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Impressionistic Impressions of 'Intelligence Gathering' at Menwith Hill, Monday 4 July 2005 ...
Style of protest: 'motley cheerful' ...
Background atmosphere: 'paranoid oppressive' ...
'Motley' style of protest seems foolish, but has a lot of sense to it ... 'dismissable' as harmlessly eccentric and obviously no direct threat to the heavy state terrorism it is in opposition to ... and there is protection for the protestors in that ...
Also the 'motley' is useful psychologically, because Menwith Hill base and all the paranoia and insecurity, etc, linked to it is deeply depressing [for any sane person] to consider ... so to take on an 'antic disposition' while protesting against it has a cheering effect ... and is a sort of triumph of pleasant vitality against the 'unpleasant' [to understate!] devitalizing forces going into the making of Menwith Hill and all that goes with it ...
Indescribable 'strangeness' about the whole event ...
Surrealism Warp Factor 9.99!!! ...
A pleasant ramble in the Yorkshire country enjoyed by a motley seeming crew who are in fact very serious and committed peace protestors ... Surrounding us is an oppressive atmosphere of fear, insecurity and paranoia ... and hugely disporportionate numbers of police demonstrating all their latest crowd control kit ... including police with machine guns, police on horses, police with dogs, police with cameras, police with who knows what other kinds of surveillance equipment, police on bicycles, police on quads, police in cars, police in vans, police in armoured vehicles, etc, etc, etc, [... but just in case we feel too oppressed and controlled, there is, of course, a friendly chubby cheerful mustachioed avuncular DLO [Demonstrator Liason Officer] on hand ... who even kindly hands out free bottles of water to thirsty walking demonstrators ... ]
More cops than protestors [about 100 protestors, with at least that number of cops surrounding us, and who knows how many others hidden away in vicinity ...]
One of our core supporters - who shall remain nameless, but given the code name: Tyneside Terrier - was threatened with arrest by North Yorkshire Police for suggesting - somewhat disrespectfully, some might say - to an excessively intrusive photographic surveillance officer that there was something 'perverted' about his voyeuristic camera-snapping actitivities.
[The cop's reply was that 'you are photographed everywhere you go these days'.]
Later the 'Tyneside Terrier' was warned that he might be arrested for a breach of the peace if he repeated such comments.
Readers can judge for themselves whether our supporter really stepped beyond the bounds of decent and legal behaviour by making such comments to an 'officer of the law'.
Main speaker at that day's 'Independence From America' event at main entrance was Scott Ritter.
Tall. Bulky build. 40-something. Casual blue shirt [no jumper or coat even though weather is somewhat overcast occasionally drizelling and somewhat chilly for the time of year]
Spec-wearing American 'intelligence officer' - by no means 'nerdy' though!
Described himself as former U.S. Marine.
Also former U.N. weapons inspector deeply sceptical about wmd claims before Iraq war.
Said he was an 'American Republican' and further distanced himself from gathering politically speaking by saying that he was an American 'patriot' and also by no means a pacifist - he was 'anti-war' only in sense that as a trained military man he knew how terrible it could be - no one who understood the realites for war could be 'pro-war'.
Although a 'Republican', he was far removed from the Neo-Cons' in his outlook.
Believed in the U.S. constitution, representative democracy, and the rule of law.
Opposition to Iraq attack, etc, based on view that it was unconstitutional, ideologically motivated, and outside of the rule of international law.
Seemed 'Noble Roman'-type American 'Republican' - i.e. in the mould of Cicero etc from the late Roman Rupublican days. High-minded. Strong sense of 'humanitas'. Legalistic. 'Anti-imperialist'.
(His kind of American Republican thinking owes a lot to Roman republicans - who resisted empire building based around personality cults of the emperor - and also harks back to the anti-imperialist struggle of the original American Republicans to remove themselves from the 'tyranny' of the British Empire.) Ideal of good governance seemed to be representative democracy led by high-minded senatorial class - people like himself! {and one could actually see him as future senator).
Believer in 'active citizenship'.
Impressive speaker because he did not pander to the crowd - instead, set up points of difference between him and us, and did not pretend to be what he was not.
Even though he was clearly 'not one of us', gathering gave him a very respectful hearing. Notable also that cops and groups of building workers [seemingly employed by McAlpine] - working nearby within base - listened carefully to what he was saying.
Expressed some discomfort, as an 'American patriot', at speaking at 'Independence FROM America' event on American Independence Day.
What he said, in fact, - and the way he said it - highlighted difference between 'nationalism' [where the expressed 'love' of country is mindlessly chauvanistic and never involves any criticism of one's own nation] and 'patriotism' [where the expressed 'love' of country has a rationalism attached to it, and which involves criticism of your own country when it does the wrong things].
Referred back to American struggle to gain independence from Britain, and suggested Britain should now be struggling to gain independence from American - made a kind of appeal for more British 'patriotism' - suggesting British citizens should be more disturbed than they are of the presence of American bases such as Menwith Hill on their own soil. Suggested that as an American patriot, he would not stand for similar British bases on the soil if the power-relations of the trans-Atlantic 'alliance' were reversed.
[Suggested, by implication, that the insurgency movements against U.S. occupation in Iraq and Afghanistan were justifiable on similar 'patriotic' grounds.]
Telling phrase he used was that the relationship Britain now had with America was that of 'ABUSED MISTRESS'.
I felt strange mix of shame and anger when he said this. The phrase was very telling and an accurate/revealing metaphor. And it was an indication of some great loss of national confidence and sense of powerlessness that it took an American Republican ex-Marine intelligence officer [a representative of the 'occupying power' as it were] to spell it out to us - because not enough British people were saying it for themselves.
So I am thinking something of the lines of: 'What he is saying is what I have been thinking, but why did I need a Yankee intelligence officer to spell it out to me?!'
Re the Menwith Hill base, he said the British Government itelf probably did not know what went on in it.
Re North Korea, he side-stepped a question about American policy and gave a vague fuzzy imprecise answer - and, given the directness of most of what he said, the 'fuzziness' was notable.
Re Iran, said he feared events sequences likely to lead to some sort of U.S. attack had already begun. Said that although American opinion was turning against the aggressive militarism of the Neo-Cons because of the mess in Iraq, he had no doubt that fears about the Iranian nuclear programme could be whipped up and the American people would rally behind an intervention there. If a conflict to 'disarm' a 'nuclear threat' from Iran started, the American people would support it - not least because questioning voices like his would be excluded from the mainstream American media.
Watch the birdies.
Cameras.
Flying overhead at main base entrance local colony of swifts?/swallows?/martins?.
Truth and Illusion.
What is really going on in those domes?
No one seemed to know ...
Scott Ritter suggested that even the inner circles of the British government do not know.
Surprizingly low level of physical barrier 'security'.
Lindis Percy [60-ish Quaker pacifist, full-time unofficial leader of protest at Menwith Hill, threatened with ASBOs, etc, for her activities there] mentioned this several times [and it was very puzzling to witness] pointed out that the level of physical barrier 'security' at what was supposed to be a 'top secret' electronic spying base seemed very low - single fences in most places, with the 'hardware' areas not very far from the fences. Lots of other hidden security screens and surveillance measures, of course. And lots of physical patrolling. But place was by no means a 'fortress' on superficial appearance.
[Some have suggested it is a set-up 'soft-target' (N.B. origins in the cold war - when places like it expected to be knocked out early when the missiles started landing. The old CNDer in me remembers the assumption that Britian little more than an early warning base for the Americans.) It is easy to imagine it as a place 'inviting' low level terrorist attacks - generating fear and after which 'security generally has to be tightened' etc.]
Mindgames.
Who really knows what is going on in that place?
'They' allow it to be rumoured that it is the sort of place where every electronic communication in Europe could be monitored. If they can they can. If they can't, but it is believed they can, then a kind of 'virtual' monitoring goes on. Way 'thought-policing' and 'controlling' of citizens works in 'panopticon' Big Brother society - everything you do MIGHT be observed and monitored ... you never can tell ... so you feel observed and monitored whether you actually are or not.
Conspiracy a-googly-go-go ...
This is worth repeating:
'They' allow it to be rumoured that it is the sort of place where every electronic communication in Europe could be monitored.
~ If they can they can - and the 'surveillance state' is 'real' in an absolute sense.
~ If they can't, but it is believed they can, then a kind of 'virtual' monitoring goes on, with people always having in mind the POSSISILITY that phones might be tapped, emails monitored, etc, and so 'monitoring themselves' - and the 'surveillance state' is 'real' in a relative sense.
The second possibility seems more likely - given present state of technology, and given fact that there are not enough 'security personell' to monitor evey phonecall, email, etc.
This still sets up a very sinister form of 'thought-policing' - effectively 'controlling' citizens in virtual 'panopticon' Big Brother society ... everything you do MIGHT be observed and monitored ... you never can tell ... so you feel observed and monitored whether you actually are or not!
[Notes towards definition of 'PANOPTICON'/'PANOPTICISM'
* structure/system in which every individual unit is or could be observed at all times; has roots in 19th century 'utilitarian' designs for prisons, in which every cell/prisoner could be centrally monitored, with no private spaces;
* in late 20th century introduction of CCTV cameras into town/city centres turned these public spaces into panopticon zones;
* many other high tech developments [high resolution satelite imagining; DNA data bases; mobile phone tracking; credit cards; even supermarket 'loyalty' cards, etc] make panopticon societies more possible in 21st century [states/corporations can literally 'focus in' on any citizen/consumer - and/or his/her 'data trail'- at any time];
* 'control-freak' panopticon thinking often masked by suggestions of 'benevolence'/'paternalism' - and notions of 'protection' ['looking after' vulnerable citizens who 'cannot look after themselves' - e.g. the visually impaired, etc]
* centralist/statist forms of 'social democracy' [including strains flowing into the making of 'New Labour'] include 'panopticon' thinking ['hence' ASBOs, electronic tagging, ID cards, even 'school league tables' - focussing down to level of 'individual pupil achievement - etc ... {the new 'Westoe Crown' primary school, built on the old pit site, seems designed on 'panopticon' principles ... and so represents an indicator of future trends ...}]
* 'war on terror' incorporates many panopticon elements
* ...]
Phil Talbot, July 2005
+++++
‘Diplomacy’ ...
[Transcript below - from our archives - provides some contexts / alternative perspectives [of a sort not much to be found in mainstream media] relating to recent 'nuclear weapons tests' [October 2006] in/by North Korea / DPRK. It records, as factually as possible, what was said by Democratic People’s Republic of Korea envoys speaking openly in Britain last year ...]
On Thursday, 26 May 2005 Nader A-Naderi, Roger Nettleship, Alan Newham and Philip Talbot, of South Tyneside Stop The War Coalition, attended a meeting at Newcastle University with Mr Ha Sin Guk, Second Secretary of the Embassy of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea [DPRK] in London, and Mr Ri Kwang Nam, another member of the DPRK embassy staff.
Mr Ha [speaking in English] gave a talk in which he started by speaking about the development of diplomatic relations between Britain and the DPRK since 2001, when the London embassy was established. He said that no one from the DPRK embassy had been to Newcastle before, or indeed to the North East – a very important area of England. He spoke about the visit in the afternoon to the Redhills Miners' Hall in Durham and its great importance in the history of the working class movement, and the rooms and banners that reflect how the workers have lived and campaigned to defend their rights.
He then said that because of articles published in the newspapers many people misunderstand and mistrust the DPRK on nuclear issues and on human rights abuse, and are disinformed on the internal situation on the Korean peninsula. Therefore, he said, he would like to mention specific issues and then to give some answers to people’s questions.
Mr Ha said that 15 June 2000, was a very important occasion for Korea. This was the date of the historic meeting between Chairman Kim Jong Il, from the north, and the former President Kim Dae-jung, from the south, in Pyongyang. This, he said, declared the determination of the Korean people to unify their country by themselves peacefully and democratically, without interference from other forces, principally the US. Mr Ha said that all the Korean people were very excited by the fact that unification could come finally in our generation. After the 15 June declaration, very positive events had happenined. He said there were all kinds of bi-lateral cabinet, ministerial, economic, cultural and other meetings.
He said Korean families have been divided since the Korean war [early 1950s], and millions of people have not been able to meet their parents, sister or brothers and, even though they live in the north and south of Korea, they cannot exchange letters or telephone each other. It is a big national tragedy that because of the intervention in the Korean War, the people cannot meet each other. Therefore, he said, it is the entire Korean people’s natural desire to unify their country
peacefully and democratically as soon as possible.
Mr Ha then said that following 11 September 2001, and the Bush administration's declaration of a 'war on terrorism', George W Bush pinpointed the DPRK as part of an "axis of evil" and targeted it for pre-emptive nuclear strike.
The first term of the Bush administration discouraged the South Korean authorities from engagement with the north, so this did not bode well for the historic declaration due to this American intervention. In its second term, the Bush administration resumed the argument that the DPRK is once again an "outpost of tyranny". He said they do this even though they sometimes acknowledge the DPRK as a sovereign state demanding that they come to the table on the nuclear issue.
Speaking about the nuclear issue, Mr Ha said the DPRK was determined to solve this issue and had already declared that it wants to make the Korean peninsula nuclear free. He said the DPRK had suspended uranium enrichment and the development of its nuclear programme for the talks. But the Bush administration had destroyed the Framework Agreement which was signed between the US and the DPRK under the Clinton administration in 1994. In this agreement, the Americans had guaranteed to build Light Water Reactors to produce electricity in the DPRK, which in return would suspend and would finally destroy all its nuclear activities.
He said that in spite of their best efforts the DPRK had been unable to solve the nuclear issue, mainly because of the hostile policy of the US towards a sovereign country the DPRK. So, he said, it was a very difficult prospect to solve this issue unless the Bush administration dropped their hostile policy towards the DPRK.
He said that because of the rumours in the western world, in Britain because of the disinformation put out by the BBC and the newspapers, as well as in the US, North Korea is blamed for pushing to protect its nuclear weapons programme and other nuclear activities.
Mr Ha suggested that a sovereign country has the right to develop any kind of weapons, or forces, for its defence. When such a superpower as the US threatens to destroy their country, a people cannot accept such a threat of nuclear war and they must have their own forces for deterrence and to defend their sovereignty and the system that they have chosen.
For centuries, Mr Ha said, Korea had been oppressed by other countries like Japan. In three years during the Korean war, the American side destroyed all of the country. So, he said, people’s feelings are very strong that they will never be occupied again and oppressed by foreign forces.
Mr Ha said that the US still has 43,000 occupying troops in south Korea and more than 1,000 nuclear weapons stationed there. Therefore, the DPRK cannot live peacefully without any preparations or development of deterrent forces to confront the American threat. So, he said, the people of the DPRK are determined to defend their sovereign rights to fight against possible American intervention.
Mr Ha then stressed that whilst he wanted to clarify the background to the "nuclear issue", it is also the case that the DPRK would like to make the Korean peninsula a nuclear free zone. He said, therefore, that if the circumstances are met and America drops its hostile policy and has genuine intentions to show us, to negotiate the fundamental issues on the Korean peninsula, the DPRK is ready to go to the table at any time, whatever the format of the negotiations.
He said that the DPRK wants to solve the outstanding issues such as the nuclear issue and other related issues. He said that if the American side listens to our concerns we are also ready to listen to their concerns. If both sides trust each other and drop their suspicions and hostile policy then we think there are possibilities.
He said that the DPRK has already shown in February 2005 that the country will defend itself against American nuclear threat and that it will not go to the six-party negotiations unless America has shown genuine intention to solve this issue.
Concluding his remarks, Mr Ha said that on the 5th anniversary of the joint North-South Declaration there will be meetings held in Pyongyang and Seoul, with celebrations in Pyongyang attended by representatives from authorities and organisations from north and south Korea and organisations from all over the world.
He then pointed out that Kim Jong Il is the National Defence Commission Chairman of the DPRK, the leader guiding the party and country, and that 19 June would be the 41st anniversary of the commencement of his work in the Central Committee of the Workers Party of Korea.
Mr Ha and Mr Ri then answered questions.
The following are some of the remarks made by them in the question and answer session:
Speaking about the allegations of famine in the DPRK, Mr Ha said that there were many rumours in the western mass media that 3 million people died during the famine. He said that while this was quite false, they are not hiding that there have been some problems and difficulties and shortages of food. He said that from 1994-5 there were consecutive natural disasters of flood and drought in all of the north of Korea. Therefore, he said, our agricultural production dropped rapidly. He mentioned the added factors of the economic sanctions and blockade by the Americans and that the socialist countries had collapsed. Before this calamity, the system in the DPRK had been that the government distributed food – mainly rice and corn – but with this situation they were not able to distribute the same proportion of food, and therefore some families suffered to get proper food and there were some difficulties. He said they had called this period "the arduous march" because the society lacked food and the economy lacked raw materials, especially lack of electricity. DPRK had suffered this period for five or six years he said, the hardest period in our nation’s history to date, but now we have overcome these difficulties, and food production has improved radically and there is no famine at this moment although there were still some food shortages. So they had appealed to the world to donate food to their country he said, and many bodies as the United Nations World Food Programme have donated large amounts of food and medicines, and many international organisations are operating in Pyongyang and helping us to provide the food. He said that the lack of food and protein affected some elderly people and some babies, possibly causing some deaths, but that 3 million people died, as the western media say, with starvation in the whole of the country, is simply not true.
He said that they don’t hide that this was a very difficult period for 10 years which they have now gradually overcome. From 2002 they have changed and improved their economic management introducing some farmer markets to the commodity market. They have given the initiative to the cooperative farms to farm more themselves so that the largest sector of the economy, the agricultural sector, is gradually improving. But, at the same time, they are still cooperating with other countries for assistance and sustainable development he concluded.
Asked about the geo-political situation and the aims of the US in the region Mr Ha said that the DPRK had lived with economic sanctions for over half a century. He said the US regards the Korean peninsula as of strategic importance to achieve American influence in this very important area because the Korean peninsula is surrounded with large countries. China has the largest population in the world, Japan is the second biggest economic power in the world and Russia is the biggest country in the world with regard to territory. With that, the Korean peninsula is in the middle of the three countries. He said that the US wants the Korean peninsula as their pro-American state to deter and to influence China, Russia and this area. He said they want the Korean peninsula as their own back yard. Therefore, he said, the US wants to create every day some nuclear issues, or on another day some allegations of human rights abuse as a way of provocation to keep their military presence in south Korea. So, he said, if there is no confrontation, if there is a peaceful situation there, then there is no justification or argument for the US to keep their military presence in south Korea. Of course, he said, the US is cooperating now with China and Russia but still China and Russia are their strategic enemy in the long term. So, the US wants to maintain its influence in this area but they want the Korean peninsula as their forward base.
Speaking further about the nuclear issue, Mr Ha said that because the US has declared the DPRK as a nuclear pre-targeted country, the question arises as to how the country can be defended from these huge military arsenals? He said they only accused Iraq of having weapons of mass destruction as an excuse to invade and occupy Iraq. Therefore the DPRK has already proclaimed that they have a nuclear deterrent.
Mr Ri then added that the nuclear issue is not the main issue for the US. The only issue for the US was to overthrow the socialist system in the DPRK in what they call regime change. He then went on to detail evidence the US provided themselves for this conclusion.
Asked a question about China, Mr Ha said they are their friendly neighbours and historically they have had good relations with China and Russia. He said that since Korea was liberated from Japanese colonial rule in 1945, China has supported Korea and we have supported China, and he went on to speak about their support in the 6-party talks.
Answering a question about unification, Mr Ha said that before 2000 there were bad feelings among the people of south Korea about the north because of the strong propaganda in south Korean media and newspapers and under the American influence for more than fifty years. However, since the historic meeting in Pyongyang and the North South Declaration there have been long talks with journalists of the south Korean newspapers and the realisation that the north Koreans are normal human beings! There have been dramatic changes in the opinions of the south Korean people. Mr Ha said that the Korean people have the same language and a common history and the realisation has been growing that we can now live peacefully together. He said that the south Koreans don’t want to give up their own political system and their own ideas. He said this was the same for the north Koreans. He explained that unification will only come about by creating a confederation of the two Koreas that respected the two political and economic systems. He said that the economic cooperation between North and South was going well and there had been some close contact. He said that now tens of thousands of tourists were being sent to the DPRK. However, he warned that the
Americans don’t want this to go well and have no intention to facilitate peaceful unification on the Korean peninsula.
Answering a question about the apparent policy of the British government to use its diplomatic relations to demonise the DPRK as an "outpost of tyranny", Mr Ha said that it is true 'they' [the British authorities] want to have 'critical engagement' with 'us' [DPRK]. They have diplomatic relations with us, so why should this mean 'critical engagement'? he asked. He said that DPRK had sent many high-ranking delegations from their side to visit Britain to promote diplomatic relations – the Speaker had visited Britain, the Deputy Foreign Minister had visited three times, as well as the Prime Minister. From the UK side, only a Minister of State in the last year had for the first time visited the DPRK to discuss a number of issues, but he had made a great show of concern about alleged human rights abuse. Mr Ha said that it is completely unfair that Britain, or other visiting countries, wish to force them to follow the agenda and example of the western world. He said each country is a sovereign state, and has its own system and its own traditions. How can they follow a British standard and or allow Britain to regulate such things? He said that each country has its own sovereign right to make people more free and give people more democracy and realise more harmony in society in its own way. He said all systems and rules and regulations emerge from the people’s desire and intentions and their traditions. Mr Ha said that these visitors don’t care what our people think, what their country’s situation is but only they see the human rights situation in Korea with their own views and their own standards. Mr Ha said this is a blind policy. He said they must see it in the context of historical background and cultural traditions. He said that Korea is divided between North and South and always threatened and pressured from the American side, creating a dangerous situation. The DPRK cannot only give the individual rights and freedom but must think first of the society, first of the state and then individual interests. They are facing the threat of nuclear war from the US, so how can they say that there should be only individual freedom? He said the individual interest should be combined with the state survival because without the state how can individual people make themselves exist freely if their country becomes a colony again? Mr Ha said that under Japanese colonial rule we cannot say anything of human rights at that time because the people were oppressed by the Japanese. He said they don’t look at the rights and freedoms that exist now in the DPRK, but say that there are no political rights and freedoms. They do not look at the historical background and our political situation, he said. He said we must put the national interest first, but must make all the society, all of the people, more happy he concluded.
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