“Nobody’s Hanging Yellow Ribbons For the Persian Gulf” (1991 critique of first Gulf War by E. Karlstrom)

Webmaster’s (ETK) Introduction:

Rummaging through old files in my library, I found this article that I wrote in 1991, some 28 years ago, when I was embarking on my career as an Assistant Professor of Geography at California State University, Stanislaus. Certainly, this critique of the first Gulf War might have gained the attention of America’s most powerful elite, the corporate-government-military-intelligence “oiligarchy:” including the Bush and Rockefeller families, etc., the oil companies, and especially the CIA, other intelligence services, and US military. As I struggle now to understand why and when I might have first been placed on the secret, “Main Core”/enemies watchlist (blacklist), it occurs to me that my “targeting” could be the CIA or military’s retaliation for writing this article or perhaps other related activities that the military and secret services found objectionable.

It could even have been then President, ex-CIA director, and Third-Tier Illuminatus, George H.W. Bush. Bush I called for a New World Order in a speech to the United Nations in that same year… on September 11, 1991. (Many are apparently targeted because they oppose the New World Order.) Indeed, Bush I later claimed credit for having overcome the “Vietnam Syndrome”, i.e., significant protesting by the American people against US foreign wars of aggression.

Note that in this article, I state:

“Thus it is now becoming clear that our “national security state” is really a neo-fascist police state and that war is our energy policy.

… Bush’s New World Order, alas, looks suspiciously like the Old World Order based on U.S. militarism and domination of global resources. The continuous barrage of rhetoric and propaganda we get about freedom and democracy notwithstanding, most U.S. foreign policy this century has been directed toward securing, often militarily, the “right to profit” of American business throughout the world. Based on exploitation and domination, this old world order is self-perpetuating. It guarantees conflict because its victims occasionally rebel. Thus, the government-military-industrial complex thrives at the expense of the rest of the world, at the expense of future generations, and at the expense of true freedom and democracy; even, perhaps especially, in this country.

… Finally, we need to reactivate our involvement in the democratic process, elect some Green candidates, and take our country back from the business-government-military-industrial complex which now threatens to turn our democratic society into a police state and colony. Unless and until we do so, America itself will be increasingly ravaged by the same forces which now victimize much of the rest of the world.”

In August, 1994, I wrote another article, The Bush Dynasty of Death: Four Generations of Wall Street War-Making and War-Profiteering, which also could have resulted in my targeting.

In “Bright Light on Black Shadows,” Dr. Rauni Kilde stated:

“On July 21, 1994, the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) proposed that “non-lethal” weapons be used against anyone engaged in activities that DOD opposed. That could include almost anyone. DOD’s potential enemies may be counter-cultural individuals, those with opposing political viewpoints, economic competitors, biological undesirables, etc. From my point of view, the uses of this new technology philosophically are comparable to and amount to the Biblical Fall of man, the eviction from paradise. The all-encompassing thought-reading and mind-influencing capacity (of this technology) divides man into two encampments: Those few “God-like” people, who are allowed to use these means, and all others, whose freedom and free will is being taken away.”

Regardless of whether I am being “targeted” for writing this particular article, I certainly am being targeted today and have been, I believe, since at least the early 1990s, if not before.

I am also posting this article on this website because it provides “historical background” on our present, phony war on terrorism, and National Security Racketeering Network, Inc. Here’s the article:

Nobody’s Hanging Yellow Ribbons For the Persian Gulf; Part I

by Eric Karlstrom, Geography Professor, California State University, Stanislaus

Published in “The Sierra Runoff”, April, 1991

“The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, he has a remarkable capability for not even hearing about them.”

George Orwell, “Notes on Nationalism”, 1945

The government and media tell us we have a decisive, glorious military victory in the Perian Gulf. Nationalistic pride is seen everywhere with American flags, yellow ribbons and “support our troops” bumper stickers. But what about he effects of the war on the people and environment of the Persian Gulf? The fact is that in terms of its human and environmental costs, the Gulf War was an atrocity and a massacre.

At a cost of up to $2 billion per day, the US military unleashed more firepower in the Persian Gulf in 5 weeks than was used in all of World War II or Vietnam. The Air Force flew over 90,000 missions at the rate of 3,000 per day, or one per minute. At least 70 percent missed their targets. Although carefully “sanitized” press releases mostly censored the human carnage and have made it difficult to obtain reliable figures, an estimated 200,000 were killed, many of them innocent women and children. A U.N. mission states that post-war Iraq has been bombed back to the “pre-industrial age” and the situation there is “near apocalyptic”.

They warn that thousands more may soon die in epidemics and famines as a result of the wholesale destruction of buildings, sanitary facilities, water and sewage systems, transportation networks, and food supplies.

The agriculturally-productive delta between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers (“the cradle of civilization”) and much of the rest of Iraq and Kuwait have been devastated. Scientists estimate it will take generations and longer for the fragile desert ecosystems to recover. The desert battles of WWII set off many extraordinarily large dust storms and today, some 40 years later, only about 35 percent of the vegetation cover has regenerated in areas where tanks flattened the landscape. Some 600 oil fires are now burning out of control in Kuwait, consuming about 5 million barrels of oil/day and producing upwards of 5,000 tons of toxic smoke/day. Red Adair estimates they will be “lucky” to get the fires out within two years.

The effects of the smoke pollution may soon include nitrogen and sulfur oxides, depletion of the ozone layer from nitrogen oxides, and global warming from carbon dioxide. Of, if sufficient smoke reaches the stratos phere, a small-scale “nuclear winter” could alter local and even global climate patterns, potentially causing crop failures in the Middle East, India, Pakistan, and North America. In addition, millions of barrels of oil have spilled into the fragile Persian Gulf, creating an oil slick 5 times the size of the Exxon Valdez spill and damaging over a hundred miles of Saudi coast. The Saudi Environmental Agency states that the US is responsible for at 30% of the present spill. In short the US military strategy amounted to ecocide, a “scorched earth policy” designed to destroy Iraq and Kuwait in order to “liberate” Kuwait.

Was the war necessary and justified? Did the US actively seek to avoid it? No, on both counts. In fact, the US blocked all attempts to negotiate a peaceful settlement. Bush’s deployment last fall of 400,000 troops to the Gulf to “defend” Saudi Arabia signaled his intention to wage war on Iraq. By November, Bechtel Corporation had already signed contracts with the Government of Kuwait to rebuild the soon-to-be-war-torn Kuwait.

But why would Bush wage war at a time when peace was breaking out all over the world and the U.N. had virtually unanimously condemned Iraq’s aggression and put international sanctions in place? A real “new world order” based on peace and international cooperation was within grasp.

Bush waged the Gulf war in order to secure our access to cheap oil, preserve our “way of life”, and guarantee U.S. military and economic dominance in the world. As a Bush advisor put it:

“Even a dolt understands the principle. We need the oil. It’s nice to talk about standing up for freedom, but Kuwait and Saudi Arabia are not exactly democracies, and if their principal export were oranges, a mid-level State Department official would have issued a statement and we would have closed Washington down for August.” (Time Magazine, 8/20/90)

Some 65 percent of the world’s proven oil reserves occur in the Middle East, with20 percent under Iraq and Kuwait. (The U.S. has just 4 percent). At the present rate of extraction, he world’s oil may be gone within the first half of the next century. Hence, assuming continued dependence on fossil fuels, whoever controls the last great oil pool of oil will have unprecedented power.

Joseph Gerson of the American Friends Service Committee states:

“President Bush’s particular interest in “liberating” Kuwait lies less in keeping current oil supply lines open than in dominating access to long-term oil reserves and controlling the international economic balance of power. Control over the flow of Middle East oil has given the US enormous power over the economies of Western Europe, Japan and the newly industrialized countries of the Pacific. Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait challenged this power. The Gulf war has given Washington the opportunity to reaffirm its control over the region and thus its place as the world’ number one power. This is the New World Order Bush is talking about.”

Bush probably also waged war in order to prevent the cutbacks in military budgets which seemed inevitable as the Cold War melted away and the nation planned for a substantial “peace dividend”. In part, it was war for war’s sake. After all, nowthat America is the world’s largest debtor nation ($3.2 trillion) and is being economically surpassed by Japan and Germany, our role as superpower can best, and perhaps only, be defined and asserted militarily. Finally the war conveniently diverted national attention from numerous domestic crises, including the impending recession, the savings and loan crisis, the deteriorating quality of the environment, and the 2-3 million homeless (which accompanied 77 percent cuts in federal housing programs between 1980 and 1990). Our national priorities are certainly reflected in the national budget where 50 percent of tax revenues goes to the military, wheras only 13 percent goes to health, education, and the environment. Two thirds of the government’s research budget goes to the military while energy research gets only 4 percent, and the environment receives only 2 percent. The U.S. now spends $16 billion per year on prisons and has surpassed South Africa to the lead the world in incarceration rates. Thus it is now becoming clear that our “national security state” is really a neo-fascist police state and that war is our energy policy.

Reagan-Bush Energy Strategy

Q. We haven’t really heard you call upon Americans to conserve as a part of this crisis.
A. I call upon Americans to conserve.
Q. Will you elaborate?
A. No.

– President George H.W. Bush, Kennbunkport press conference, August, 1990

The lunacy of Bush’s Gulf War is that the industrial “way of life” he seeks to preserve is unsustainable and now threatens the ecosystem of the entire planet. The tragic environmental consequences of our oil addiction confront us everywhere- toxic air and water pollution; the increasing uninhabitability of our cities, the death of forests, lakes and organisms from acid rain; the threat of global warming; and the destruction of ocean habitats from oil spills. It took nature a million years to produce the fossil fuels our global industrial economy now consumes in a year. And at present rates of consumption, we will exhaust the world’s oil reserves within 50 to 80 years.

Meanwhile, Americans, with 5 percent of the world’s population, consume 25% of the world’s energy. The average American consumes 50 times more energy than a citizen of Bangladesh. We consume 17 million barrels of oil/day, of which 8.4 million are imported, 50% of that going to fuel cars and trucks. The U.S. has 35 percent of the world’s cars and at present they get an average 19 mpg. Increasing car fuel efficiency standards by only 2.8 mpg would save the amount of oil (5 percent) the U.S. imported from Iraq and Kuwait prior to last fall’s embargo. Automobiles have now been developed which get between 55 and 121 mpg, and the Senate’s Bryan Bill would have required vehicles to get at least 42 mpg. This bill would have saved 1,700 million barrels of oil per year, more than twice the 775 million barrels the U.S. gets from all the Arab OPEC countries. Bush lobbied hard against the bill and defeated it.

Why is Bush willing to sacrifice countless lives, billions of dollars, and the earth’s environment to assure that we maintain our dependence on oil? And why is he unwilling to promote conservation and efficiency measures which would help clean-up the environment and conserve oil? The answers are deeply embedded in the economic structure of America. The American Petroleum Co. is the largest political lobby in Washington. Bush himself founded Zapata Oil. Secretary of State Baker is linked with Exxon, Mobil, Standard Oil, and Kerr-McGee. Vice-President Quayle is backed by Standard Oil. The Department of Defense is the single largest oil consumer in the world.

Who were the real winners of the Gulf War? First, the U.S. government maintained its control over Middle Eastern oil prices. Also, Chevron’s profits jumped 800 percent from 1989 to 1990 and other oil companies posted 30 to 80 percent gains in the last months of 1990. And, of course, now that billions of dollars worth of weapons have been exploded over the Gulf, military contractors will have to replace them.

Our present environmentally insane energy policy was not inevitable. (President) Carter had initiated efforts to halt our growing dependence on foreign oil and dramatically increased funding for research on renewable energy sources and increased efficiency. In fact, conservation measures have provided seven times more new energy supplies since 1973 than all efforts to build new power plants or drill new wells combined. Given a chance, increased efficiency standards can reduce the quantity of oil we need and renewable sources can eventually replace the rest. Solar, wind, biomass, biogas; we now have the technology we need to convert to sustainable energy sources. What has been lacking is the political will.

But the gains of the Carter years were quickly erased by the Reagan-Bush administration. During the 80s, Reagan-Bush: 1) cut federal spending for research and development for conservation and solar energy technologies by 90 percent, 2) reduced the budget for renewable fuels by 90 percent, 3) cut federal funding for mass transit in half, 4) granted auto industry requests to reduce fuel efficiency requirements for 1986-1988, and 5) turned the Department of Energy upside down so that DOW now devotes 2/3 of its budget to producing nuclear weapons rather than funding energy development.

Thus, the Political Ecology Group states:

“The Gulf War is the culmination of more than a decade of government energy policies that have consistently undermined efforts to promote efficiency and renewable alternatives to oil.”

This policy continues. Last year, West German Parliament set a goal to reduce CO2 emissions by 32 percent over 15 years. The Bush administration, meanwhile, called for more studies of the problem and no action. As Greenpeace’s Peg Stevenson notes, the government “casts polluting industries as the “victims” of a hasty response to the greenhouse threat.” In effect, according to Stevenson, “the oil and energy companies tell the administration what to do and it does it.”

Not surprisingly, then, the current National Energy Strategy, prepared by DOE in the fall of 1990 (and reiterated in Bush’s 1991 State of the Union Message) abandons virtually all conservation and renewable energy options that would reduce our fossil fuel dependence, while simultaneously urging increased tax subsidies which pay oil companies to exhaust U.S. oil supplies as fast as possible. Rather than calling for reduced dependence on foreign oil, the strategy proposes we maintain our present level of oil imports through the year 2010.

Nobody’s Hanging Yellow ribbons For the Persian Gulf; Part II

by Eric Karlstrom, Geography Professor, California State University, Stanislaus,

The Sierra Runoff, May, 1991

Solutions: A Genuine New World Order, Energy Self-sufficiency, and Lasting Peace

Bush’s New World Order, alas, looks suspiciously like the Old World Order based on U.S. militarism and domination of global resources. The continuous barrage of rhetoric and propaganda we get about freedom and democracy notwithstanding, most U.S. foreign policy this century has been directed toward securing, often militarily, the “right to profit” of American business throughout the world. Based on exploitation and domination, this old world order is self-perpetuating. It guarantees conflict because its victims occasionally rebel. Thus, the government-military-industrial complex thrives at the expense of the rest of the world, at the expense of future generations, and at the expense of true freedom and democracy; even, perhaps especially, in this country.

Preservation of the old order requires that we continue to view the world’s people and environment as “resources” to be exploited for profit by business. Since we enforce our imperial objectives with our military, each of us must also be prepared to risk the extinction of our species and most other species. In the nuclear era, any regional conflict can escalate into a full-scale nuclear war with the potential of destroying billions of people and the earth’s biosphere.

As former President of the Association of Science, Kenneth Boulding, states:

“National defense is now the greatest enemy of national security.”

We will never be secure until these weapons are dismantled, and our military establishment is converted to peaceful concerns, and we are no longer systematically cajoled and deceived by government and the media into having a designated enemy.

Since our real objectives of global economic and military dominance are not at all compatable with our professed values of freedom and democracy, our government has had to become increasingly sophisticated at manipulating public opinion. Today, the government and medai have adopted a number of the strategies Big Brother utilized in Orwell’s 1984. They incite hatred of “designated enemies” with rhetoric such as “evil empire,” “another Hitler,” etc. They have also become masters at censorship, “doublethink” and “new-speak.”

Civilian casualties are “collateral damage,” bombs are “ordnance,” bombing raids are “visits,” body bags are “human remain pouches,” and indeed, in the ultimate Orwellian twist, war is “peace or peace keeping.”

And 8 months after Ambassador April Glaspie’s fateful July 25 interview with Sadam Hssein in which she stated the U.S. had “no opinion” on his border dispute with Kuwait, effectively giving him the “green light” to invade Kuwait, Glaspie now tells us she also told him that “we insist that you settle your disputes nonviolently.” So now the State Department is also in the business of re-writing history. Complicity of the press, is, of course, required in these processes but is usually accomplished because all the major media are owned by Fortune 500 companies, the same people that run the government. NBC is owned by GE, the largest nuclear bomb maker in the world (some 35,000 since WWII).

But the truth isn’t that hard to see. The Political Ecology Group states:

“No political order imposed at gunpoint can solve the ongoing social conflicts within the (Gulf) region. The U.S. policy of supporting undemocratic feudal monarchies in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Emirates had benefited the West at at the expense of the majority of the Middle Eastern population. This arrangement has resulted in a bonanza for the arms industries in the U.S., Europe, and the Soviet Union. These countries sold over $150 billion dollars of the world’s most sophisticated weapons to Middle East nations between 1973 and 1984…. The governments of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia currently have hundreds of billions of dollars invested in the European and U.S. economies. Meanwhile, little oil revenue has been used to build sustainable, diversified Middle Eastern economies that improve the situation of the majority of the people. The result is that millions of people in the Middle East live in poverty, while surrounded by rulers who live in plenty.”

Our national security now depends not upon money, oil, or weaponry, but rather, upon the maintenance of healthy human communities within a healthy natural environment. To forge a genuine new world order, that is, a sustainable, peaceful and environmentally-secure society, we must first work for justice, for humans and for the environment. Second, we must begin to utilize the strategies nature has developed over the past 4.6 billion years. Nature operates on solar power, recycles energy and materials, and maintains a healthy diversity of species. We can bring the human economy into better accordance with nature’s economy by: 1) dramatically reducing our consumption of resources, 2) shifting from nonrenewable to renewable fuels, 3) demilitarizing our economy, 4) learning to respect the rights of other nation peoples to manage their own affairs and resources. Obviously, this will require some changes in our values.

For starters, we adopt the Buddhist idea of “maximum well being on minimum consumption”; reject materialism as an end and militarism as a means; and begin to restrain the destructive, exploitive forces presently so entrenched within our capitalist system. We might also finally learn to heed Christ’s commandments to “Love your enemies” and “Love they neighbor as thyself.”

What can we as individuals do? The first step is to become informed. The following books provide essential information and concepts: Gaia: An Atlas of Planet Management (N. Meyers, Ed.), The Gaia Peace Atlas (F. Barnaby, Ed.), The Chomsky Reader, The Culture of Terrorism and Necessary Illusions-Thought Control in a Democratic Society (N. Chomsky), The Washington Connection and Third World Fascism (N. Chomsky and E. Herman), War Against the Poor and Low Intensity Conflict and Christian Faith (J. Nelson-Pallmeyer), and The Poverty of Power, Energy and the Economic Crisis (B. Commoner).

As a second step, we need to act on this information and begin to live more responsibly on the earth. We can begin by recycling, curtailing our consumption of resources, and increasing our use of mass transit, car-pools, bicycles, and our own legs! Finally, we need to reactivate our involvement in the democratic process, elect some Green candidates, and take our country back from the business-government-military-industrial complex which now threatens to turn our democratic society into a police state and colony. Unless and until we do so, America itself will be increasingly ravaged by the same forces which now victimize much of the rest of the world.

Webmaster’s 2019 Postscript: When I wrote this piece in 1991, I was very much an avid “environmentalist” and was, perhaps, too naive and idealistic. At the time, I was teaching a university course entitled “Human Ecology,” which in retrospect, I think consisted of too much propaganda. In about the year 2000, however, I began to understand that the environmental movement had been hi-jacked by the U.N. and other “powers-that-be” for political purposes. I now believe that a more accurate assessment of environmental issues can be found on my naturalclimatechange.org website.

However, my skepticism regarding and critique of the government-military-industrial complex is even more valid today than when I wrote this article!