Culture and Life

by Rob Gowland

Fascists? Who, us?

The first province of Yugoslavia to be successfully dismembered from it 
was Croatia, where a fascist regime was brought to power on a platform of 
strident nationalism and anti-communism. It was strongly aided by Germany 
and the US, Germany being the first country to recognise the regime of 
Nazi-apologist Tudjman.

Tudjman became notorious for his pronouncements denying or rewriting 
Croatia's wartime past as a fascist state and Hitlerite puppet.

He particularly outraged non-fascists by his attempt to change the status 
of the former concentration camp at Jasenovac, wanting to put up memorials 
to the Ustashi guards, amongst other offensive changes.

In the middle of last year Nazi-hunters successfully obtained the 
extradition from Argentina of Dinko Sacik and his wife Nada. Dinko had been 
commandant of Jasenovac camp and his wife had been a guard there. Dinko 
also had responsibility for the nearby Stara Gradiska camp.

Of course, trying fascists in a country with a pro-fascist government was 
never going to be easy, and so it has proved, at least in Nada's case. 
Accused of war crimes including the torture of prisoners, she was released 
for "insufficient evidence".

Dinko, charged with the murder of 2,000 people, comes up for trial this 
week. Don't hold your breath for a meaningful sentence, even if he is found 
guilty.

Croatia's recent human rights record, including ethnic cleansing, 
destruction of Serb homes and churches and war crimes, received nothing 
like the attention being given to Serbia over the troubles in Kosovo. Now 
why is that, do you think?

* * *

Ethical assassins

Do you remember Saudi billionaire terrorist Osama bin Laden, whom the 
Yanks credited with masterminding the not very successful bombing of their 
embassies in Kenya and Tanzania?

US missiles were hastily fired into his "base" in Afghanistan and into the 
El Shifa pharmaceuticals factory in the Sudan that he was allegedly using 
to produce components for nerve gas.

That was last August. Since then he has done a vanishing act from the mass 
media. Is the US still trying to track him down? Who knows.

The only recent media references to Bin Laden came this month, but they 
weren't very comforting to the US.

The US ABC television network and The New York Times reported that 
the soil samples allegedly taken from near the Sudanese plant by a CIA 
agent had been examined by the Chemistry Department of Boston University 
which found no trace of chemical weapons compounds in them.

The CIA had claimed that they showed traces of EMPTA, an ingredient in the 
production of nerve gas.

Boston University had been brought in by Salah Idris, the owner of the El 
Shifa plant, who categorically told ABC he had no ties to Bin Laden.

Before the US attack, El Shifa had produced half of Sudan's medical 
supplies, and anti-malaria drugs for much of Africa.

ABC also reported that the US Defence Intelligence Agency had concluded 
that the destruction of El Shifa was based on "bad intelligence and bad 
science".

Which raises questions about the validity of the "intelligence" that blamed 
the Kenyan and Tanzanian bombings on Bin Laden in the first place. After 
all, the use of "unprovoked attacks", bombings, massacres and 
assassinations has long been part of US covert operations.

They even have a special military unit, the Delta Force, which dons foreign 
uniforms to stage attacks on US forces in sensitive areas where a 
"provocation" is needed by the White House.

Delta Force was used rather blatantly in the Panama Canal Zone to provide 
an excuse for US troops to intervene on a large scale.

The next time there is a massacre by a regime the US is trying to 
overthrow, think about Delta Force before accepting the US-derived mass 
media version.

The White House spy Linda Tripp, the "go-between" who brought Monika 
Lewinsky's story to special prosecutor Starr (out of her concern for good 
government, of course), bragged about her previous role as a covert agent 
for Delta Force.

Last year the US Congress seriously took up the question of whether they 
should drop the official ban on assassinations adopted by President Ford in 
1976.

Ford imposed the ban after disclosures about CIA attempts to kill Fidel 
Castro had caused a wave of international protests.

The likelihood that the US actually abandoned assassination as part of its 
covert arsenal is of course laughable.

Pro-assassination members of Congress readily admitted that the US still 
continues to "eliminate" the countries' "enemies".

What concerned them seemed to be that, because of Ford's ban, attempts to 
bump off high profile targets like Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, Libyan 
President Moammar Kadafi or even our old friend Osama bin Laden had to be 
disguised as attacks on military targets. This it was felt was 
"hypocritical".

Besides airborn missile attacks are much more messy and not nearly so 
effective as an assassin's bullet. A lot harder to hide who did it too.

What the pro-assassination lobby were arguing for was the restoration of 
assassination as a "legitimate" form of US government activity.

Their twisted logic was demonstrated by L Paul Bremer III, who served as 
the State Department's top counter-terrorism official during the 
administration of that moral and ethical paragon Ronald Reagan.

Bremer said trying to kill "enemy" leaders with missiles "isn't morally or 
ethically preferable in any way". And he's absolutely right. And of course 
he is absolutely right.

But neither is killing political opponents with a telescopic rifle or a 
poisoned cigar. It is the killing that is unethical, not the size of 
the body count or the "collateral" damage.