Saturday Morning Links

Assorted content for your weekend reading.

- George Monbiot recognizes that all of the major problems now confronting us derive from the political class' willing subservience to the filthy rich. And Casey Michel notes that the Trump regime's obsession with Greenland reflects the world domination plans of particularly anti-social plutocrats. 

- Paris Marx discusses the need to decouple Canada from any dependence on U.S. tech giants - due to both their own destructive practices, and their fealty to Donald Trump. Timothy Garton Ash writes that Trump's threats to NATO allies will inevitably force the development of a new international order. And Stuart Trew points out the limitations on a strategy of merely replacing the U.S. with China as a dominant source of capital and export market. 

- Ambrosia Wohjan reports on new research showing that the microplastics released from synthetic fabrics may post a particular risk to agriculture. 

- Finally, Jamelle Bouie writes that one of the most important points of distinction between Trump and previous presidents is his mindset that the U.S. exists only as his property and for his benefit. And Doug Firby discusses how the UCP has made dirty politics the norm in Alberta in an effort to lock in permanent power for itself - and how only public rejection can reverse the tide. 

Tuesday Morning Links

This and that for your Tuesday reading.

- Pema Levy observes that Elon Musk's use of the U.S. government to line his own pockets would be illegal under any standard in which conflicts of interest are recognized as being prohibited, while tengrain discusses how the Washington Post and other corporate media are content which dares to challenge Musk. And Brian Beutler points out what Democrats should be doing if they were interested in serving as a meaningful opposition, rather than merely taking up space and hoping for an authoritarian coup to fail on its own. 

- Don Moynihan writes about the obvious mismanagement involved in Musk's practice of purging staff first and asking whether they were needed later, while Tom Nichols discusses how the Trump regime is using weaponized ignorance to destroy government expertise which will be exceedingly difficult to rebuild. And Henry Carnell points out the costs of a war on equity and inclusion.  

- Heather Stewart interviews Joseph Stiglitz about the reality that investors have every reason to stay away from a U.S. regime marked by arbitrary and destructive decision-making. Jeet Heer discusses why the rest of NATO has every reason to set up an alternative defence structure that doesn't depend on an untrustworthy ally. 

- George Monbiot writes about the potential ways Trump may trigger a global collapse. And DeSmog reports on the collaboration between the administration, the fossil fuel sector and fascist politicians from multiple countries working toward that end. 

- Elizabeth Thompson reports on the work Canadian volunteers are doing to try to preserve U.S. public data before it's permanently disappeared. And Kristofer Harrison notes that one of Canada's strongest possible response to Trump's threats will be to fight the corruption at the heart of his regime. 

- Meanwhile, Cole Bennett calls out the conservatives who are eager to sell out Canada to the Trump administration. And Alex Cosh writes that Pierre Poilievre is absolutely unfit to respond to Trump - particularly as his obsession with cutting taxes and slashing government makes him an obvious fellow traveller/pawn rather than a foil to Trump's plans.  

- Finally, Maeva Shearlaw, Adam Sich, Ken Macfarlane and Temujin Doran discuss how the scourge of poverty is undermining the health-care system in the UK (as is the case in Canada as well). And the Australia Institute examines how the climate breakdown is creating all the more financial precarity for households. 

New column day

Here, questioning whether Canadians share Stephen Harper's newly-professed aspiration to spend tens of billions of dollars more every year to prop up U.S. and U.K. military contractors.

For further reading...
- David Pugliese reported on this week's NATO summit.
- NATO's most recent spending calculations are here (see PDF link), showing that Canada currently spends about 1% of GDP on its military. Note that while this number pegs Canada's current spending at about $18.4 billion per year, I reference the $19 billion figure used by both government and outside sources in the previous link.
- While some of us think it's worth asking whether military spending is actually intended to accomplish anything in particular, at least some Very Serious People are arguing that there's nothing more important than spending gobs of money to prove that we're indeed Very Serious.
- By way of comparison to the price of meeting the proposed military spending standard, see here and here (PDF) for estimates of the raw cost of national child care and pharmacare plans respectively. (In the latter case, I treat the added price of additional use as reflecting the new cost of a federal plan.)
- Finally, Jim Stanford rightly highlights how Canada has ignored another international funding target in the form of a significantly smaller foreign aid commitment. But I'd think it's well worth recognizing a contrast between the two which fits the theme of my column: helping those who need it most seems to fit perfectly as something worth aspiring to, while it's hard to see what normative value there can be in arbitrary military spending numbers.

A change in command

I mused a few weeks ago that a likely influx of U.S. troops into Afghanistan might offer an ideal opportunity for Canada to put an end to its current combat mission. But the Times reports that the rationale for withdrawal may be even stronger than I'd figured, as the U.S.' plan involves a radical restructuring of the current multilateral command structure:

The United States is planning to take control of all military operations in Afghanistan next year with an Iraq-style troop surge after becoming frustrated at Nato’s failure to defeat the Taliban.

Plans are being drawn up to send as many as 15,000 extra troops to Afghanistan with a single US general always in command, as in Iraq, defence sources said.

The Pentagon is also pushing for a permanent “unified command” in the south of the country that would sideline the Dutch and the Canadians.

At present, control of the south is rotated between the British, Dutch and Canadians, the three countries that provide the bulk of the troops.

In other words, the planned U.S. surge doesn't just figure to add more than enough troops to offset the effect of a Canadian pullout. Instead, the U.S.' plan is also based on the assumption that the current NATO mission structure needs to be broken down - with the effect of putting all command responsibilities (and presumably plenty of associated decision-making authority) in the hands of the U.S. alone, rather than any coalition where Canada could possibly influence how the mission is carried out.

Which means that the assumptions underlying the last extension vote no longer seem to be operative. And if staying in Afghanistan under a NATO-commanded mission isn't even an option, then it should be obvious that there's a need to reconsider whether Canada wants to dedicate troops to a purely U.S.-led mission - and likely to conclude otherwise.

On backward progress

Not surprisingly, the Cons have done their best to avoid following through on their supposed intention to provide some measurable benchmarks in Afghanistan. But it should be safe to say that whatever the goals are, a massive increase in civilian deaths (particularly ones caused by government/international forces) would have to be a sign that the combat mission isn't accomplishing what it's supposed to:

Bolstering signs that the security situation in Afghanistan is deteriorating, UN reports indicate there have been 62 per cent more civilians killed during the first five months of this year compared to the same period last year, putting the death toll on track to top the more than 1,500 Afghan civilians killed in 2007.
...
According to the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) officials in Kabul, there were 1,500 civilian casualties in 2007. Of these, 46 per cent were caused by insurgents and other anti-government forces, 41 per cent were inflicted by coalition and pro-government forces, while 13 per cent were "un-attributable" and the result of land mines or crossfire.

By comparison, between January and May 2008, some 698 civilian deaths were recorded by UNAMA, representing a 62 percent increase over the 431 non-combatant deaths recorded in the same period in 2007. However, insurgent attacks were reportedly responsible for 60 per cent of those deaths, compared to 37 per cent being caused by pro-government forces.

What's worse, the breakdown in the article doesn't show just how large the increase in deaths caused by international or government forces looks to have been. Applying the percentages listed in the article, the number would have been in the range of 160 for January to May of 2007, rising to 286 in the same period in 2008 for a 78% increase.

As a result, there doesn't seem to be any plausible case to be made that another year of combat has either made Afghan civilians more secure. And with the number of deaths caused by the government side increasing dramatically, there's plenty of reason to think that the competition for the support of the Afghan populace is also looking worse from last year to this one.

All of which means that once again, about the only goal the current mission seems to be achieving is to bog down as much of the Canadian military for as long as possible in an effort that's going in the wrong direction. And that should offer ample reason for Canadians to want a way out.

An exit strategy

Both the Star's editorial board and Linda McQuaig are worth a read in discussing how the U.S. election may affect Canada's role in Afghanistan. But while both seem to look largely at the downside that an increased U.S. focus (particularly under an Obama presidency) might lead to pressure for yet another round of mission creep, it's worth noting that the possibility of the U.S. diverting a large number of troops from Iraq to Afghanistan also presents a significant opportunity for any Canadian government willing to take a stand to end the combat mission.

After all, there doesn't seem to be much disagreement among the NATO countries now involved in Afghanistan that Canada's combat role has left us taking a disproportionate share of the international burden. But the absence of anybody else apparently willing to take over the role now played by Canadian troops has been cited as one of the main reasons for extending the mission rather than seeking to disengage from combat and take on a different role.

From that starting point, a planned influx of U.S. troops which dwarfs what Canada could possibly contribute would seem to offer an ideal opening to ask the U.S. (and anybody looking to win favour with the new American regime) to take over. And while the Harper government obviously isn't about to go in that direction, a renewed prospect of ending the combat mission in Afghanistan might well be enough to help topple the Cons in time to take the opportunity.

(Edit: fixed typo.)

Excuses, excuses

Not surprisingly, the Cons are now having to retract their false claim that it was NATO (and not Deceivin' Stephen) who decided to uninvite opposition defence critics from the upcoming Bucharest summit. But the new explanation only invites more questions about what the Cons' strategy was to begin with:

The Star reported yesterday that Defence Minister Peter MacKay's office had invited opposition critics to go to Bucharest April 2-4, then rescinded the offer 24 hours later, saying, "NATO officials reduced the number of Canadian officials that ... will be allowed to accompany our minister."

Following inquiries to MacKay's office, director of operations Paul J. Throop sent another note to opposition parties "to clarify" why defence critics had been uninvited.

"I wanted to convey to you our directive on the NATO meeting that we do not require pairing, not that it was a NATO directive. Sorry for the confusion," Throop wrote in an email Wednesday.

Pairing is the parliamentary custom of matching a travelling government MP to an opposition member so that no one party is disadvantaged in the event of a vote in the House of Commons.

Now, it's embarrassing enough that the Cons seem to consider being caught in a lie as "confusion". But consider what the Cons' current message suggests about their reason for inviting the opposition parties.

After all, there's no particular reason why a pairing arrangement requires that opposition MPs be flown out of the country. Indeed, the same process is frequently followed by agreement between the parties when MPs aren't able to attend a vote.

But if one takes the Cons at face value, then they were originally willing to offer opposition critics a place in the Bucharest delegation - at public expense - solely for the purpose of getting them out of the House of Commons. And that's only made all the worse by the Cons now reversing course after apparently deciding they don't want any inconvenient reality coming from the Canadian delegation.

Needless to say, it doesn't look like the latest excuse will be the last one. But regardless of what explanation the Cons eventually settle on, the ultimate question once again is how anybody - whether reporter, pundit or mere observer - could justify believing a word from the Cons in the face of yet another set of contradictory and nonsensical excuses in the making.

On sales pitches

Thomas Walkom writes that while Harper's latest jaunt to Afghanistan has mostly been evaluated as a photo-op intended to boost his image domestically, there's another significant factor behind the trip as well - albeit one that speaks even more poorly to the viability of the mission:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper's surprise trip to Kabul is not just a photo op for domestic Canadian consumption. It's part of a concerted effort by the U.S. and its NATO allies to stiffen the spine of President Hamid Karzai and forestall growing sentiment in Afghanistan for a political settlement with the Taliban...

(P)ublic opinion in Europe and Canada is increasingly skeptical about the value of a war that produces casualties but no definable benefits.

Germany is to review its commitment later this year. French President Nicolas Sarkozy has hinted that he might withdraw his country's troops. And in Ottawa, opposition parties have demanded that Canadian forces be withdrawn from the danger zones in Afghanistan's south by no later than February 2009.

On the other hand, Afghans themselves are increasingly restive about the presence of foreign troops in their country – especially when those troops kill civilians. Air strikes are particularly controversial, leading even Karzai to criticize the U.S. practice of large-scale aerial bombardments.

After recent air attacks, including one in Herat earlier this month that killed an estimated 50 civilians and left 2,000 homeless, protesters demanded that Karzai resign.

The flip side of this Afghan dissatisfaction with NATO is a growing movement for some form of political accommodation with the Taliban. Two weeks ago, the Afghan parliament's upper house voted to end offensive military operations and enter into direct talks with the hard-line Islamists.

The lower house has not yet decided whether to support this move. But in March, it passed another controversial bill promoting national reconciliation that would grant all warring factions, including the Taliban, immunity from prosecution...

None of this is entirely novel. Deal-making among warring factions is an Afghan tradition. In 2001, as U.S.-backed forces were sweeping the Taliban from power, an Afghan official close to Karzai negotiated an accommodation with Taliban chief Mullah Omar that would have allowed him to live freely in Kandahar in return for abandoning armed struggle.

The U.S. scotched that attempt. But Karzai has continued his back-channel relations with Taliban insurgents, a fact he acknowledged publicly last month...

(T)he capitals of the West are in a tizzy. Leaders like Harper have to convince their own electorates that Afghanistan is worth the candle. At the same time, they have to convince Afghans that their troops are more than ham-fisted foreign meddlers.

The alternative is a deal with the Taliban that ends the war and allows the country to rebuild. The U.S. and its friends want the war to end – but not that way.

In other words, the secondary purpose for Harper's visit (along with a flurry of other diplomatic activity) has been to push for continued and unnecessary conflict. And if that can only happen as a result of Afghanistan's supposedly more-democratic government ignoring both the will of its people and its own better judgment...then presumably we'll be told once again that self-determination only extends so far as we agree with the results.

It remains to be seen whether the latest round of pressure manages to delay any change for at least another FU or two. But whatever the results of Harper's latest visit, Canadians should be asking themselves whether they want their government's foreign policy to be directed toward trying to sell continued war.

Update: Michael Fellman has more about the growing use of militaristic rhetoric in Canada, which ties in nicely with Harper's effort to sell support for military activity abroad. But there's plenty of reason to doubt whether the pitch will succeed on either ground.