war crimes
The Crime of Occupation: From Bosnia & Kosovo to Congo, Haiti and Vieques
Opening panel remarks by Sarah Sloan, International Action Center
It’s been said that war is an extension of politics by other means. But what is politics? In this period, that is, the period of the last hundred or so years, politics, if we examine it, is really simply concentrated economics. That is, the politics of this age are the politics of economics. And war is just one way in which economic interests and the dominant economic forces attempt to achieve their agenda.
One hundred years ago, the Untied States invaded Cuba claiming to be on a humanitarian mission to help liberate Cubans who were fighting for their independence from the Old Spanish Empire. But it shouldn't be too hard for us to realize that it wasn't about the freedom or liberation of the Cuban people. It was for the grabbing, that is, the annexation, or political and military domination of Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines by the United States. Specifically, the United States was trying to be able to grab the sugar and tobacco plantations of the Carribean. They were trying to dominate Central America so as to build what soon became the Panama Canal. And they were trying to militarily grab the Phillippines as a foothold as part of a bigger economic expansion towards China.
The U.S. spoke in the name of liberation. But the occupation of these countries has lasted for one hundred years. And let's not forget that a part of Cuba, socialist Cuba, is still occupied by a U.S. military base at Guantonomo. This occupation meant a new kind of enslavement, new forms of exploitation for the land, the resources, and especially the labor of the Cuban, Puerto Rican, and Phillipino people.
When the U.S. seizes territory they have a tendency not to leave.
Forty-six years ago this week, there was an armistice agreement, not a peace treaty, but an armistice agreement that ended the Korean War. Even to this day the U.S. has not signed a peace treaty with the northern part of Korea, the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea. The U.S. refusing to sign a peace treaty means that technically, the U.S. is still at war. This provides the legal pretext to keep forty thousand U.S. troops occupying south Korea.
When the U.S. comes and occupies, they have a tendency not to leave.
It lists like a role call--from Panama to Korea to Nicaragua to Haiti to Cuba to Africa to the Middle East, and now to Yugoslavia. This period, the era of imperialism, has meant that the world has been partitioned by a handful--and it's a very small, tiny handful--of capitalist and imperialist countries in western Europe and the United States.
The U.S. and NATO say they're occupying Kosovo to liberate Albanians. That's no less of a lie. We don't separate the war crimes from the political and economic agenda of these imperialist countries. We have to know what it is that we're fighting against. This is an economic system that depends on the occupation of other lands and other peoples by force of arms. It depends on the subjagation and exploitation of those people. It is in a perpetual drive towards war for the purpose of economic benefits for its corporate elite. We consider any system like this to be inherently criminal, to be morally bankrupt.
And so we take the time to examine the criminal character of the occupation. Bosnia, Haiti, Kurdistan, Vieques, the Congo--different parts of the world, but all share the common problem of imperialist domination. Today, on the panel, are representatives of these struggles here to give testimony of the occupation and the crimes against humanity committed in their countries. Today, we forge the bonds for a new united front against war crimes, crimes against humanity and the system that breeds them.
Commission of Inquiry
c/o International Action Center
39 West 14th Street, Room 206
New York, NY 10011
email: iacenter@iacenter.org
http://www.iacenter.org
phone: 212 633-6646
fax: 212 633-2889
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