People Before Profit blog

Questions on 9/11 refuse to go away

Sat, 31 Jul 2004 07:39:00 +0000

The final report of the bipartisan national 9/11 commission is unlikely to stamp out questions about the Bush administration’s handling of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, its Iraq war, or its overall foreign policy.

Rather than folding up shop after issuing their report, allowing these issues to fade from the public’s eye, as Bush may have hoped, commission members announced they would spend the summer lobbying for their recommendations. Senate hearings are in the works.

Republicans clearly hope to pin the blame for the administration’s 9/11 and Iraq failures on “faulty intelligence,” and divert attention to the commission’s recommendations for restructuring the intelligence agencies. But those proposals themselves raise troubling questions. And the report, cautious as it is, raises other issues that can cause problems for the Bush administration as it heads into the heat of the presidential election campaign.

The report calls for establishment of a cabinet-level national intelligence director (NID), located in the office of the president, who would oversee the CIA, FBI and all other intelligence bodies. In addition, the report proposes creation of a National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC), also in the president’s office, which would direct intelligence gathering and operations both inside and outside the U.S.

Investigative reporter Robert Dreyfuss calls these “Big-Brother-like” measures. He points out that “the NCTC-NID combination would concentrate the power to carry out domestic spying in an all-powerful nexus, located where? In the White House.”

Warning against blurring the lines between domestic and foreign intelligence, the American Civil Liberties Union said bringing “the CIA’s culture of covert, subversive operations” into the domestic arena would mean “a further weakening of civil liberties protections.”

The Bush administration’s manipulation of intelligence to sell the Iraq war has sparked concerns about separating intelligence gathering from political pressure. But these proposals go in the opposite direction. An “intelligence director sitting in the White House would be in the hip pocket of the president,” ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero said.

More profoundly, former Clinton Labor Secretary Robert Reich comments, “Let’s not fool ourselves into thinking that better intelligence is a substitute for better policy.”

In a slap at the Bush administration’s unilateralist militarism, and indirectly suggesting that the U.S. invasion of Iraq has damaged efforts to curb terrorism, the commission calls for a “balanced” preventative strategy “that is as much, or more, political as it is military.” Further, the report says the U.S. “should offer an example of moral leadership … committed to treat people humanely [and] abide by the rule of law.”

Although Dick Cheney continues to claim otherwise, the commission also reaffirms its conclusion that there is no evidence of collaboration between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda.

In a section given scant attention by the commercial media, the report traces the emergence of Bin Laden and al Qaeda to the U.S.-sponsored war that ousted the Soviet-backed secular/democratic Afghan government in 1988. The report says that war “gave Islamist extremists a rallying point and training field.” Bin Laden, with access to his family’s huge fortune, became known “as a person who generously helped fund the anti-Soviet jihad,” the report says.

“Bin Ladin understood … the extent to which the continuation and eventual success of the jihad in Afghanistan depended on an increasingly complex, almost worldwide organization,” the report continues. He and associates “established what they called a base or foundation (al Qaeda) as a potential general headquarters” for this. “The international environment for Bin Ladin’s efforts was ideal. Saudi Arabia and the United States supplied billions of dollars worth of secret assistance to rebel groups in Afghanistan fighting the Soviet occupation.”

The report claims that Bin Ladin and associates received “little or no” assistance from the U.S. “because they had their own sources of support.” But the point is clear: the roots of al Qaeda lie in the U.S. government’s covert anti-Soviet “jihad.”

Despite efforts to spread blame equally between the Clinton and Bush administrations, the report paints a harsh picture of Bush’s lack of interest in the flood of attack warnings in the summer of 2001.

“Most of the intelligence community recognized … that the number and severity of threat reports were unprecedented. Many officials told us that they knew something terrible was planned, and they were desperate to stop it,” the commission says.

A briefing Bush received on Aug. 6, 2001, titled “Bin Ladin Determined to Strike U.S.,” referred to “patterns of suspicious activity in this country consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks, including recent surveillance of federal buildings in New York.” It mentioned a call received in May by the U.S. Embassy in the United Arab Emirates “saying that a group of Bin Ladin supporters was in the U.S. planning attacks with explosives.”

The 9/11 report says Bush “did not recall discussing the Aug. 6 report with the Attorney General or whether Rice had done so.” The commission “found no indication of any further discussion before September 11 among the President and his top advisers of the possibility of a threat of an al Qaeda attack in the United States.”

The author can be reached at suewebb @ pww.org.

The German Peasant War: A Panoramic Legacy of the German Democratic Republic

Sat, 31 Jul 2004 07:36:00 +0000

While on a visit to the German Democratic Republic (GDR, or East Germany) 21 years ago, at the time of the great peace demonstrations against U.S. cruise and Pershing missiles, I learned that an East German painter would soon begin a vast panorama on the subject of the German Peasant War of the 1520s.

My curiosity aroused, I located a small book giving examples of the work of this artist, Werner Tübke. To be honest, I was not very impressed. Tübke’s graphic art obviously favored the Old Masters, and seemed old-fashioned and static. However, when I next returned to Germany in the late winter of 2003, I resolved to make an expedition to see the actual completed work in the little town of Bad Frankenhausen, located in the center of the country.

The Peasant War erupted at the time of the Reformation, when all Europe was convulsed with the currents of change. In 1517, Luther nailed his 95 Theses on the door of the church in Wittenberg, calling for reforms in Christianity.

The hierarchy of the Catholic Church soon bitterly opposed any change. Luther burnt the papal bull excommunicating him. Germany itself was divided into hundreds of small feudal realms. Some of its rulers sympathized with Luther; others took the side of Rome.

Within the Reformation, there were further political and theological divisions. A radical wing, based primarily among the peasants, but including some substantial towns, called for more thoroughgoing changes. The Twelve Articles of the peasants stipulated the end of serfdom, the election of pastors rather than appointment by a hierarchy, and the restoration of hunting, fishing and pasturage rights which were being seized by the church and the nobility.

In the spring of 1525, as many as 300,000 peasants rose up against their masters in one of the great revolts of European history. Battles occurred all through southern and central Germany, but the peasants lacked military experience, and had little coordination, while the nobles, frightened for their lives and property, were assisted by thousands of mercenaries returning from a war against the French. Some estimates of the slaughter run as high as 100,000. Whatever the actual number slain, this bloodbath cemented the authority of church and state over the people and helped shape the course of German history for the next 500 years.

Bad Frankenhausen was the site of one of the most terrible peasant defeats. Beginning in 1973, the government of the GDR started to plan a suitable panorama on the Schlachtberg (“Battle Mountain”), and eventually Werner Tübke took charge of the project. It took him 12 years to complete. It was dedicated in Sept. 14, 1989, just before the upheavals that led to the disappearance of the GDR and the unification of Germany.

One’s first impression upon entering the vast room in the cylindrical building on Battle Mountain is of dark foreboding, as there is little light, and only a few dim outlines are visible. As more visitors make their way up the stairs and the room fills, the lights are slowly turned up, revealing an astonishing spectacle 40 feet high, extending around the entire interior circumference of over 350 feet, including some 3,000 figures.

Roughly following a sequence of seasons of the year, there is a sweep of majestic scenes, culminating in an enormous section of the Bad Frankenhausen battle. There is no remnant of the static quality of Tübke’s painting years before. One section illustrates nothing less than the creation of the world in a swirl of movement, similar to the murals of Diego Rivera or especially David Siqueiros in Mexico. Another scene shows an opulent figure floating in mid-air: it’s the Pope, with the ears of a jackass. Yet another shows Luther as a Janus figure, with one face gazing back toward a crucifixion, and the other forward to a burning decree excommunicating him. There are multiple allusions to classic European paintings of the Tower of Babel, the Sphere of the Created World, and medieval punishments such as breaking on the wheel. There is a powerful element of satire at work here, as when bishops and cardinals play a friendly game of dice with aristocrats.

The main battle scene depicts at its center the revolutionary leader Thomas Müntzer, whose anguished face reflects his realization that the revolt is doomed. Shortly after the battle, he was captured, tortured and beheaded. Yet for all the chaos of his times, there he is, immortalized in this great painting.

This magnificent work is nothing less than the Sistine Chapel of European socialist art. During a period when the socialist and progressive heritage of Germany has been under assault for 15 years, it is encouraging that this monument remains unscathed. I asked at the information desk how many people had visited it since 1989, and was told: 2 million.

There are comprehensive sets of slides, books and posters of his work available via the museum’s web site: www.panorama-museum.de, or by writing the Panorama Museum, Am Schlachtberg 9, Bad Frankenhausen D-06567, Germany.

Werner Tübke died in Leipzig this past May after a long illness. He was 74.

Fred Whitehead, who lives in Kansas City, Kan., has published extensively on Midwestern cultural history. He can be reached at