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Date: Tue, 3 Mar 1998
From: Chris Thorman <•••@••.•••>
Subject: East Timor
Believe it or not (I could hardly believe my eyes), there is a huge
front-page article in the SF Chronicle today titled "An Island Lives in
Fear: Indonesian regime subdues East Timor with torture and killings",
complete with color photo, color maps, etc. First paragraph quotes that
200,000 of 700,000 pre-invasion population have been killed since 1976, etc.
Wonder how that finally got onto the radar?
- - -
Chris Thorman •••@••.•••
Ignition, Inc. (415) 392-6244 x3
870 Market Street (415) 392-6245 fax
San Francisco, CA 94102 http://ignitiondesign.com
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Chris,
A good question. Propaganda shifts are usually very informative of elite
intentions.
It is not a question of "getting on the radar" because the US has been
heavily involved in the East Timor genocide all along, not necessarily with
on-site advisors, but with arms, tacit approval, a media blackout, and a
hunger for access to resources.
Massacring native populations, clearing the land for capitalist
development, has been a trademark US policy ever since the Indian Wars.
We are seeing a propaganda shift, not an awareness shift.
The meaning of the shift, I suggest, is actually quite obvious. It follows
a pattern we have seen frequently over the past decade or so, and the
closest precedent is probably Marcos and the Phillipines.
For decades Marcos (like Suharto) was supported and armed by the US (and
other Western powers) BECAUSE of his success at suppressing democracy and
permitting Western economic exploitation. But the time arrived when Marcos
became a political liability. Suddenly the news was full of reports of
"crony capitalism" and of the heroism of the pro-democracy activists. The
same activists would have been called "marxist dissidents" only a few years
earlier and the Phillipines would have been called an "outpost of
democracy".
Since he had become a political liability, it was necessary to replace him.
Suddenly all the things he had been doing with US backing and blessing
were "discovered" and Western public opinion was prepared for a change of
government. The US -- which deserved the _blame_ for the oppression of the
Phillipines during all those years -- instead positioned itself as the one
helping to _solve_ the problem.
Exactly the same thing happened with Noriega and with Saddam, although the
reasons for deciding each had become a liability was different in each
case.
It seems clear to me, therefore, that the US is about to engineer the
overthrow of Suharto and his replacement by a leader of Washington's
choosing. The people of Indonesia will not be allowed to choose their own
new leader, just as Iran was not allowed to choose its own - the Ayatollah
was forced on them by the US and France. When people choose their own
leader they have a nasty habit of choosing one who represents the people.
rkm
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"You may not be able to change the world, but at least
you can embarrass the guilty." --Jessica Mitford (1917-1996)
"Those who can, must!" --Anonymous
"I feel the suffering of millions, and yet when I look up at the sky I
somehow feel that this cruelty shall end and that peace and tranquility
will return."
-Anne Frank
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Posted by: Richard K. Moore | PO Box 26, Wexford, Ireland
•••@••.••• | www.iol.ie/~rkmoore/cyberjournal
* Non-commercial republication encouraged - with this sig *
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