I want you to give all these chiefs of the soldiers here to understand that we are for peace, and that we have made peace, that we may not be mistaken by them for enemies.
A Cheyenne cemetery is in the same direction as where my mother told me she watched gypsies camp through her west window as a girl, about ½ mile from that house. I have reverently walked though that Cheyenne cemetery as early as ten, looking at the headstones and wondering who they were and where they came from. I did not know then, that in that cemetery were descendants from the Sand Creek Massacre.
The Approaching Genocide Towards Sand Creek
Simultaneously, Roman Nose led the Dog Soldiers in battle while Black Kettle strove for peace. Chief Black Kettle was promised complete safety by Colonel Greenwood as long as he rose the U.S flag above him.(1) Black Kettle persisted in his calls for peace in spite of the continuing exterminations and the shooting of Lean Bear.
Lean Bear, a leading peacemaker who had previously met with President Abraham Lincoln in Washington, D.C., was shot from his horse without warning by U.S. troops during a Kansas buffalo hunt. The troops were acting under orders from Colonel John M. Chivington who commanded the military district of Colorado: "Find Indians wherever you can and kill them" (The War of the Rebellion, 1880-1881, pp. 403-404).
Perplexed by the continuing genocide, Black Kettle sent for Little White Man, known as William Bent.Almost prophetic, both agreed in their meeting that a war was about to be born if nothing changed. Black Kettle's peaceful attempts tragically failed, even though he took his people to Sand Creek, fully expecting peace.His last effort for peace was raising the U.S. flag just prior to the massacre.
"...Though no treaties were signed, the Indians believed that by reporting and camping near army posts, they would be declaring peace and accepting sanctuary.
However on the day of the "peace talks" Chivington received a telegram from General Samuel Curtis (his superior officer) informing him that "I want no peace till the Indians suffer more...No peace must be made without my directions."
Unaware of Curtis's telegram, Black Kettle and some 550 Cheyennes and Arapahos, having made their peace, traveled south to set up camp on Sand Creek under the promised protection of Fort Lyon. Those who remained opposed to the agreement headed North to join the Sioux.
The Sand Creek Massacre of November 29, 1864
Black Kettle and his people had every reason to expect complete safety from their bloodshed after agreements for peace were made and the Dog Soldiers left to join the Sioux. Nonetheless, Chivington's troops advanced on the Cheyenne and Arapaho near dawn. The sound of those approaching hooves must have sounded ominous.
U.S. soldiers inevitably chased the defenseless Cheyenne and Arapaho by horse and foot with knives and guns in hand. Their victims had to be positioned before ripping off their scalps, cutting off their ears, smashing out their brains, butchering their children, tearing their breastfeeding infants away from their mother's breasts, and then murdering those infants. The "Bloody Third" soldiers necessarily had to kill the infants before cutting out their mother's genitals
The one question I never saw asked in the congressional hearings was, "Didn't you disgraceful soldiers realize they were family?"
Kurt Kaltreider, PH.D. "American Indian Prophecies." pp. 58-59:
-The report of witnesses at Sand Creek:
"I saw some Indians that had been scalped, and the ears cut off the body of White Antelope," said Captain L. Wilson of the first Colorado Cavalry. "One Indian who had been scalped had also his skull smashed in, and I heard that the privates of White Antelope had been cut off to make a tobacco bag of. I heard some of the men say that the privates of one of the squaws had been cut out and put on a stick..." John S. Smith...
All manner of depredations were inflicted on their persons; they were scalped, their brains knocked out; the men used their knives, ripped open women, clubbed little children, knocked them in the heads with their guns, beat their brains out, mutilated their bodies in every sense of the word...worse mutilation that I ever saw before, the women all cut to pieces...children two or three months old; all ages lying there.
Sand Creek being a deliberate massacre is not contested, especially since the "Bloody Third" set the village in flames and took all the evidence back to Washington to hide it.
Letters written by those at Sand Creek From Lt. Silas Soule to Maj. Edward Wynkoop, Dec. 14, 1864:
"The massacre lasted six or eight hours...I tell you Ned it was hard to see little children on their knees have their brains beat out by men professing to be civilized....They were all scalped, and as high as a half a dozen [scalps] taken from one head. They were all horribly mutilated...You could think it impossible for white men to butcher and mutilate human beings as they did there, but every word I have told you is the truth, which they do not deny...I expect we will have a hell of a time with Indians this winter."
Before departing, the command, now the "Bloody Third", ransacked and burned the village. The surviving Indians, some 300 people, fled north towards other Cheyenne camps.
Medicine Calf Beckwourth sought Black Kettle to ask him if peace was yet possible, but Black Kettle had moved out to be with relatives. Leg-in-the-Water replaced him as the primary chief; so, Beckwourth asked Leg-in-the-Water if there could be peace. Principle chief Leg-in-the-Water responded with these powerful words.
Dee Brown. "Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee." p. 94:
"The white man has taken our country, killed all of our children. Now no peace. We want to go meet our families in the spirit land. We loved the whites until we found out they lied to us, and robbed us of what we had. We have raised the battle ax until death."(1)
...despite broken promises and attacks on his own life, speak of him as a great leader with an almost unique vision of the possibility for coexistence between white society and the culture of the plains…
FDR Signs the Glass-Steagall Act (Carter Glass on Left)
Many Democrats wish Bill Clinton still occupied the White House. However, before you put him in Mt. Rushmore, you might want to investigate his role in the mortgage foreclosure crisis.
The chief aim of what I have termed the Republican Counterrevolution has always been to roll back the New Deal. Anti-gov'ment rhetoric hides this as surely as states' rights hid racist segregation. Of all the New Deal legislation the GOP has sought to overturn, one that has always been at or near the top of the list is the Glass-Steagall Act. Ironically, a Democratic president repealed this for them. Glass-Steagall
An unreconstructed Southerner from Virginia, Carter Glass shepherded the creation of the Federal Reserve System through Congress, which has caused some to call him the "founding father of the Federal Reserve System." Later Glass would serve as Wilson's Treasury Secretary, recommending aid to Europe after World War I. Just before leaving Treasury to become senator, Glass warned about banks getting involved in stocks.
In his economic history of the Great Depression, John Kenneth Galbraith pointed out one of the causes was:
The large-scale corporate thimblerigging that was going on. This took a variety of forms, of which by far the most common was the organization of corporations to hold stock in yet other corporations, which in turn held stock in yet other corporations.
Galbraith would note:
During 1929 one investment house, Goldman, Sachs & Company, organized and sold nearly a billion dollars’ worth of securities in three interconnected investment trusts—Goldman Sachs Trading Corporation; Shenandoah Corporation; and Blue Ridge Corporation. All eventually depreciated virtually to nothing.
It is hard to imagine today what it felt like to walk through the door of a bank in those days and learn that the dollars you had earned had vanished. Every day spent working and saving had been for nothing. A great many farmers, brick layers, carpenters, factory workers believed the bankers had stolen their lives.
When Franklin Roosevelt took office, both the President and Congress knew the banking crisis demanded immediate action. The result was one of the crown jewels of the New Deal: the Glass-Steagall Act, officially known as the Banking Act of 1933. Glass made sure the bill forbid banks from getting into the investment business. In addition, the bill established the Federal Deposit Insurance Company, which protects our bank deposits.
In 1971, in Investment Company Institute v. Camp, no less than the United States Supreme Court would write what stands as the most cogent summary of the reasons for Glass-Steagall:
Congress was concerned that commercial banks in general and member banks of the Federal Reserve System in particular had both aggravated and been damaged by stock market decline partly because of their direct and indirect involvement in the trading and ownership of speculative securities.
The legislative history of the Glass-Steagall Act shows that Congress also had in mind and repeatedly focused on the more subtle hazards that arise when a commercial bank goes beyond the business of acting as fiduciary or managing agent and enters the investment banking business either directly or by establishing an affiliate to hold and sell particular investments.
Many arguments the Supreme Court advanced in support of Glass-Steagall, would prove prophetic three decades later.
Bill Clinton and the Wall of Me
Billionaire Sanford I. Weill, who according to Louis Uchitelle made "Citigroup into the most powerful financial institution since the House of Morgan a century ago," has what I call the Wall of Me leading to his office, which he has decorated with tributes to him, including a dozen framed magazine covers. A major trophy is the pen Bill Clinton used to sign the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act, a move which allowed Weill to create Citigroup. Fittingly, Citigroup is a major contributor to guess which current Democratic Presidential candidate?
Sandy Weill calls President Clinton in the evening to try to break the deadlock after Senator Phil Gramm, chairman of the Banking Committee, warned Citigroup lobbyist Roger Levy that Weill has to get White House moving on the bill or he would shut down the House-Senate conference. Serious negotiations resume, and a deal is announced at 2:45 a.m. on Oct. 22. Whether Weill made any difference in precipitating a deal is unclear.
Just days after the administration (including the Treasury Department) agrees to support the repeal, Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin, the former co-chairman of a major Wall Street investment bank, Goldman Sachs, raises eyebrows by accepting a top job at Citigroup as Weill's chief lieutenant. The previous year, Weill had called Secretary Rubin to give him advance notice of the upcoming merger announcement. When Weill told Rubin he had some important news, the secretary reportedly quipped, "You're buying the government?"
When Bill Clinton gave that pen to Sanford Weill, it symbolized the ending of the twentieth century Democratic Party that had created the New Deal. Although the 1999 law did not repeal all of the banking Act of 1933, retaining the FDIC, it did once again allow banks to enter the securities business, becoming what some term "whole banks."
The repeal of one of the most important pieces of legislation in this nation's history came about as a result of another Clinton "triangulation," the wobbling attempt to find the middle of the road that has somehow managed to pass for a philosophy with many Democrats for over two decades. As former Clinton former campaign Richard Morris once described it, you move a little to the left, a little to the right. I'd love to hear Clinton give that explanation to a foreclosed home owner today.
With the stroke of a pen, Bill Clinton ended an era that stretched back to William Jennings Bryan and Woodrow Wilson and reached fruition with FDR and Harry Truman. As he signed his name, in the whorls and dots of his pen strokes William Jefferson Clinton was also symbolically signing the death warrant of Liberal America and its core belief in the level playing field that had guided the Democratic Party. But it was the gift of the pen to Sanford Weill and its assuming an honored place on the Wall of Me that rubbed salt in the wound.
Practices of the unscrupulous money changers stand indicted in the court of public opinion, rejected by the hearts and minds of men.
Clinton not only repealed the act Roosevelt had put in place to curb those practices, but presented one of the pens used to sign it to one of those "money changers."
What Hath Clinton Wrought?
What can be said in Clinton's favor is that in 1999 few people anticipated the out-of-control growth of the hedge fund industry and the subprime mortgage market. The New York Times described the new financial world created by the repeal of Glass-Steagall in a June 2007 profile of Goldman Sachs:
While Wall Street still mints money advising companies on mergers and taking them public, real money — staggering money — is made trading and investing capital through a global array of mind-bending products and strategies unimaginable a decade ago.
Curiously, Goldman Sachs head Lloyd Blankfein paints the perfect big picture of what has happened:
We’ve come full circle, because this is exactly what the Rothschilds or J. P. Morgan, the banker were doing in their heyday. What caused an aberration was the Glass Steagall Act.
Blankfein's analysis testifies to the full impact of Bill Clinton's actions, for like many members of the Counterrevolution he sees the New Deal as an aberration and longs for a return to the days J. P. Morgan and other tycoons gave the Gilded Age its nickname. His "aberration" was eliminated not because of the actions of some radical Republican, but because of Bill Clinton. No wonder Goldman Sachs is also a prime contributor to you-know-who.
As is often the case, the story of the repeal of Glass-Steagall and the growth of the subprime mortgage market that is now crumbling around us like a financial house of cards can be best be told by a graph:
If you think of this graph as the level playing field, notice how flat it was before Bill Clinton repealed Glass-Steagall, then notice how steep it has become. Those subprime loans amount to nothing more than an organized ripoff of millions of innocent Americans, with the steepness of the graph illustrating the how far the playing field has tilted.
The result is that all of a sudden people are thinking Glass-Steagall wasn't such a bad idea after all. Robert Kuttner testified before Barney Frank's Committee on Banking and Financial Services in October, evoking the dreaded specter of the Great Depression:
Since repeal of Glass Steagall in 1999, after more than a decade of de facto inroads, super-banks have been able to re-enact the same kinds of structural conflicts of interest that were endemic in the 1920s – lending to speculators, packaging and securitizing credits and then selling them off, wholesale or retail, and extracting fees at every step along the way. And, much of this paper is even more opaque to bank examiners than its counterparts were in the 1920s. Much of it isn’t paper at all, and the whole process is supercharged by computers and automated formulas.
I'm not saying that Glass-Steagall would have made a difference to the evolution of the collateralized debt obligations. But it might have helped identify and isolated the damage.
As Congress continues to investigate the mortgage crisis, more people are wondering whether the repeal of Glass-Steagall was a mistake.
The Future of Your Mortgage
In testimony before Congress on November 8, Federal Reserve Chair Ben Bernanke painted a grim picture of the current crisis and even grimmer picture of the future:
On average from now until the end of next year, nearly 450,000 subprime mortgages per quarter are scheduled to undergo their first interest rate reset. [My emphasis]
According to a December 2006 study by the Center for Responsible Lending, a nonpartisan research and policy organization:
More than 2 million people with subprime loans are facing foreclosure this year and nearly 20 percent of subprime mortgages issued between 2005 and 2006 are projected to fail.
But numbers and testimony and even history mean little to those who suddenly find themselves up against the wall. In every city and town across this country "For Sale" signs are popping up on lawns. Behind each of those signs lies a personal story, a family tragedy, which like the tragedies of the Great Depression, tells of innocent Americans felled by an affliction they never saw coming. Walk any street in this country today--even in affluent neighborhoods--and each time you see one of those signs the hairs on the back of your own neck stand up, because those signs instill the same fear people felt when they walked into a bank in 1932 and found their money gone.
Two million people have found themselves one step away from figuratively being tossed out onto the street, the way millions were in the 1930s. Meanwhile, there are young people starting new lives for whom home ownership is rapidly receding, middle-aged people who finally had scraped together enough for a down payment only to find they can't get a mortgage and older people for whom their home was their retirement and now find its value dropping like George Bush's poll numbers. Finally there are even millions more for whom the collateral damage from the crises promises to cast its shadow over their American Dream.
The International Monetary Fund recently drew the following lessons from various financial crisis:
It is difficult to tell at the time whether a financial crisis will have broader economic consequences
Regulators often cannot keep up with the pace of financial innovation that may trigger a crisis.
Both have characterized what happened after the repeal of Glass-Steagall. It is too bad Bill Clinton did not have their wisdom when he made his decision, but then when you make decisions by triangulating, how much weight do you give such studies?
And the current crop of politicians? Look closely at their donor lists, which I detailed in the series "Follow the Money." Then wonder why no moderator or other candidate has asked Hillary Clinton if she supports her husband's repeal of Glass-Steagall? Ask the other candidates if they support Bill Clinton's move.
Meanwhile the signs keep sprouting and the playing field keeps tilting and soon the snow will start to fall, drifting against the signs. How many more people will have lost their homes when the snow melts?
The intent to commit genocide at Washita is hidden in plain view, unless key elements are brought together. These are: that the Cheyenne were placed on land where they would starve while promises to avert starvation were broken; that George Bent observed how Civil War soldiers did not harm white women and children by a “code of honor,” while Indian women and children were slaughtered; that Sheridan declared "The only good Indians I ever saw were dead;" and that the War Department did not differentiate between peaceful and warring Indians. Hence, the orders “to kill or hang all warriors.” As the consequence, the intent was to kill all men of a specific race.
We’ll begin with Custer prior to the Washita Massacre along with the fact that the Cheyenne were forced onto land wherein they would starve.
Part 1: The Intent to Commit Genocide
Custer's tactical errors of rushing ahead of the established military plans and dividing his troops are well known.
On the verge of what seemed to him a certain and glorious victory for both the United States and himself, Custer ordered an immediate attack on the Indian village.
Contemptuous of Indian military prowess, he split his forces into three parts to ensure that fewer Indians would escape. The attack was one the greatest fiascos of the United States Army, as thousands of Lakota, Cheyenne and Arapaho warriors forced Custer's unit back onto a long, dusty ridge parallel to the Little Bighorn, surrounded them, and killed all 210 of them.
Yet, what enabled him to get back "on the course" after his court martial in 1867 and his being relieved by President Ulysses S. Grant temporarily in 1876?
The answers to that question are deception, wisely having prevented Washita from being labeled a massacre by halting the slaying of women and children at Washita; thus, sidestepping a full investigation as Sand Creek was (my speculation), and more lies.
Forcing and binding those Native Nations onto land where they could not survive by hunting or agriculture, breaking promises to provide those survival means, and propaganda revolving around the Kansas Raids reset Custer "on the course." Moxtaveto (Black Kettle) was innocent.
What about the Dog Soldiers, weren't they somehow to blame? An old Indian joke goes, "When the whites win, it's a victory; when the Indians win, it's a massacre." Let's look at what occurred amongst the Chiefs after the Sand Creek Massacre and prior to the Kansas Raids to find some answers, in between the "victories" and the "massacres."
And so, when the Chiefs gathered to decide what the people should do, Black Kettle took his usual place among them. Everyone agreed Sand Creek must be avenged. But there were questions. Why had the soldiers attacked with such viciousness? Why had they killed and mutilated women and children? It seemed that the conflict with the whites had somehow changed. No longer was it just a war over land and buffalo. Now, the soldiers were destroying everything Cheyenne - the land, the buffalo, and the people themselves.
Why? George thought he knew. He had lived among the whites and had fought in their war. He knew their greed for land and possessions - Their appetite for these things was boundless. But they also obeyed rules of warfare peculiar to them. They waged war on men, and only on recognized fields of battle. In the great life-and-death struggle between North and South even then raging in the East, prisoners were routinely paroled and released or held in guarded camps, where they were fed and cared for. And the whites never warred on women and children who were protected by law and by an unshakable code of honor -
Still Black Kettle counseled peace. A war with the whites, he said, could not be won. The newcomers were too numerous, their weapons too strong. Besides, they had the ability to fight in winter when Cheyenne horses were weak and food was scarce... For Black Kettle, Cheyenne survival depended on peace. War could only bring more Sand Creeks, more deaths, more sorrow - One by one the council Chiefs smoked the red stone war pipe, each recognizing the importance of his decision. When the pipe reached Black Kettle, he passed it on, refusing to smoke. But the others took it up, indicating they would fight.
Hence, the Kansas "Raids" were the only means left available to keep what was promised to them: the ability to survive. The land "given" to them was neither harvestable nor huntable. Those "raids" were the last resort of self defense for survival.
Black Kettle miraculously escaped harm at the Sand Creek Massacre, even when he returned to rescue his seriously injured wife. And perhaps more miraculously, he continued to counsel peace when the Cheyenne attempted to strike back with isolated raids on wagon trains and nearby ranches. By October 1865, he and other Indian leaders had arranged an uneasy truce on the plains, signing a new treaty that exchanged the Sand Creek reservation for reservations in southwestern Kansas but deprived the Cheyenne of access to most of their coveted Kansas hunting grounds.
Furthermore, General Sheridan never had any intention of peaceful relations with Black Kettle whatsoever.
(Bold mine)
Dee Brown. "Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee." P. 169.
In his official report over the "savage butchers" and "savage bands of cruel marauders," General Sheridan rejoiced that he had "wiped out Black Kettle, a worn - out and worthless old cipher."
He then stated that he had promised Black Kettle sanctuary if he would come into a fort before military operations began. "He refused," Sheridan lied, "and was killed in the fight."
In fact, it is owed to General Sheridan himself the "American aphorism," "The only good Indian is a dead Indian." It started as "The only good Indians I ever saw were dead."
Whether or not Black Kettle strove for peace or the Dog Soldiers fought.. they were all as "good as dead." The extermination policy set Custer "on the course" to Washita.
Given the War Department's mandate that all Cheyennes were guilty for the sins of the few in regard to the Kansas raids, there is no question that Custer succeeded in this purpose by attacking Black Kettle's village. His instructions from his superiors had been "to destroy their villages and ponies; to kill or hang all warriors, and bring back all women and children."
Part 2: The Approaching Genocide at Washita
Custer was pursuing the snow tracks of Dog Soldiers that would eventually lead to Black Kettle's village on Thanksgiving Day in a cruel irony. The cruelest irony however, was that Black Kettle and his wife would be slain nearly four years to the day that they both escaped Chivington at the Sand Creek Massacre. Black Kettle's honesty concerning young men in his village he could not control was of no avail. He and his village were going to be "punished" and broken beyond any immediate or distant recovery.
John Corbin, the messenger from Major Elliot, rode up and informed Custer of two large Indian snow tracks. One was recent. Preparations were then made to pursue the "savages" as covertly as possible. Smoking ceased and weapons were bound to prevent visual or aural detection. In addition, the 7th whispered and paused frequently as they rode slowly towards the future tracks that would lead to Black Kettle's village. Simultaneously, Black Kettle received dire warnings that he and the others ignored. A Kiowa war party gave the first warning of having seen soldier's tracks that were heading their direction. It was discounted. Black Kettle's wife, Medicine Woman, gave another warning that night before the 7th's arrival of an intuitive nature during the meeting in the Peace Chief's lodge by firelight. She begged them to move immediately. It too was dismissed. They would move the next day, instead.
Black Kettle had already moved their camp recently, which the returning war party that had helped in the Kansas Raids learned upon their returning. November 25th found this war party dividing into two different directions in order to reach their destinations the quickest. Approximately 139 of them traveled to the big village on the river, while about 11 of them led Custer straight to Black Kettle. A bell around one dog's neck enabled all the dogs to be located easily by the tribe, and after a Cheyenne baby cried, Custer pinpointed their exact location. He coordinated the attack to begin at dawn from four fronts.
Custer knew their mobility was greatly hampered in winter time; consequently, that was an important element in the "campaign."
Part 3: The Genocide At Washita
The sensory components of the genocide at Washita in now Cheyenne, Oklahoma must be held in mind in order to capture the entire breadth of it. These are sound, smell, and sight. For example, the shrill crying of the noncombatant Cheyenne women and children, and the yelling of the charging 7th Calvary with their knives and guns would have been beyond deafening. And the fog with gunpowder smoke must have been worse than any nightmare, while the red blood - stained snow and the smell of death permeated the ground and air.
A woman dashed into the village to warn Black Kettle of the coming troopers; he hastily snatched his rifle from his lodge and fired a warning shot for all to awaken and flee. If he had attempted to meet the soldiers and ask for peaceful negotiations, that would have been useless; as a result, he then mounted his horse with his wife, Woman Here After, and tried to escape through the North direction. His horse was shot in the leg before bullets knocked him and his wife off the horse and into the Washita River, where they both died together.
"Both the chief and his wife fell at the river bank riddled with bullets," one witness reported, "the soldiers rode right over Black Kettle and his wife and their horse as they lay dead on the ground, and their bodies were all splashed with mud by the charging soldiers." Custer later reported that an Osage guide took Black Kettle's scalp.
Moving Behind, a Cheyenne Woman, later stated: "There was a sharp curve in the river where an old road - crossing used to be. Indian men used to go there to water their ponies. Here we saw the bodies of Black Kettle and his wife, lying under the water. The horse they had ridden lay dead beside them. We observed that they had tried to escape across the river when they were shot."
Location of Black Kettle's death
Warriors, eleven who died, rushed out of their lodges with inferior firepower to defend the village. Simultaneously, the overall noncombatants ran for their lives into the freezing Washita River.
(Taken with permission)
The words of Ben Clark, Custer's chief of scouts, brought the truth out after Custer distributed propaganda about one white woman and two white boys as having been hostages in Black Kettle’s village. There were no “hostages, a Cheyenne woman committed suicide. Speculating, here is why.
She didn't want her son mutilated by Custer or a 7th Calvary soldier; she didn't want her vagina ripped out and put on a stick, worn, or made into a tobacco pouch. So, she killed her son and herself first.
There, as the people fell at the hands of the troopers, one woman, in a helpless rage, stood up with her baby, held it out in an outstretched arm, and with the other drew a knife and fatally stabbed the infant - erroneously believed by the soldiers to be a white child. She then plunged the blade into her own chest in suicide.
(Location of the genocide at Washita, a few yards from Black Kettle’s death)
The 7th hunted them down and murdered them. Although the orders were to "hang all warriors;" it was much more convenient to shoot them. All wounded Cheyenne were shot where they laid.
Osage scouts mutilated women and children. They did a "roundup" of their own by using tree limbs to herd the defenseless Cheyenne women and children back to the village, where the mutilations could continue. Custer halted the slaying of women and children at one point, but he raped them later in captivity.
They (Osages) "shot down the women and mutilated their bodies, cutting off their arms, legs and breasts with knives."
The 7th captured the Cheyenne and started bonfires. They burned the 51 lodges to the ground. Winter clothing that was depended upon for winter survival was incinerated in the flames, as was food supplies. Weapons and all lodge contents were burned also, including any sacred items.
Finally, 875 horses were shot, thus stripping away their last means of survival and independence.
Dee Brown. "Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee." P.170
Late in December the survivors of Black Kettle's band began arriving at Fort Cobb - Little Robe was now the nominal leader of the tribe, and was taken to see Sheridan he told the bearlike soldier chief that his people were starving - they had eaten all their dogs.
Sheridan replied that the Cheyennes would be fed if they all came into Fort Cobb and surrendered unconditionally. "You cannot make peace now and commence killing whites again in the spring." Sheridan added, "If you are not willing to make a complete peace, you can go back and we will fight this thing out."
Little Robe knew there was but one answer he could give. "It is for you to say what we have to do," he said.
(It is worth noting also that the Fuhrer from time to time expressed admiration for the "efficiency" of the American genocide campaign against the Indians, viewing it as a forerunner for his own plans and programs.)
The Cheyenne women were "transported" by an officer named Romero to the other officers once they were prisoners at Fort Cobb.
Rape.
Custer "enjoyed one" every evening in the privacy of his tent. Presumably, he stopped raping the Cheyenne women when his wife arrived.
Custer's wife, Elizabeth (Bacon), whom he married in 1864, lived to the age of ninety-one. The couple had no children. She was devoted to his memory, wrote three books about him, and when she died in 1933 was buried beside him at West Point. Her Tenting on the Plains (1887) presents a charming picture of their stay in Texas. Custer's headquarters building in Austin, the Blind Asylum, located on the "Little Campus" of the University of Texas, has been restored.
Jerome A. Greene. "Washita." Chap. 8, p.169.
Ben Clack told Walter M. Camp: many of the squaws captured at Washita were used by the officers...Romero was put in charge of them and on the march Romero would send squaws around to the officers' tents every night. [Clark] says Custer picked out a fine looking one and had her in his tent every night."
This statement is more or less confirmed by Frederick Benteen, who in 1896 asserted that Custer selected Monahseetah/Meotzi from among the women prisoners and cohabited with her "during the winter and spring of 1868 and '69" until his wife arrived in the summer of 1869. Although Benteen's assertions regarding Custer are not always to be trusted, his statements nonetheless conform entirely to those of the reliable Ben Clark and thus cannot be ignored."
To end this, I will quote former Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell from the dedication of the Sand Creek Massacre, "If there were any savages that day, it was not the Indian people."
A star-studded group of historians has issued a statement supporting Senator Barack Obama for President. Among the signatories are former AHA Presidents Joyce Appleby and James McPherson, Cliopatria blogger Ralph Luker, and our very own James Livingston. The statement reads, in part:
… it is his qualities of mind and temperament that really separate Obama from the rest of the pack. He is a gifted writer and orator who speaks forcefully but without animus. Not since John F. Kennedy has a Democrat candidate for president showed the same combination of charisma and thoughtfulness - or provided Americans with a symbolic opportunity to break with a tradition of bigotry older than the nation itself. Like Kennedy, he also inspires young people who see him as a great exception in a political world that seems mired in cynicism and corruption.
As president, Barack Obama would only begin the process of healing what ails our society and ensuring that the U.S. plays a beneficial role in the world. But we believe he is that rare politician who can stretch the meaning of democracy, who can help revive what William James called "the civic genius of the people."
The group, led by Georgetown’s Michael Kazin (the principal author of the statement) and Ralph Luker (the principal organizer), is recruiting more historians to sign the statement. If you are a professional historian, you can add your name by e-mailing either of them (their contact information is listed at the link above).
Here’s why I won’t be joining them.
My candidate endorsements for the current presidential cycle have been a crazy-quilt of indecision. Including draft candidacies, I have variously supported Brian Schweitzer (for whom I co-founded the first draft campaign of the 2008 season, back in May 2005), Russ Feingold, Barack Obama, Al Gore, John Edwards, and Christopher Dodd. Back in 2004, those of us Howard Dean supporters lampooned blogger Ezra Klein (now a writer at The American Prospect) for shifting his support from Gary Hart to Dean, Wesley Clark, and finally Edwards – but my waffling this cycle has outstripped even Ezra’s.
Beneath my inherent indecision, however, my candidate-switching has been motivated by the distinct feeling that none of the candidates currently in the race truly meet my standards of what a President should be. Obama, in particular, has been a real disappointment. After hearing his electrifying speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, I was prepared to enthusiastically support his candidacy.
But Senator Obama has not campaigned in the bold, pathbreaking manner in which he delivered that speech. On the contrary, the entire record of his campaign is one of equivocation and half-measures. To name just a few examples, Obama has sought to undo decades of successful government secularization by advocating for more overt expressions of faith in the halls of power. He orchestrated a “Sister Souljah” moment with liberal blogs as his foil when he defended from online criticism Democratic senators who supported the Supreme Court conformation of the anti-abortion conservative John Roberts. Despite his initial opposition to the war, he has refused to pledge an end to American military involvement in Iraq or to take the lead in Congress on ending the war. He has campaigned with a homophobic minister, Rev. Donnie McClurkin, and refused to disavow McClurkin even when the man’s views were pointed out to him. He failed to appear in Congress to vote against the confirmation of Attorney General Michael Mukasey, who believes that waterboarding is not a form of torture. His “universal” healthcare program covers fifteen million fewer Americans than does that of former Senator Edwards. He has failed to lay out specific plans to combat poverty, as has Edwards. He ceded leadership to Senator Dodd on the critical issue of the President’s illegal warrantless wiretapping of American citizens. These are not the actions of a President; they are not even the actions of a strong leader.
(As an aside, I categorically reject the notion that I or anyone else should vote based on “a symbolic opportunity to break with a tradition of bigotry” in what is shaping up to be easily the most critical election in a generation. The only way to break with this tradition is to judge Senator Obama not by the color of his skin, to paraphrase Dr. King, but by the content of his character. That a group of distinguished historians would advocate such a consideration, even in passing, is deeply troubling to me.)
Am I too picky for the American political scene, demanding absolute agreement from my candidate? I doubt it – I disagreed with Howard Dean in 2004 on issues from the war to balanced budgets, gun control, and gay marriage, yet I respected him for his principled positions and enthusiastically supported him anyway. What I am unwilling to overlook is a difference of opinion over the fundamental goals of presidential leadership for the coming term.
Such a disagreement exists between my views and those expressed by Obama in his 2006 book, The Audacity of Hope. According to his own words, Obama advocates “a politics with the maturity to balance idealism and realism, to distinguish between what can and cannot be compromised, to admit the possibility that the other side might sometimes have a point.” (p. 42) Or again, he looks longingly back to “a time before the fall, a golden age in Washington when, regardless of which party was in power, civility reigned and government worked.” (p. 25) Or yet again: “I believe any attempt by Democrats to pursue a more sharply partisan and ideological strategy misapprehends the moment we’re in.” (p. 39)
Let’s talk about the moment we’re in. Kazin and his colleagues have a good description of part, but only part, of the pitfalls of today’s America:
The gap between the wealthy elite and the working majority grows ever larger, tens of millions of Americans lack health insurance and others risk bankruptcy when they get seriously ill, and many public schools do a poor job of educating the next generation. Due to the arrogant, inept foreign policy of the current administration, more people abroad mistrust and fear the United States than at any time since the height of the Vietnam War. Meanwhile, global warming speeds toward an unprecedented catastrophe.
Ah yes, but it’s worse than that. We have a world filling swiftly with enemies of America who see us as the nation who put black hoods over the heads of innocent Iraqis and tortured them for sport. We have a government that proclaims allegiance to “family values” while poor black children in the inner cities starve to death. Every time we visit an American airport, we have a recorded voice sweetly proclaiming to us Soviet-style that “any inappropriate comments or jokes may result in your arrest.” We have soldiers extended to the breaking point fighting a war we have no strategy to win, while the real terrorists multiply in Afghanistan. We have Republicans like Mark Foley sexually harassing teenage boys, like Duke Cunningham running a pay-for-play ring in the halls of Congress, like Roy Moore defying the Supreme Court to display religious texts in a public building, like Alberto Gonzales ordering U.S. Attorneys to conduct politically-motivated investigations, like President Bush tapping the phone lines of millions of American citizens without a warrant. And in the midst of all this, Obama preaches civility and healing, while George Bush denounces Democrats as soft on terrorism and bad for working Americans. I feel strangely like John Adams at one particular moment in Sherman Edwards’ delightful musical 1776, when it appears unlikely that his fellow Continental Congressmen will agree to support independence from England and King George III. “Fat George has declared us in rebellion!” Adams shouts, gesturing toward Congress in exasperation; “Why in bloody hell can’t they?”
My distinguished colleagues want to “begin the process of healing what ails our society,” to bring back the ephemeral Camelot of the Kennedy years. But their medicine is wrong for today’s ills. We do not need Obama to heal the rift between good and evil, or to bind up the nation’s wounds with the right-wing venom still in her bloodstream. We need a political bloodletting that undoes the last seven years of outrage and injustice and restores our government to the control of people who actually care about America. We need a president who understands that the current crop of Republican leaders are not opponents but enemies, to be rooted out of public life rather than appeased with the cooling balms of bipartisanship and civility. We need not a Warren Harding-style return to normalcy after all this regressive government, but a proactive fire-breather like Theodore Roosevelt, Robert La Follette, or Howard Dean. We need a president, in short, who sees this historical moment not as a time for healing, but as a time for change and transformation – a warrior rather than a nurse.
Obviously no such candidate has emerged, and it is too late to draft another leader into the race this cycle. There are no easy solutions to this problem. But we as historians should not fall over ourselves to endorse a candidate who has traded the audacity of hope for the mendacity of politics as usual. The American people cry out for change; we do them no favors when we send them a man who offers only empty words.
The following op-ed of mine was originally distributed by the History News Service at the beginning of this month.
Whatever you think of Al Gore, it’s hard to deny the sheer strength of his current popularity. With an Oscar, an Emmy, and a Nobel Prize to his credit in 2007 alone, the former Vice President and current climate-change crusader seems perfectly positioned to win the highest office in the land.
Yet despite a vigorous effort to draft him into the Presidential race, Gore insists that he’s “involved in a different kind of campaign.” There’s no doubt that Gore’s reluctance to run is genuine, but the fact that someone so passionately committed to global change has little interest in a presidential bid is a bad sign for the health of our political system.
Gore’s not the only prominent leader to forego the Presidency in recent decades. Twenty years ago, pundits jokingly referred to the weak Democratic presidential field as the “seven dwarfs” after several well-respected Democrats refused to run. In 1996, Gulf War general Colin Powell rejected an independent presidential bid despite polls showing him besting both major-party nominees. And this year alone, a stunning array of popular politicians – from Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to former House speaker Newt Gingrich to former NATO General Wesley Clark – have rebuffed repeated efforts to draft them into the race.
It wasn’t always this hard to persuade great leaders to run for President. In The Federalist Papers, James Madison confidently predicted that the U.S. would “obtain for rulers men who possess most wisdom to discern, and most virtue to pursue, the common good of the society.”
His fellow Founding Fathers practically fell over themselves to prove Madison right; in the nation’s early years, every major statesman wanted to be President, even those clearly ill-suited for the job. John Quincy Adams, for example, an ornery career diplomat, was a far better Secretary of State than a candidate for elective office – but that didn’t stop him from running for, and winning, a single Presidential term in 1824. When three-time loser Henry Clay declared that he’d “rather be right than President,” his statement reflected disappointment rather than a lack of ambition.
In the decades to come, a few leaders resisted the pull of the Presidency. Civil War General William Tecumseh Sherman stunned Republicans in 1884 when he assured them that “if drafted, I will not run. If nominated, I will not accept. If elected, I will not serve.”
But most politicians were only too happy to seek the White House. Theodore Roosevelt, for instance, wanted to be President so much that he ran for a third term against his own hand-picked successor, William Howard Taft. In 1910, Roosevelt explained that he cared little for “those cold and timid souls” who shy away from political combat. “The credit,” he declared,” belongs to the man who is actually in the arena.”
Today, few leaders heed Roosevelt’s advice. Our “men [and women] in the arena” seem more interested in running for the sidelines or, like Gore, in waging “a different kind of campaign.” Roosevelt would wonder what kind of campaign could possibly be more important than a presidential one. In one sense, he’d be right: the amount of good Gore could do as a climate change activist would be dwarfed by what he could accomplish for the environment as President.
But leaders like Gore seek more than just political power; they covet what Roosevelt called the “bully pulpit” of the Presidency – the power to inspire and persuade, to change Americans’ minds on issues of national import. Thanks to increasing voter apathy, this function of presidential leadership seems headed for extinction.
A poll last year showed that over a third of Americans thought voting on the TV show “American Idol” was more important than voting for President, and, in fact, the winning “Idol” that year received more votes than George Bush did in 2004. The uncomfortable truth is that Americans are more interested in what’s sung on television than what’s said in the White House; consequently, men and women with something worth saying are less likely than ever before to seek the Oval Office.
A century ago, leaders with passion and vision lined up eagerly for Presidential runs because they knew that a presidential victory would secure for them the rapt attention of the nation and, with it, the ability to change the United States for the better. Today, Al Gore realizes that if he wants “to change the way people think” about our global climate, he needs to look outside political office.
It’s no wonder people have been disappointed in American political leaders for a generation. We can’t expect our most visionary leaders to take to the presidential pulpit when no one’s sitting in the pews.
The evidence, as a November 18 Washington Post editorial intones, is “overwhelming.” The evidence that the editorial adduces includes signs of diminishing violence throughout Iraq, the rout of al Qaeda from its strongholds, and a renewal of normal activity in the markets of Baghdad. On the basis of such evidence the indisputable verdict can now be delivered: “the ‘surge’ of U.S. military forces in Iraq this year has been, in purely military terms, a remarkable success.”
But as the editorial goes on to say, the “principal objective of the surge was not military, but political.” By purely military means the American counterinsurgency operation—the surge—has substantially reduced sectarian strife. A political space has thus been created in which the factions composing the Iraqi government can begin peacefully to settle their differences. Unfortunately, “Iraq's national government seems all but paralyzed, its leaders unable to set aside sectarian agendas despite the ebb of sectarian warfare.” In the words of General Ray Odierno, a “window of opportunity” has been opened, but the sectarian stubbornness of the Iraqi government, and particularly its ruling Shiite faction, is perversely letting it slip shut again.
This editorial is just one contribution to a new narrative that is now being written about the Iraq War. In this narrative the war is being won but victory is in danger of being fatally compromised by the intransigence of the Iraqi government. And it is obvious that the goal of this narrative is not only to interpret the present situation in Iraq but also to control the future debate about Iraq. We need therefore to begin to address the cogency of this narrative, and a good place to start is the recent Weekly Standard essay by Kimberly Kagan, wife of Fred Kagan, one of the so-called “architects” of the surge. Since the beginning of the surge Kimberly Kagan has been contributing detailed updates of its progress to the Standard. Her latest effort, “How They Did It,” describes the course and assesses the results of the surge. Though Kagan, of course, lauds the surge as a success, we’ll see that, on its own terms, the surge is not the success that she and other proponents of the war declare it to be. We’ll also see that the window of opportunity that is being pushed shut is not the one they think it is.
1. Okay Then, How Did They Do It?
“The surge of operations that American and Iraqi forces began on June 15 has dramatically improved security in Baghdad and throughout Iraq,” Kagan begins. As expert witness she brings forward General Ray Odierno who attributes the success of the surge to three factors. First, the counterinsurgency strategy on which the surge is based, the so-called “clear, hold, and build” strategy, has proved an operational success. In its clearing phase, the surge has eliminated “extremist safe havens and sanctuaries,” and now, in its holding phase, the surge is enabling us “to maintain our gains.” Second, the “the ongoing quantitative and qualitative improvement of the Iraqi security forces” has enabled them to contribute significantly to both the clearing and holding phases of the surge operation. Third, there has been “a clear rejection of al Qaeda and other extremists by large segments of the population.” The best evidence for this rejection is “the bottom-up awakening movement by both Sunni and Shia who want a chance to reconcile with the government of Iraq.”
This “bottom-up” movement is the most important indication that the surge is working. Any counterinsurgency has as one of its goals the separation of the insurgents from the local populations that provide them with information, supplies, and sanctuary. Though necessary to the success of a counterinsurgency campaign, this separation of locals from insurgents is not sufficient to squelch an insurgency. Once the counterinsurgency has effectively detached locals from insurgents, it must keep them detached, and the only effective and lasting way of keeping locals detached from insurgents is to attach them to the government against which the insurgents are fighting. According to Odierno, the surge is doing precisely that. Both Sunni and Shia populations are, from the “bottom-up,” separating themselves from al Qaeda and seeking to “reconcile” with the central government in Baghdad.
Kagan now gives us a brief operational history of the surge. Proceeding from the center, Baghdad, and working outward, the surge has implemented its “clear and hold” strategy in three phases. The first phase, the Baghdad Security Plan, started in February and used standard counterinsurgency methods to detach the local populations in Baghdad from the extremists. By establishing close day-to-day contacts with locals, American troops gained their trust and cooperation. Willing now to work with the Americans, locals supplied them with the information they needed to target al Qaeda elements and drive down “the number of execution-style killings in the capital.” The second phase, Phantom Thunder, which extended from June 15 to July 15, consisted of a series of “major clearing operations” in and around Baghdad which drove al Qaeda operatives from such sanctuaries as Baquba and Falluja. The third phase, Phantom Strike, began in mid-August and remains current. Its purpose is to hold the positions cleared in June and July and to prevent the extremists routed from their old sanctuaries from establishing new ones.
Without doubt the most important aspect of this holding phase of the surge has been the spontaneous movement by “concerned citizens” in the various localities to secure the gains that the surge has made. Even before the onset of the surge, tribal leaders in Ramadi, the capital of al Anbar province, were turning against the excesses of al Qaeda militants. General Petraeus, Kagan says, was alert to the strategic potential of this development and “transformed the tribal movement in Anbar into a national phenomenon supportive of government institutions.” Petreus, that is, recognized the true significance of the al Anbar phenomenon, namely that local populations were detaching themselves spontaneously from al Qaeda influence and reorienting themselves to the government in Baghdad. He therefore “fostered grassroots movements throughout Iraq, methodically negotiating security agreements with local officials, tribes, and former insurgent leaders.” Petreus, Kagan confidently asserts, has “thus achieved one of the major objectives of the counterinsurgency strategy by reconciling much of the Sunni population with the government.”
It is now up to the Maliki government to take advantage of “the window of opportunity” the surge has provided and integrate the Sunni population, and especially those former Sunni insurgents who have turned against al Qaeda, into a truly representative Iraqi government. Such a reconciliation between the dissonant factions of Iraq has always been “the ultimate objective of the surge,” Kagan says. But whether that harmonization can be achieved, she concludes, “remains to be seen.”
Though Kagan ends her overview on an appropriately cautionary note, she nonetheless has marshaled her information in such a way as to drive home her essential point: on its own terms, both military and political, the surge has been a resounding success. Kagan understands that clearing and holding can be ephemeral phenomena. By means of appropriate military methods judiciously applied, a counterinsurgency can succeed in detaching locals from insurgents. But in order to keep them detached the counterinsurgency must “win their hearts and minds;” that is, it must reorient their political allegiance away from the insurgents and attach it to the government against which the insurgents are fighting. And, according to Kagan, such reorientation is precisely what the surge has accomplished. Thus, echoing Odierno, she emphasizes and extols the “bottom up” movement of “concerned citizens” who have turned away from al Qaeda and are now seeking to “reconcile” with the Maliki government.
I have no doubt that Kagan is right when she claims that many local Sunni populations have detached themselves, at least for now, from the Salafi Sunni jihadis who refer to themselves as al Qaeda. As she herself admits, the Anbar sheiks needed no prompting from Petreus to begin ridding themselves of the jihadis in their midst. For one thing, the more radical Salafists have as their goal a grand pan-Islamic caliphate that would absorb into itself Iraq and all other Islamic states, and most Sunnis have no interest whatsoever in becoming members of anything resembling an all-encompassing caliphate. Further, even those nationalist jihadis who reject the idea of a caliphate and who want to transform only Iraq into a radical Islamic state have repelled moderate Sunnis by their fanatic brutality. And finally, the secular Sunni Baathists, who still dream of restoring themselves to their former positions of preeminence and power, have wasted no tears on the damage done to a faction whose radical religiosity they loathe and detest.
However, this detaching of local Sunni populations from al Qaeda (more accurately, from the Salafi jihadis who call themselves al Qaeda) has been only preliminary to the crucial part of the counterinsurgency campaign: attaching the Sunnis to the Shiite government. Or, to put it another way, the principal objective of the surge is to convince the Sunni population to avow the legitimacy of the Shiite government. Kagan understands that the focus of a counterinsurgency is not on the insurgents in isolation, but on the interrelated dynamic between the insurgents and the local populations in which they operate. For a counterinsurgency to succeed, it is not enough to degrade, by military means, the operational efficacy of the insurgents. It must also convince the locals that the insurgents are not a legitimate political force. Once it has achieved that goal it can then reorient the locals and convince them that the government against which the insurgents are fighting is a legitimate political entity and one to which they owe their allegiance. According to Kagan, that objective is well on its way to being realized, for the local Sunni populations who have detached themselves from “al Qaeda” have transformed themselves into “concerned citizens” who avow the legitimacy of the Shiite government and are seeking non-violently to “reconcile” with it.
2. Jurf al Sakhr
To test her proposition that the surge has prompted local Sunni populations to reconcile with the Maliki government, I’ll examine briefly an illuminating example of the “clear and hold” strategy implemented by Petreus. In a November 13 article in McClatchy, Nancy Youssef describes the transformation of Jurf al Sakhr from an al Qaeda and Sunni insurgent stronghold to a town composed of “concerned citizens” willing to work with the Maliki government. Jurf al Sakhr, located in Babil province, just south of Baghdad, is a Sunni town in a predominately Shiite region. In order to protect the resident Sunnis from possible Shiite violence, Saddam deployed troops to the town, nearly all of whom “became unemployed overnight in 2003 when the US occupation government disbanded the Iraqi army.” Soon after the forced demobilization of these troops, “the town became a key Islamic militant stronghold, where residents earned a living by attacking US troops.” Though Youssef does not make the connection explicit, it seems that the disbanded Sunni troops took on another role, that of insurgent, and allied themselves with Salafi militants against the occupying Americans.
Once the surge got underway and chased the extremists from the town, the Americans had to “hold” it, that is, secure it against a resurgence of militant activity. To facilitate this stage of the counterinsurgency, the Americans selected Sabah al Janabi, “the tribal sheik of the Islamic Army, the secular Sunni insurgency,” and installed him as “mayor” of the town. A flurry of dealmaking ensued. Janabi visited the nearby Shiite town of Musayyib and assured its leaders that their town would be safe from Sunni violence. In return he asked that they recognize his new status as “mayor” of Jurf al Sakhr. They did so, and he next approached the government leaders of Babil province and won from them a mayoral salary. The dealmaking reached its culmination when the Americans “agreed to employ Sheik Sabah’s fellow tribesmen and former insurgents as concerned local citizens,” that is, as a security force whose members “would earn $375 a month.” Thus in one astounding and remunerative swoop the Americans transformed former Sunni insurgents from enemies of the state into reliable supporters of the Shiite regime.
This American-formed and American-paid contingent of tribesmen and former insurgents was charged with the maintenance of the town’s safety and peace, and it seems that they did their job well, since “violence dropped immediately.” Reconstruction began, and Janabi, foreseeing the time when the Americans would leave and take their money with them, approached the provincial government of Babil for funds to continue the reconstruction projects. “We want to be equal with the Shiites,” Janabi said, knowing full well that the Sunnis of Jurf al Sakhr will be able to achieve equality with their Shiite neighbors only if the Shiite government funds their efforts at reconstruction and security.
Just as it is in the self-interest of the tribesmen and former insurgents to acclimate themselves peacefully to their new and profitable position, so too it is in the self-interest of the Shiite government to maintain them in that position when the Americans leave. It seems, though, that such mutually sustaining self-interest will not, finally, dictate the outcome of the situation. The Sunni residents of Jurf al Sakhr “assume that the elected central government,” the Shia-dominated government of Nouri al-Maliki, “will never help them.” And neither is it “clear whether the Shiite provincial government will support the Sunni town.” Without support from either the central or the provincial government, though, the newly created “concerned citizens” will not be able “to keep Islamic extremists from dominating the town again.”
As we’ve seen, it is American largesse that is currently funding the tribesmen and former insurgents who compose the “concerned citizens” of the security force. When the Americans leave, the funds that support the security force leave with them. If both the Baghdad and the provincial governments refuse to step in as a substitute source of funding, the tribesmen and former insurgents will not only abandon their efforts at maintaining security, they will drop all pretense that they are “concerned citizens” who avow the legitimacy of a central Shiite government. And the Salafists will return, unopposed by the “concerned citizens” whose reconciliation with the Baghdad government was achieved and sustained only by the powerful stimulus of American cash.
If Jurf al Sakhr is representative of the methods of the insurgency, then its story seriously undermines Kagan’s conclusion that the “concerned citizen” movement is reconciling Sunni populations to the Shiite government. The Sunni population of Jurf al Sakhr, including the former insurgents, reject and have detached themselves from the extremist agenda of the Salafi jihadis. But they have not attached themselves to the Shiite government. The allegiance of the former insurgents is floating and will anchor itself only in a source of reliable income. They will, that is, be willing to reconcile with the Shiite government and avow its legitimacy, but only if that government financially supports their current role as “concerned citizens.”
3. Whose Nation Is It Anyway?
And maybe not even then. The new Iraq narrative claims that the surge has done its job and all that is now required for peace to become a real possibility is for the Maliki government to take advantage of the self-interest of these “citizens” and financially to support their “concern.” But it’s quite possible that Maliki has assessed the situation and concluded that, behind the façade of “concerned citizenry,” motives other than mere self-interest remain powerfully at work. In other words, if Maliki is not reaching out to and funding the newly hatched Sunni security forces it is because he recognizes that the locals who compose such forces, especially former insurgents, are motivated not only by self-interest but also by something that under the right conditions will blow self-interest at the moon: a nationalist ideal.
In spite of the emphasis that the surge and its proponents have placed on the Salafi jihadis they call al Qaeda, the prime motivating force of the insurgency has never derived from this small subset of the Sunni population. It has derived, rather, from those Sunnis, including former Baathists, incensed by the radical shift in the balance of power between themselves and their Shiite compatriots. Both the Sunni and the Shia know that at present the balance of power favors the Shia. Reconciliation, therefore—and an end to the insurgency--means that the resentful and disaffected Sunnis must accept their status as a secondary faction in a Shia-dominated state.
Maliki knows, however, that many Sunnis—and of course many former Sunni insurgents—are not now and might never be fully reconciled to Shiite dominance in the politics and culture of Iraq. These Sunnis are willing for the present to reach an accommodation with the Shiite government, but that accommodation is a dangerously fragile one. Maliki, then, can reach out and fund local Sunni security forces, but he will, no doubt, also ask himself how long the Sunni “concerned citizens” will rest content with a poor pittance of local power and concede the real prize of national power to their Shia rivals. To put this problem in the context of Jurf al Sakhr: Will the former Sunni insurgents, even if they are given financial support by the Shiite government, long remain satisfied with their new status as guardians of local order, or will they sooner or later band together with other local Sunni security forces (and, possibly, homegrown Salafi jihadis) and attempt to recapture what they see as their rightful status in Iraq?
In an excellent post at Marc Lynch’s blog, Abu Aardvark, Brian Katulis reminds us that “Iraq’s multiple internal conflicts at their core are vicious struggles for power.” It is therefore unlikely that the “concerned citizens” or “bottom-up” movements have convinced the Maliki government that the local Sunni populations, and especially, of course, the former insurgents, have become pacified supporters of the Shiite state. Quite the contrary, the local military successes of these movements, according to Katulis, have “put Shia leaders on edge” and have made them wary of supplying these movements with financial or material assistance. After all, Katulis asks, “Why…would Maliki and his Shi’a coalition want to supply resources to people they believe are bent to destroy them?”
Why indeed? The struggle for power between the Sunni and the Shia is and will continue to be a struggle between two competing national ideals. There are those among the Sunnis who have not forgotten their predominant position in the nation of Iraq, and their ultimate goal remains not local or provincial power but national power. Though at present “reconciled” to the Shiite state, they still believe that the only truly legitimate government is a Sunni government, and they will bide their time and await the opportunity that they know will come to restore themselves to their rightful place as leaders of their nation.
If such is the case—if, that is, a significant faction among the Sunni population refuses to concede that a Shiite government is a legitimate government—then, on its own terms, the surge is now and will continue to be a failure. To claim success a counterinsurgency must not just degrade the military efficacy of the insurgents but must attach the allegiance of the population to the government against which the insurgents are fighting. If the counterinsurgency fails in that political mission then it has fundamentally failed. And it certainly seems as if the surge in Iraq has failed in that mission. Separating local Sunni populations from the radical Salafists does nothing to address the fundamental problem, namely that many among the Sunni population refuse to see a Shiite government as anything other than an alien intruder. The “concerned citizen” movement is no doubt a useful tool that the surge can use against extremists, but it is not indicative of a Sunni willingness to concede legitimacy to a Shia-dominated government. Behind the façade of “reconciliation” that the “concerned” Sunnis present to their occupiers is not only self-interest but something even more potent and dangerous: their inextinguishable intent to reclaim the national power, and with it the national honor, that they have lost.
4. Disengage and Reengage
One would think that the Kagans, themselves idealists, would understand the power that ideals have in shaping the flow of history and realize that the “reconciliation” of local Sunni groups, and especially former Sunni insurgents, with the Shiite government is, to a crucial extent, a relationship of convenience. But the Kagans themselves are committed to a nationalistic ideal, one to which all others, finally, must and will give way.
For neocons such as the Kagans, America’s destiny is to spread its ideal of freedom and democracy throughout the world. Indeed, it is our moral obligation not just to spread that ideal in the Middle East, but even to impose it, because we are in a struggle with those who are seeking to impose on that region their ideal of despotism and terror. We are engaged, that is, in a world-historical struggle against a fascistic terrorism that seeks to dominate not only the Middle East but also the world, and we must not disengage from Iraq until we have won that struggle. The fate not just of Iraq but of our national ideal—the preservation of freedom from autocrats and terrorists--depends now on our will to remain in Iraq until we eradicate terrorism and establish a functioning democracy in which the contending factions can settle their differences peacefully.
One must, I think, concede the Kagans this point: the achievement of a functioning non-violent democracy in Iraq is a possibility. When Sabah al Janabi said that the Sunni of Jurf al Sakhr want to be equal with the Shia, he seemed to indicate not only that he wants to reach an accommodation with his Shiite neighbors but also that he can reach such an accommodation. In other words, at least some among the Sunni locals will accept their status as a minority in Iraq—and accept a Shiite government as a legitimate government—as long as they are treated by the Shiite majority as their cultural and political equals. On such a foundation a reconciliation is indeed possible. But that reconciliation is possible only if we admit that the surge, that last and best hope of the neocons, has failed, and that America cannot resolve the problem of sectarian strife in Iraq by military means. Such an admission leaves us only one rational and potentially productive option: Disengage militarily and reengage, within a multinational framework that includes Iran, Turkey, and the other regional powers, diplomatically and economically.
We now have, I think, a window of opportunity to effect such a military disengagement and diplomatic reengagement. The Bush administration and its neocon enablers, however, will not just let that window slip shut—they will push it shut. To disengage from Iraq militarily is to cede control of the situation to the Iraqis themselves, and that is something the neocons will not tolerate. They will not let a situation develop in which they can no longer assert their will, and as long as America remains an occupier and implements one or another form of military persuasion, they can continue to assert their will and control, so they think, the course of history. The neocons have their ideal imperial vision of the Middle East—a paradise of freedom and democracy under American auspices—and they have no intention of leaving until they realize it.
It is, however, one thing to help the Iraqis achieve a reconciliation by means of diplomatic persuasion and economic aid and quite another to impose it on them at the point of a gun. The former respects the sovereignty of Iraq as a nation and the independence of the Iraqis as a people. The latter reduces Iraq to an appendage of American self-interest and the Iraqis to subjects of American will.
And the Iraqis know the difference between the two.
5. Go Away.
Though the residents of Jurf al Sakhr no longer assume the role of insurgent and attack American troops, “their disdain [for the occupying Americans] remains,” Youssef writes. As an illustration of their seemingly insurmountable animosity for the occupiers, she offers this telling little incident: “As U.S. troops walked up to Sheik Sabah's office last week, his young son, Ahmad, sneered ‘Go away’ in Arabic.”
Go away. These two words capture accurately the attitude that many in Iraq have towards their occupiers. The Iraqis understand the significance of the American presence. By occupying their country America is determined to assert its will and to dictate the course of events according to its own purposes and goals. And the purposes and goals of the Iraqis? America will see to it, forcibly if need be, that the goals of the Iraqis, Sunni and Shia both, coincide with the goals of America.
One of America’s goals is certainly a practical one: to secure for itself access to a vital natural resource, oil. Another and no less important goal is to advance its historical mission: to oppose tyranny and to promote democracy. The neocons can be practical politicians but they are at their core indefatigable moralists. Next time I’ll return to a quintessential example of the political moralist, Robert Kagan, and to the philosopher who differentiated, on the basis of the categorical imperative, the political moralist from the moral politician, Immanuel Kant.
Note: The Katulis post is part of a series of exchanges between him and Colin Kahl. Marc Lynch provides links and comments of his own here. Highly recommended.
I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired of the main television media ignoring American Indian issues in general, and I'm even more sick and tired of conservative personalities spewing their racist venom towards American Indians. I think Olbermann would cover the critical issue of Pretty Bird Woman House if he were asked to by enough of us, but let's look at some spewing of racist venom towards American Indians by conservative personalities first after a generalized observation of mine.
Ironically, conservative personalities seem to actually "mention" Indian issues more than non - Indian liberal ones by my observations alone. Take for example, Anne Coulter's "The little Injun that could." Why?
I think it's because conservative personalities such as Coulter, Limbaugh, and O'Reilly find American Indians to be easy targets towards which they can project their racism, having accepted the lies of colonialism.
The process of colonization involves one nation or territory taking control of another nation or territory either through the use of force or by acquisition. As a by-product of colonization, the colonizing nation implements its own form of schooling within their colonies. Two scholars on colonial education, Gail P. Kelly and Philip G. Altbach, help define the process as an attempt "to assist in the consolidation of foreign rule" (Kelly and Altbach 1).
Coulter, Limbaugh, and O'Reilly all seem to have accepted the lies of colonialism by my estimations of them; consequently, Limbaugh spewed anti - Indian rhetoric, while O'Reilly didn't know what hit him. We'll address Limbaugh first.
What in the hell was the uncompassionate, climate - disintegrating - denying - bully Limbaugh thinking when he spewed his racist venom towards eighteen year old Cheryl Charlee Lockwood ofSt. Michaels, Alaska? (Bold and underline mine)
A crying shame: Rush Limbaugh adds Alaskan to polarizing efforts The young woman, Cheryl Charlee Lockwood, 18, of St. Michaels was one of several young leaders to speak during the "Youth Leadership on Climate Change" hearing. It coincided with Power Shift 2007, a national youth summit involving thousands from across the nation on what the student organizers called "the climate crisis."
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Mr. Limbaugh's first-day reaction was to inaccurately and insultingly describe Ms. Lockwood as a 13-year-old Inupiat (she's Yup'ik) girl from Alaska and cast her on par with the white actor who played the "crying Indian" during 1970s TV commercials aimed at littering. He decried her emotional testimony as a nauseating Democrat ploy.
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The coup de grace was Mr. Limbaugh laughing with a woman caller who claimed to be a former Alaska resident, now "a Texan by choice." Of Ms. Lockwood's testimony she said, "if they're losing their way of life, that would probably mean the liquor store was closing."
To all my Indian brethren - for those who are unhappy with what the "imperialists" did to your culture - move to the panhandle, set up teepees, and hunt for your food. If that's what you want to go back to, quit whining and protesting and JUST DO IT!
- and the picture of racism against American Indians just keeps becoming larger and more complete. So, what was Limbaugh thinking?
He was thinking anti - Indian and racist thoughts. Glaringly obvious, he would never cover Pretty Bird Woman House, except in a racial and discriminatory manner. What about O'Reilly?
O'Reilly might still be in an emotional hangover from being put aptly in his place.
TWEAKING BILL O'REILLY As it turned out, Bill O'Reilly himself was among those to see the video. Television's angriest talking head was not pleased. O'Reilly responded to the video by airing it on his Fox News cable program and calling the Fairies "nutso" and "child abusers," among other things, while suggesting that social services open a case to track down the little girl. Thankfully for the little girl, social services stayed away, but the attention did not. The video exploded across the blogosphere, and a million and a half hits and several death threats later, these child-abusing atheists became the 18th most subscribed-to band in the history of YouTube, right behind platinum-selling MC Mike Jones.
So, scratch racist, conservative, Bush Republicans off the list for possibly helping; I think Keith Olbermann (email here) is the one to contact, don't you?
Class Struggle: conflict between social or economic classes (especially between the capitalist and proletariat classes)
A century before the Declaration of Independence, America was undergoing a revolution. However, this revolution was not based on a desire for independence from England. This revolution was all about fighting class and racial oppression.
Society in the Virginia Colony of the 1670's was beginning to resemble society of England. The Tidewater Gentry made up only about 5% of the population of the colony, but owned nearly all the best land. The lower classes were pushed into the interior country were indian attacks were frequent and the land was rocky. What's more, the lower class in Virginia had also been the lower class in Britain. Britain began criminalizing poverty nearly two centuries earlier and began forceably deporting its homeless and poor to wilderness colonies in 1597, a majority of whom died in the first few years.
Adding to the tensions were falling tobacco prices and high, regressive taxes on small farmers to pay for fort construction. Berkeley managed to get some relief from the taxes for his personal friends, but not for the colony in general. There were natural disasters such as hailstorms, hurricanes, and droughts that year.
But the overarching political background was the legacy of the English Civil War. The victory by Parliament in that war was also a victory by the upper class.
Prelude
William Berkeley was already 70-years old during Bacon's Rebellion. He had fought for the King during the Civil War and had been forced into retirement in Virginia by the defeat. When the monarchy was restored in 1660, Berkeley was in a unique position and found himself appointed governor of the Virginia Colony. Berkeley was a playwright and scholar, and a favorite of the King.
Nathaniel Bacon, 40 years younger than Berkeley, was Berkeley's cousin through marriage. After acquiring some Tidewater Land, he was appointed to the governing council in 1675.
Trouble with the locals
The troubles began with a dispute between the Doeg Indians and plantation owner Thomas Mathews. It seems Mathews didn't always pay for goods he purchased. The Doegs attacked the plantation and several were killed. Bacon organized a large group of settlers for a retaliatory raid...and then attacked the wrong tribe, the Susquehannocks.
Frequent complaints of bloodshed were sent to Sir William Berkeley from the heads of the rivers, which were as often answered with promises of assistance. These at the heads of James and York rivers (having now most people destroyed by the Indians) grew impatient at the many slaughters of their neighbours and rose or their own defence, who choosing. Bacon for their leader, sent oftentimes to the Governor, humbly beseeching a commission to go against those Indians at their own charge. Mr. Bacon, with fifty-seven men, proceeded until the fired the palisades, stormed and burned the fort and cabins, and (with the loss of three English) slew 150 Indians.
The Susquehannocks retaliated and killed hundreds of settlers. In order to contain the situation before it spiraled completely out of control, Berkeley set up up a meeting between the warring parties. The meeting went horribly wrong and several of the tribal chiefs were killed. Berkeley also set up a "Long Assembly" to investigate the whole affair. The assembly was accused of corruption because of its preference of trade over the security of the small farmers.
Not coincidentally, most of the favored traders were friends of Berkeley. Regular traders, some of whom had been trading independently with the local Indians for generations, were no longer allowed to trade individually.
As if that wasn't enough, most independent traders were banned from dealing with the indians on the grounds of preventing arms from falling into the hands of hostiles. However, the assembly wasn't without its virtues. An outrage that had been building for decades forced the council to reform voting rights. For the first time all freedmen would be allowed to vote, and limits would be put on the number of years that someone could hold office.
Berkeley continued to plead for calm during this crisis, while Bacon demanded that he authorize a retaliatory raid. It didn't help Berkeley's cause that he was making a tidy profit on his monopoly on the beaver trade with the local indians. Bacon demanded a commission to launch a raid against the attacking indians, but Berkeley declined. When Bacon proceeded anyway, Berkeley declared him a rebel, and also agreed to pardon any of Bacon's men if they went home peacefully. Berkeley rode into Bacon's headquarters at Henrico with 300 armed men and Bacon fled into the forest with 200 of his men. Berkeley then called for an election to the House of Burgesses to gauge the colony's leaning. Much to Berkeley's surprise, the colony elected Bacon to the Burgess.
In June 1676 Bacon traveled to Jamestown to take his seat on the Burgess.
He once again demanded his commission to continue expeditions against the Indians. He was immediately arrested and was ordered by Berkeley to apologize. Bacon complied, and, once he apologized, was pardoned and permitted to take his seat with the rest of the Burgesses. He was still not given a commission.
At this point Bacon was gathering an increasing amount of popular support with all classes of colonists, except for the upper class. Berkeley failed to notice the shift.
Civil War
Bacon continued to demand a commission to fight against the indians. During the debate Bacon grew disgusted. He left the proceedings, gathered up a large group of armed men and surrounded the statehouse. Once again he demanded a commission. Berkeley answered with, "Here shoot me before God, fair mark shoot." Bacon didn't shoot Berkeley, but Bacon also didn't back down. After several minutes of strong words, Berkeley backed down. He gave into all of Bacon's demands. Berkeley's authority was in shambles while Bacon dominated Jamestown from July to September of 1676.
Shortly afterwards an indian attack distracted Bacon. While Bacon responded, Berkeley attempted to launch his own coup.
General Bacon marched with 1,000 men into the forest to seek the enemy Indians; and, in a few days after, our next news was that the Governor had summoned together the militia of Gloucester and Middlesex counties, to the number of 1,200 men, and proposed to them to follow and suppress the rebel Bacon. Bacon stormed it (Jamestown) and took the town, in which attack were twelve men slain and wounded, but Governor Berkeley, with most of the followers, fled back down the river in their vessels. Here, resting a few days, they agreed to the burning of the town. Mr. Lawrence and Mr. Drumond, owning the two best houses save one, set fire each to his own house, which example the soldiers following laid the whole town (with church and statehouse) in ashes, saying the rogues should harbor no more there.
Berkeley's coup failed because Bacon had the popular support of the people. Not just the farmers, but also the laborers, indentured servants, and even slaves. This was class war, and for the first time in colonial history the poor were winning. Bacon, in order to cement his popularity, made a Declaration of the People on July 30, 1676. Most notable during his leadership was recognition of the right to bear arms. Berkeley fled to John Custis' plantation on the Eastern Shore. By this time Bacon's control over his troops was beginning to degrade. The burning of Jamestown on September 19, despite targeting the aristocracy, was a little extreme for many of his followers. A ship sent by Bacon to the Eastern Shore was seized by Berkeley's men.
Collapse of the rebellion and fallout
The final showdown between Bacon and Berkeley never happened. On October 26th, 1676, Bacon abruptly died of the "Bloodie Flux" and "Lousey Disease" (body lice). His body was likely burned. Leadership of the rebellion fell to Bacon's right hand man, Joseph Ingram. However, Ingram had none of the charisma of Bacon, and the rebellion collapsed. Several armed merchant ships arrived in Jamestown and took the side of Berkeley. In a matter of weeks Berkeley had regained control of the colony. Berkeley immediately repealed all of the liberal reforms passed that year, including the right to bear arms. He also launched a reign of terror against political opponents. He seized rebel property without the benefit of a trial. He also hung all the rebel leaders, 23 in all.
Months later, when the Royal Navy and Royal Commissioners arrived, the colonists had the chance to vent their grievances. Amnesty was issued for everyone except Bacon. Berkeley was relieved of his command and called back to England.
"That old fool has hanged more men in that naked country than I have done here for the murder of my father." - King Charles II commenting on William Berkeley
