the Iraqis welcome the American liberation and appreciate their rebuilding efforts. In a YouGov poll last month, 50 percent said the war was "right" (23 percent had no opinion). Only thirteen percent wanted U.S. and British forces to leave Iraq "straightaway"; 31 percent hoped the troops would stay for "a few years."

- Stephen Pollard, 'We can still succeed in reconstructing Iraq', The Independent (UK), August 25, 2003.

The same poll says that only 5 percent want the return of Saddam, and only 6 percent want rule by mullahs, adding up to a whopping 11% approval rating for the guerrillas.

I collect propaganda posters.

Fitting.

One of my favorites, from World War II, depicts a strapping young SS officer holding a smiling local kid in his arms. "Trust the German soldier," the caption exhorts citizens of occupied France. But when liberation came in 1945, Frenchmen who had obeyed that poster were shot as collaborators. The men and women who resisted--the "terrorists" who shot German soldiers, cut phone lines and bombed trains--received medals and pensions. Invaders always say that they come as liberators, but it's almost never true. Whether you live in Paris or Baghdad or New York, you're expected to know that, and to act accordingly.

Yes, Rall is -actually comparing- coalition forces with the Nazis. It is, however, fortunate that he brings up this monstrous and fatuous comparison, as I will now demonstrate.

...

Under George W. Bush, truth and justice are no longer the American way. The U.S. occupation of Iraq is misguided, evil and doomed to failure. The sooner we accept this difficult truth, the sooner we decide to stop being the bad guys, the sooner we'll withdraw our troops. The bloodshed may continue after we leave--and we'll be partly to blame for that. But until we pull out, the carnage is all ours.

Sami Tuma's brother was shot to death when he drove past a U.S. military checkpoint. (The psychotic U.S. military policy in Iraq, despite countless killings of innocent civilians and at least five reporters to date, is not to warn victims before opening fire.) "It is simple," says Tuma. "If someone kills your son, wife or brother without any reason but only that they happen to be walking or driving in the street, what you will do? You retaliate."

It's what I'd do. It's probably what you'd do too.

Ted Rall saw fit to bring up a Nazi comparison earlier, and it's only fair to apply a more accurate one here. As Hugh Hewitt has written, "despite what the quagmire chorus would have you believe, this isn't the first time America has tried to rebuild a war-torn, formerly fascist state". Precisely so.

During the Allied occupation of Germany (in which horrific war crimes were inflicted upon the German civilian populace by the Red army, not to mention fewer and more minor crimes by Western troops in comparison) a Nazi guerrilla movement called the Werwolf arose to fight the the occupying forces. To wit,

"A case in point is the Nazi Werewolf guerrilla movement founded by Heinrich Himmler in 1944, which fought the occupying forces of Britain, America and Russia until at least 1947.

The Werewolves were originally organised by the SS and the Hitler Youth as a diversionary operation on the fringes of the Third Reich, which were occupied by the Western Allies and the Soviets in the autumn of 1944. Some 5,000 -- 6,000 recruits were raised by the winter of 1944-45, but numbers rose considerably in the following spring when the Nazi Party and the Propaganda Ministry launched a popular call to arms, beseeching everybody in the occupied areas -- even women and children -- to launch themselves upon the enemy. In typical Nazi fashion, this expansion was not co-ordinated by the relevant bodies, which were instead involved in a bureaucratic war among themselves over control of the project. The result was that the movement functioned on two largely unrelated levels: the first as a real force of specially trained SS, Hitler Youth and Nazi Party guerrillas; the second as an outlet for casual violence by fanatics.

The Werewolves specialised in ambushes and sniping, and took the lives of many Allied and Soviet soldiers and officers -- perhaps even that of the first Soviet commandant of Berlin, General N.E. Berzarin, who was rumoured to have been waylaid in Charlottenburg during an incident in June 1945. Buildings housing Allied and Soviet staffs were favourite targets for Werewolf bombings; an explosion in the Bremen police headquarters, also in June 1945, killed five Americans and thirty-nine Germans. Techniques for harassing the occupiers were given widespread publicity through Werewolf leaflets and radio propaganda, and long after May 1945 the sabotage methods promoted by the Werewolves were still being used against the occupying powers

Although the Werewolves originally limited themselves to guerrilla warfare with the invading armies, they soon began to undertake scorched-earth measures and vigilante actions against German `collaborators' or `defeatists'. They damaged Germany's economic infrastructure, already battered by Allied bombing and ground fighting, and tried to prevent anything of value from falling into enemy hands".

- Perry Biddiscombe, 'Minutemen of the Third Reich: history of the Nazi Werewolf guerilla movement', History Today, October 2000.

And:

"What did the Werwolf do? They sniped. They mined roads. They poured sand into the gas tanks of jeeps. (Sugar was in short supply, no doubt.) They were especially feared for the "decapitation wires" they strung across roads. They poisoned food stocks and liquor. (The Russians had the biggest problem with this.) They committed arson, though perhaps less than they are credited with: every unexplained fire or explosion associated with a military installation tended to be blamed on the Werwolf. These activities slackened off within a few months of the capitulation on May 7, though incidents were reported as late as 1947.

...

Goebbels especially grasped the possibility that guerrilla war could be a political process as well as a military strategy. It was largely through his influence that the Werwolf assumed something of the aspect of a terrorist organization. Where it could, it tried to prevent individuals and communities from surrendering, and it assassinated civil officials who cooperated with the Allies. Few Germans welcomed these activities, but something else that Goebbels grasped was that terror might serve where popularity was absent. By his estimate, only 10% to 15% of the German population were potential supporters for a truly revolutionary movement. His goal was to use the Werwolf to activate that potential. With the help of the radical elite, the occupiers could be provoked into savage reprisals that would win over the mass of the people to Neo-Nazism, a term that came into use in April 1945".

- John J. Reilly, review of by Perry Biddiscombe, 'Werwolf! The History of the National Socialist Guerrilla Movement, 1944-1946', Online at http://pages.prodigy.net/aesir/wer.htm

Recall Rall's words above about fighting foreign occupiers in Iraq: "It's what I'd do. It's probably what you'd do too".

Using Rall's logic we can deduce that if Rall were a German citizen post-1945, he too would join the Werwolf neo-Nazi movement. Is further comment necessary?

Ted Rall is the author of the graphic travelogue "To Afghanistan and Back," an award-winning recounting of his experiences covering the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan. It is now available in a revised and updated paperback edition containing new material. Ordering information is available at amazon.com.

I'll pass.

Khomeini Loves America

2003-08-07T23:52:00.000-05:00

"America" says Ayatollah Seyed Hussein Khomeini, "is the symbol of freedom."

Christopher Hitchens is a Baaaaaad Man

2003-07-18T00:03:00.000-05:00

Dennis Perrin has recently joined the lemming-Left's latest pile on, churning out yet another tedious attack upon Christopher Hitchens.

I'll spare the reader a rebuttal to Perrin's tired backbiting, except to note that for one who claims Hitchens as his "mentor" as an essayist ('Back then Christopher Hitchens was It to me', he gushes; 'back then' apparently meaning when Hitchens remained one of the flock), Perrin's writing gives no indication of literary competence: "Hitch could care less about this", he scrawls, when in fact he means the opposite. Indeed, his entire piece is poorly argued, and his prose style is execrable.

Whatever one thinks of Hitchens' broadsides, he exhibits a remarkable command of his native idiom, and in his book reviews is quick to pounce upon schoolboy howlers pertaining to spelling, grammar and usage (e.g., the misuse of 'hopefully'). The fact that the master's finesse seems to have rubbed off on his erstwhile protege not one bit says a great deal more than Perrin's clichéd whines about his former mentor ever will.

Advantage Bush

2003-07-07T01:13:00.000-05:00

An entertaining 2004 Presidential candidate selector says my ideal candidate is George W. Bush. Though I'm not surprised at the overall choice, I do have sharp disagreements with Bush over specific issues (e.g., budgetary concerns, and international trade). Apparently the 100% rating means that Bush is the closest candidate to my ideal, even if he does not share every view I have. Given the paucity of viable Democratic candidates in the field, and my admiration of Bush's handling of foreign policy since 9/11/01, my decision isn't difficult.

Here were my overall results:

1. Bush, George W. - US President (100%)
2. Libertarian Candidate (94%)
3. Gephardt, Cong. Dick, MO - Democrat (90%)
4. Edwards, Senator John, NC - Democrat (73%)
5. Biden, Senator Joe, DE - Democrat (72%)
6. Kerry, Senator John, MA - Democrat (70%)
7. Lieberman Senator Joe CT - Democrat (70%)
8. Buchanan, Patrick J. – Reform/Republican (69%)
9. Kucinich, Cong. Dennis, OH - Democrat (65%)
10. McCain, Senator John, AZ- Republican (63%)
11. Feingold, Senator Russ, WI - Democrat (62%)
12. Leahy, Patrick Senator, Vermont - Democrat (62%)
13. Jackson, Cong. Jesse Jr., IL - Democrat (58%)
14. Graham, Senator Bob, FL - Democrat (57%)
15. Feinstein, Senator Dianne, CA - Democrat (54%)
16. Kaptur, Cong. Marcy, OH - Democrat (53%)
17. Phillips, Howard - Constitution (53%)
18. Dean, Gov. Howard, VT - Democrat (38%)
19. Green Party Candidate (35%)
20. Moseley-Braun, Former Senator Carol IL - Democrat (30%)
21. Sharpton, Reverend Al - Democrat (28%)
22. Socialist Candidate (23%)
23. Hagelin, John - Natural Law (17%)
24. Bradley, Former Senator Bill NJ - Democrat (16%)
25. Clark, Retired Army General Wesley K "Wes" Arkansas - Democrat (14%)
26. Vilsack, Governor. Tom IA - Democrat (-1%)
27. LaRouche, Lyndon H. Jr. - Democrat (-10%)

Well-Informed Media Critics

2003-07-06T21:30:00.000-05:00

In a comical little interview from last October's Guardian, radical linguist Noam Chomsky informs us of a dark conspiracy that's taken hold over what was once the people's Internet. It seems that "[t]here are massive efforts on the part of the internet's corporate owners to try to direct it to become a technique of marginalisation and control. Media analyst Norman Solomon did a study of references to the net. Pre-95 it was mostly referred to as an "information superhighway": post-95 it was "free shopping". The effort is to direct people towards commerce or diversions such as pornography".

Chomsky, well-known for his attempts at media criticism (and, infamously, for his obstreperous efforts in the 1970s to whitewash the Cambodian holocaust), is apparently unaware that the Internet is not owned, by corporations or indeed anyone else: rather, it's an abstract name for a global collection of networks operated by various entities, both public and private. Presumably, what Chomsky is fumbling to say is that because companies like GTE and AT&T own the wires, they are controlling what gets downloaded from the servers (in this case commercial and pornographic websites). Far be it from me to question this percipient hypothesis of elite thought control, but I find it more likely people just enjoy buying things they like and looking at pornography- no prodding necessary.

Chomsky also cites Norman Solomon's worried scribblings on a supposed shift in Internet terminology, but, alas, he gets that wrong as well. Solomon does not refer to "free shopping", but e-commerce. Even this critique of Solomon's comes across as obtuse: it is precisely because of massive corporate investment in the Internet and commercialization that it has become user-friendly enough to appeal to the entire population, most of whom before the advent of AOL could barely use a mouse. Perhaps Solomon preferred the old days, when the government and universities ran the servers, and with computer aficionados and academic types the almost exclusive users. My own belief as to why "information superhighway" is no longer used is because it sounds, well, wordy, and pretentious. Terms like the Internet and World Wide Web have supplanted it since the early days of mass popularization.

Solomon is better known for his unintentionally hilarious attack on the cartoon strip Dilbert, in which he objurgates its creator Scott Adams for giving the downtrodden white-collar proletariat a partial outlet for its frustrations with management, but without addressing the larger problems of the corporate structure, thus allowing the workers' revolutionary potential to be dissipated. As a parody of crypto-Marxist theories of immiseration, this is quite funny; unfortunately, Solomon is in earnest.

We need media criticism that provides us evidence the information we're getting about the world is accurate or inaccurate. As it is, Chomsky and Solomon's specious conspiracy theories and witless radical tracts can provide us with only passing amusement.

The American Revolution and its Significance

2003-07-04T22:54:00.000-05:00

On this date each year, Americans celebrate the adoption in 1776 of the Declaration of Independence by the representatives of the Second Continental Congress, and the founding of a noble and unique enterprise in human history. On this date, Americans do not merely celebrate the break from Britain, but the beginning of an experiment that ushered in a worldwide revolution in liberty.

The American colonies were among the most literate societies in the world at the time (indeed, more so than Europe), with New England in particular boasting a literacy rate of 95%. Influenced by Enlightenment thinkers like John Locke, Adam Smith, and Thomas Paine, the people rallied to the cause of independence and the philosophy of natural rights: that the rights of man (life, liberty, and property) were not bestowed by government but were in fact intrinsic and inalienable. At a time when most of the western world lived under some form of monarchy, the founding of a society based on these ideals and declaring itself free from the world's most powerful empire marked the death knell for oppressive tyranny over human liberty, and the beginning of the emancipation of countless other nations from their colonial masters and homegrown tyrants; it is an emancipation that continues to this day.

July 4 marks the date of the founding of a country whose political system and social ideal became the wonder of billions, and it is for good reason that the first shot of the American Revolution fired at Lexington was said to be the shot heard around the world. On this day we celebrate our liberty, along with the bitter struggles waged throughout history in order to preserve it. Let us never forget that.

The Illustrated Man

2003-07-03T06:24:00.000-05:00

I recently came across a quote that reminded me why Ray Bradbury is one of my favorite authors:

"The most dangerous thing you can do is to know who you are. See, Norman Mailers's problem is he thinks he's Norman Mailer. And Gore Vidal's problem is he thinks he's Gore Vidal. I don't think I'm Ray Bradbury. You see, there's a big difference. Just do your work everyday, don't go around thinking, "Geez, wow!" The hell with that. The work is important, the work is fun and there's no time: if you get into your work everyday, there's no time to think who you are".

- "The Romance of Places: An Interview with Ray Bradbury," Robert Couteau, Quantum: Science Fiction & Fantasy Review. Spring 1991.

Antisemitism at Oxford

2003-06-30T00:16:00.000-05:00

The latest outrage of an Israeli science student's application being turned down at Oxford because of his nationality should come as no surprise. This is, after all, the university of poet Tom Paulin, who wants US born Jews in Israel 'shot dead'.

"I have a view on the situation in the Middle East but I am not a racist or anti-Semitic," says the bigot. "I just want to draw a line under the whole thing."

Oh, I'm sure you do, old boy. I'm sure you do.

Stating the Obvious

2003-06-29T23:02:00.000-05:00

A recent Pew Global Attitude Survey reports that opinions toward globalization are significantly more positive in poorer nations than in wealthy ones. In Sub-Saharan Africa, for example, increased trade and integration is twice as popular as it is in the United States and Europe. This shouldn't be surprising. On the contrary, it is in concordance with common sense: developing countries require foreign capital if they are to to increase their rate of economic growth (and hence reduce their overall level of poverty). It is therefore natural for the overwhelming number of people in the world who live in abject poverty to welcome the opportunity to improve their lot. In contrast, it is often the comparatively well off citizens of the developed world who oppose globalization based on self-interested protectionist fallacies (e.g., Pat Buchanan and US labor unions) or delerious anti-capitalist rhetoric (e.g., Ralph Nader and WTO protestors).

We witness these positive opinions toward globalization in individual cases. Commenting on a 1997 attack by US unions on the long hours in Nicaragua's nascent garment industry, garment factory worker Candida Rosa Lopez replied, "Sometimes, at the end of the year, the factory doesn't have enough orders. Then we can't work as many hours, or make as much money. I wish more people would buy the clothes we make" ("We Need These Jobs: Nicaraguan Workers Dispute 'Sweatshop' Report", Miami Herald, November 30, 1997). It so happens that wages in these factories are 50% better than the Nicaraguan average, with workers making almost twice as much as school teachers. "I make a lot more here, putting seams in shirts," says Rosa. "The work is simple and I make about 900 cordobas [$90] a month. No other business would give me this opportunity".

Likewise, in Vietnam, Nike factory worker Tsi-Chi makes three times the minimum wage for a state-owned enterprise, earns more than her husband, and receives from Nike free or subsidized meals, along with free medical services and education ("The noble feat of Nike", The Spectator, June 7, 2003). It offers her far better prospects than the alternative of working 10 to 14 hours a day outdoors in agriculture. When asked what her hopes are for her son's future, Tsi-Chi answers that a "generation ago, she would have had to put him to work on the farm from an early age". Instead "she wants to give him a good education, so that he can become a doctor. That's one of the most impressive developments since Vietnam's economy was opened up. In ten years 2.2 million children have gone from child labour to education".

When we compare these sentiments with the inane and economically illiterate remonstrations of globalization opponents, it becomes obvious that said individuals are likely to live in that deluded state that George Orwell termed "money-sheltered ignorance"; a special kind of idiocy observed in those operating under "a bourgeois illusion bred of money and security" ("Pacifism and the War", Partisan Review, August-September 1942). It is a plain and unfortunate fact that people in the developing world like Rosa Lopez and Tsi-Chi can afford no such illusions.

Depleted Uranium- Propaganda vs. Reality

2003-06-26T22:01:00.000-05:00

After reading John Sweeney's recent J'accuse of radical dingbat John Pilger for his tendentious claims about the putative health hazards of depleted uranium used in the Gulf War (in essence a de facto miming of Saddamista agitprop), the curious reader may find the following articles illuminating:

Risks From Uranium Limited, Experts Say

Depleted Uranium FAQ

Nuclear Genocide? Piercing through the depleted uranium myths

Moral Stupidity

2003-06-26T00:59:00.000-05:00

Orson Scott Card has a brilliant essay on the sickening attempts to draw moral equivalence between Israeli actions and Palestinian terrorism. A must-read.

Not Bad...

2003-06-25T00:11:00.000-05:00

"Libertarian - You believe that the main use for government is for some people to lord it over others at their expense. You maintain that the government should be as small as possible, and that civil liberties, "victimless crimes", and gun ownership should be basic rights. You probably are OK with capitalism. Your historical role model is Thomas Jefferson."

Which political stereotype are you?

"O Lord, the Jews...kill them one by one"

2003-06-24T23:03:00.000-05:00

What the Saudi Arabian government funds.

In other news, the Saudis are desperate to ease their growing economic difficulties. How unfortunate.

Who Armed Iraq?

2003-06-24T23:00:00.000-05:00

An old but important reminder.

New Republic dissembles on Iraq

2003-06-23T23:45:00.000-05:00

Already gearing up for its 2004 smear campaign, the New Republic has now changed its tune on the Bush administration's stance on Iraq. Weekly Standard has the goods.

Particularly egregious is TNR's assertion of Iraq having no "clear terrorist link". Aside from carrying out assassination attempts on former US presidents lives, rewarding the families of Hamas homicide bombers who blow up Jewish civilians in buses and pizzerias, and funding, e.g., the Abu Nidal Organization, Kurdish PKK separatists in Turkey, and the Iranian Mujahedeen-e-Khalq, I can't see one either. Also, despite the attempts of various groups to downplay links with Al Qaeda, there was in fact a highly suspicious prima facie case to the contrary.

Perhaps if a few more massacres of thousands of civilians on American soil were accomplished, and were found to be connected to Iraq, it would have been OK to go ahead on in and take out the dictator who had flouted the ceasefire agreement he signed in 1991 for 12 years, all the while continuing his weapon programs under the noses of UN inspectors and mercilessly oppressing his people. Certainly we all would have slept better knowing we took the time to make sure, as would the dissidents languishing in Saddam's torture chambers.

Favorite blog of the moment

2003-06-23T00:01:00.000-05:00

Notes of an Iranian girl

One of the best of the relatively few English-speaking Iranian weblogs around presently.

Review: Loung Ung, First They Killed My Father

2003-06-22T23:38:00.000-05:00

A Riveting Khmer Rouge Memoir

Loung Ung is only 5 years old when the Khmer Rouge march triumphantly into her home of Phnom Penh in 1975. When she sees the soldiers in black pants and red sashes roll into the city, she asks her father who these men are and what they want:

"They want us", he replies. "They're not nice people. Look at their shoes- they wear sandals made from car tires".

"Pa, why the shoes? Why are they bad?"

"It shows that these people are destroyers of things".

In her book First They Killed My Father, Loung Ung shows just how prescient her father was, painting the 4 year nightmare that followed for her and her family in graphic detail. As opposed to many other survivor accounts (e.g., Pin Yathay, Stay Alive, My Son), First They Killed My Father is written from a child's present tense perspective, making the horrific events it portrays all the more disturbing. Removed from her happy city life after the forced evacuation of Phnom Penh, Ung and her family are made to walk at gunpoint for days into the countryside, away from the "bourgeois" cities and their corrupt Western influences. Her father, a former police officer, instructs them to pretend to be poor peasants, knowing it's the only way they will survive the purges of anyone associated with the previous regime.

The next two years are ones of ever-present hunger and constant moving, as Ung's family tries to prolong the inevitable discovery of their identity. When the soldiers do come and take her father away to be brutally tortured and executed, Ung's mother is left to care for the children by herself. Knowing that staying together will mean certain death for them all, she makes the most difficult decision a mother can make: she tells Ung and her siblings to leave her and for each of them to learn to survive on his own.

Claiming to be an orphan, Ung joins a camp for child soldiers and is trained to fight Vietnamese (The Angkar, as the Khmer Rouge called themselves, were convinced of an imminent Vietnamese invasion and launched continuous pre-emptive attacks on Vietnamese villages, thereby provoking an invasion). She later finds out her mother was executed just months before the 1979 Vietnamese invasion. At this point an actual orphan, Ung re-unites with her remaining brothers and sisters in a refugee camp and makes her way from several foster families in Cambodia into the United States to start a new life. Though she quickly adjusts to normal American life, she will never forget the enormous suffering and loss she experienced under the Khmer Rouge.

First They Killed My Father is an absorbing and stirring book. Loung Ung lucidly recounts appalling scenes of starvation, murder, and enslavement that were everyday occurrences for millions of Cambodians from 1975-79. Her vividly macabre description of a lynching of a captured Angkar soldier by a mob of Cambodians is but a small example of the seething hatred the victims of the Khmer Rouge feel even today for those who murdered their families and destroyed their lives. Ung also reveals the not-so-benign nature of the Vietnamese occupation, describing her horrifying near rape experience at the hands of a Vietnamese soldier.

Read First They Killed My Father, and you will begin to grasp the utter depravity and terror of life under one of the most notorious communist regimes of the twentieth century.

Can Anarchy and a free market work in Somalia?

2003-06-21T21:14:00.000-05:00

Andrew Cockburn seems to think it can. Pretty fascinating stuff.

The Gold Standard

2003-06-21T20:52:00.000-05:00

"the hippie dirtbags didn't think 12 years was long enough because it takes most of them 12 years after college to find a job".

-Michael Steedman, on why the Left thinks the US should have given the inspectors more time to work.

Greetings and Salutations

2003-06-21T17:43:00.000-05:00

Welcome to my blog.

I'll be posting articles, links and original commentary about topics that interest me: Politics, Economics, History, and Current Events in particular. Updates will depend on my busy personal schedule but should be fairly regular. Stay tuned.