Issue130

n In the first fortnight of the war on Iraq
there were more people killed than in 25
years of conflict in Northern Ireland.

n Now UK and US forces are preparing for
a siege of Baghdad which could see the
streets turned into rivers of blood.

n And what's the verdict of Scotland's so-
called national Sunday paper, Scotland on Sunday?
"This war has been a stunning success."

anti war

UK soldiers refuse to fight

Two members of the British armed forces in Iraq have refused to fight in what they regard as an immoral war.
The two men have been sent home and, if prosecuted and found guilty of disobeying orders, could be jailed for up to two years.
A third conscientious objector, a reservist who disobeyed orders to travel to the Gulf, could also face trial.
The objectors told officers that they were refusing to fight in a war that involved the deaths of innocent civilians.
Justin Hugheston-Roberts, the chair of Forces Law, a nationwide group of lawyers for soldiers, said:
"These cases are being handled by a very experienced lawyer.
"They raise serious issues as to the conscience of the individual over and above the necessity to obey lawful commands."
The actions of these three bravest of anti-war protestors have failed to break into the 24 hour TV war coverage, with the Ministry of Defence fearing a public relations disaster.

US refuseniks

American soldiers are also refusing to fight.
One US conscientious objector, Jon McLeod, wrote to the Voice last week.
Here, Jon tells us why he's refusing to take part in the war that he calls a "massacre".
"I enlisted two years ago in the US army because it seemed like a good way to pay for my college tuition.
"After seeing what army life was really like, I decided it wasn't for me, but I was determined to stick it out and fulfill my contract.
"Then, when Bush decided to attack Iraq without any reason whatever, I could take no more.
"I can not and will not be part of this massacre on the Iraqi people.
"This nonsense about weapons of mass destruction - a term I have grown to loathe - is nothing more than a lie, an excuse to take control of the oil rich lands, to boost American stocks in companies like Haliburton, and to fulfill one man's evil agenda.
"Bush is a terrorist.
"I applied for leave and never returned. I am now living in China as an English teacher, but I do not know how long this is possible. They may revoke my passport.
"America loves to kill in the name of freedom.
"War should be a last resort, always the last resort.
"The 9/11 attacks were tragic, but it would make sense to look at the US foreign policy.
"Nobody decides to hop into a plane, fly it into a building and take their own life, as well as thousands of people's lives, just because they 'hate freedom', as Bush said.
"I want everyone to understand that I am no coward and I would fight if it was necessary, but this war on Iraq is nothing more than a massacre to satisfy greedy capitalist pigs."
n Jon faces prison if he is returned to the US.
If anyone is in a position to offer him advice, please get in touch with the Voice

Warmongers carve up Iraq

Clare Short refused to follow Robin Cook out of her plush office and ministerial car to the outskirts of the back benches because, she said, she was reassured about the involvement of the UN in the reconstruction of Iraq.
Documents have now come to light that expose US plans to allow their home grown profiteers to take the full advantage of the contracts to rebuild Iraq.
Scrabbling like dogs over tasty morsels, US companies have already positioned themselves to best take advantage of the biggest reconstruction project since the Marshall Plan rebuilt Europe after the Second World War.
And Bush has handed the choicest cuts to them on a plate. Schools, hospitals, water, electricity and health provision are all up for grabs, and the biggest treat for US capitalism is the £60 billion handout to provide them.
The UN have been efficiently carved out of the project and unless Clare Short can find another excuse to maintain her ministerial privileges she may yet be sitting next to Robin Cook.
You wouldn't wish that one on very many women, would you?

Lies from the start

We've had a weapons dossier that turned out to be 12 years old and stolen from a student.
Claims that Saddam is in league with Bin Laden have been laughed off our screens by the rest of the Arab world.
And the allegations that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction must surely have been torn apart since they resorted to the last weapon of the truly desperate - suicide bombing.
'We've won Umm Qasr', 'We haven't won Umm Qasr'. 'There's an uprising in Basra', 'There isn't an uprising in Basra'.
Lies have slipped out of Tony Blair's mouth like shite out of a pipe onto Blackpool beach since he began his rush to war on Iraq.
They are then loyally repeated as gospel truth by the tabloid media. It's what usually happens during a war.
The Iraqi people don't get the chance to put their side of the story, at least not until it's all done and dusted and the real death toll emerges, buried somewhere in the broadsheets' Saturday magazines.
But Blair was playing with fire when he started lying about the deaths of British soldiers in the newspapers and on the TV, watched by their horrified families.
When pictures of the bodies of tragic Sapper Luke Allsopp and Staff Sergeant Simon Cullingworth were shown on Al Jazeera television, Blair claimed the men had been "executed" by Saddam's forces.
Not so, say Allsopp's family, who've been told by the army that their brave son died in active service while sweeping for mines, "doing the job he loved".
And they're devastated that Blair is using the body of their son and brother to, according to Armed Forces minister Adam Ingram, "point up our knowledge of the depravity, the brutality of that regime".
The first casualty of war, they say, is the truth.
It's all the more disgusting when governments turn genuine, heart-breaking casualties into propaganda lies.

Asylum seekers repressed under Labour's terror laws

by Felicity Garvie

A young Scots woman wrongfully arrested on charges of terrorism last week spoke out against the policy and actions of the British government and the police.
At a press conference, Karen Serir recounted the horrors of a dawn raid on her Glasgow home six weeks ago.
On the back of weeks of press hysteria over terrorism, asylum seekers and the threat of chemical attacks, she and her Algerian husband, Ali, were arrested under the Suspicion of Terrorism Act by armed police officers at 5.20am.
Despite being pregnant, Karen was stripped naked and held for 36 hours clothed only in a paper suit and a blanket.
Ali is still being held, although the terrorism charges have since been quietly dropped.
Joining Karen, Hussein recounted how his Scottish wife was arrested in a similar raid while he was on holiday in Algeria. On his return he immediately reported to the police, and now faces possible deportation.
Sana Sadollah, an Iraqi Kurd, told the assembled press how the US and UK governments had broken their promises to support the Kurdish people's campaign to live in peace and democracy on their traditional territory.
Finally, a school student from Edinburgh spoke about the pounding schoolkids were taking from the press for their anti-war actions.
He said the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, which the UK is signatory to, guarantees the right of children to be heard.
"We are old enough to fight," he said, "so we are old enough to say 'no'. We are going to inherit the world the politicians leave us with, therefore we must be listened to."
MSPs John McAllion and Tommy Sheridan joined the young people in condemning the hypocrisy of a war being fought allegedly for "liberation" in Iraq, while such harassment and repression is going on under our noses in Scotland.

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election news

Another Scotland is possible

The Scottish Socialist Party launches its election manifesto this week.
Under the title 'Another Scotland is Possible', the document outlines the SSP's vision for Scotland's future.
It shows how the SSP has grown into a real force for change, presenting over 200 policies to transform the length and breadth of Scotland.
Radical anti-poverty measures like the scrapping of the Council Tax would immediately address the inequality that has blossomed under New Labour.
Environmental policies like closing all toxic waste dumps, putting a five-year ban on GM crops and launching a widespread recycling program would put a stop to the environmental damage that threatens our planets future.
Scrapping PPP privatisation, increasing funding and accountability and paying public sector workers a decent wage would transform public services.
Full independence for Scotland is one of the SSP's core principals, but this manifesto works within the confines of devolution.
It highlights the fact that the Labour/Liberal coalition has made Holyrood seem like a blunt instrument. The parliament does have the power to affect real change, and this manifesto shows how it can be done. Yet the manifesto also lists what powers Holyrood does not have, and makes the case for a free socialist republic.
The manifesto also takes into account the fact that the SSP is not going to take power this year.
If people vote in the way polls indicate, the SSP will take around ten seats. Six 'fast-track' pledges lay out what this team of SSP MSPs will be fighting for.
These pledges include plans to replace the Council Tax, introduce free school meals and to continue a principled opposition to war.
In this election, the SSP will to shake Scottish politics from the ground up. The manifesto puts this in writing.
No longer will the main parties get away with shutting their eyes to people's real needs, while selling out Scotland's resources to the highest bidder.
The SSP is beginning to convince people that another Scotland is possible and worth fighting for.

n The manifesto costs £2.50 and is available from:
SSP, 73 Robertson Street, Glasgow, G2 8QD.
Or call: 0141 221 7714. Make cheques payable to 'Scottish Socialist Party'

Watch out for SSP election broadcast

The first of the SSP's election broadcasts will go on air this Friday - April 4.
Directed by multi-award winning director Peter Mullen and fellow actor/director Davy McKay, the short film features interviews with protestors on the massive February 15 anti-war demonstration in Glasgow.
You can see the broadcast on BBC2 at 5.55pm, ITV at 6.30pm and BBC1 at 10.35pm.
A second broadcast is to be shown on Friday April 23 - more details later.

BBC rig TV debate

Tommy Sheridan has been excluded from taking part in a BBC televised election debate between party leaders.
The excuse is that the SSP only gathered 2 per cent of the vote in 1999 and is therefore only considered to be a minority party.
This flies in the face of current evidence, where the SSP achieves 10 per cent in The Herald's System 3 polls and is being given a proportionate amount of coverage on other election shows.
A more plausible reason for the exclusion is that Jack McConnell has threatened to boycott the debates if Tommy is invited.
A story in the Sunday Herald at the end of last year implied that this would be the case, saying that McConnell saw no reason for his profile to be used to promote other parties. With the SSP's consistent opposition to the war, it is even more likely that this is just another way of keeping anti-war protest out of the election.
SSP members are encouraged to apply to be in the audience. Withhold the fact that you are a party member in case they suspect you will be taking part in a stunt to demonstrate against this censorship. Perish the thought!
The debate will be shown at the end of April. Call the BBC on 0131 248 4080 to be in the audience.

SSP TV election coverage
n Wednesday April 9 at 11pm, STV - Face to Face, Bernard Ponsonby grills Tommy Sheridan
n Monday April 21 at 7pm, BBC1 - Tommy Sheridan faces questions from a panel of first-time voters
n Tuesday April 22 at 10.30pm, BBC1 - Newsnight Scotland, featuring Tommy Sheridan (if he's out of jail after Faslane protest)

You're having a laugh, aren't you?

by Simon Whittle

Mark Thomas headed an all-star line up at the SSP's comedy benefit extravaganza last Sunday at Glasgow's Pavilion Theatre, compered by Viv Gee.
First up, Sandy Nelson took to the stage with his guitar. He turned the tables on artists like Oasis, Travis, The Strokes and Britney Spears, changing the words of their songs to lyrics about what he thought of them.
It was original and hilarious:
"Oops, I did it again/I released the same song/Four times in a row..."
Mark Steel was next up.
He cut to the chase straight away and got ripped into the news 'coverage' of the war, or as Mark called it: "24 hours of rolling shit." He had everyone rolling about for the entirety of his set. Great stuff.
"Hello, lefties" said Miles Jupp as he wandered on after the interval, looking down his nose at us before flying off on a tirade of anti-working class humour that said more about snobby upper class attitudes than anyone or anything else.
I'm sure there was a section of the audience that simply didn't 'get' him - maybe they didn't see the irony. But Miles stole the show for me: "I bumped into a chap in a shop doorway in Glasgow.
"He mumbled something about having trouble finding a vein.
"I know what it's like, trying to find a quality bit of Stilton."
Mark Thomas finally hit the boards to a tremendous welcome. He was full of tales about demos, direct actions and protests. He too had a go at the latest news coverage - an easy but justifiable target.
It's hard not to simply list every gag/exposŽ that he told, but he wasn't afraid to take the piss out of himself - and socialist organisations and their members.
After what seemed like only a short time onstage, he was wishing us luck, saying his goodbyes and it was all over.
Simply fantastic.

SNP steals meals

by Paul Stewart

The SNP have given another demonstration of their concern at the rise of the SSP - by "endorsing" one of the SSP's six key election pledges!
The party has circulated a leaflet in the Firhill area of Glasgow calling for free school meals for all school children.
Unfortunately, but not unsurprisingly, the leaflet makes no mention of the fact that last year's Free School Meals Bill was in the name of Tommy Sheridan, or that the SSP had spearheaded the campaign behind it.
Instead it cynically and opportunistically attempts to associate the demand solely with the SNP.
Tommy's bill was co-sponsored by SNP MSP Alex Neil.
However, while SSP members across the country were galvanising public support for the bill amongst working class communities, trade unions and other groups such as One Plus, the rest of the SNP were nowhere to be seen.
In Maryhill, the constituency where the leaflet in question surfaced, the SNP made no attempt to join the campaign until a lobby of local MSP and Labour whip Patricia Ferguson organised by local SSP members.
An SNP contingent turned up with placards and stickers to hijack the occasion.
When the SNP finally fell in behind Alex Neil to vote for the Bill, Education spokesperson Mike Russell was assigned to speak in favour. Instead, he spent his time getting ripped into the way the Bill was written.
It has often been said that besides independence, the SNP had no policies whatsoever.
Their recent actions in Firhill, resorting to stealing the credit for another party's policy, have proven this beyond all question.

anti war

Bristol to Baghdad
eyewitness account from Iraq

Jo Wilding, a law student from Bristol, recently travelled to Baghdad to act as a human rights observer. The following are extracts from her diary, sent via the internet whenever communication channels permit.

March 22

News comes of two coalition planes shot down over Baghdad.
"...As we drove onto Jumeriya (Republic) Bridge, it was clogged with traffic and a crowd hanging over the side. Boats were darting up and down hunting in the reeds for pilots.
"Something was burning on the far side of the river, too small to be a plane - maybe a piece of wreckage, maybe an attempt to flush out anyone hiding."
Later, she hears an explosion coming from the direction of the local oil refinery. "I told myself... that the people I've met who live there are probably fine, but part of me didn't believe it till I finally get them on the phone."
All around are buildings with collapsing roofs and blown-out windows.
"Trenches of oil are burning furiously, the black clouds enveloping clusters of houses and turning the road to night as you pass through."

March 23

A children's birthday party proceeds in the garden behind a tea shop, despite dark smoke clouds rolling out across the sky and the not-so-distant roar of bombs falling.
"The explosions happen all day now, though not frequently. Though in the middle class areas everything is still closed, in the poorer parts of town, the streets look the same as ever.
"As I write, the sky is still rumbling, the windows shaking. It's strange how quickly it becomes normal."

March 25

"After a missile explodes, flocks of birds fill the sky, disturbed by the shock waves. After a gust, they are replaced by a cornucopia of rubbish, drifting in the smog of sand and dust and smoke which has turned the air a dirty orange so thick it blotted out the sun. Even the rain was filthy, splattering you with streaks of mud."
A bridegroom, Omar, cries silently in a hospital corridor. His wife of three weeks, Nahda, and two others will killed when their farmhouse in Dialla was bombed yesterday.
"The windows of sixteen houses nearby were all broken, the neighbours told us, and the blast made the children's ears bleed."

March 26

"At nine o'clock this morning a group of caravans was hit with cluster bombs, according to the doctors. A tiny boy lay in terrible pain in the hospital, a tube draining blood from his chest, which was pierced by shrapnel... I'm not sure whether he knew yet, or could understand, that his mother was killed instantly and his five sisters and two brothers were not yet found.
"His father had gone to bring blood for him and his uncle, Dia, was with him."

March 27

Jo hears reports of a missile attack on a convoy of civilian buses from Syria. An Apache helicopter tailed them before rocketing a bridge they were approaching. The buses collided, but no casualty figures are available.
The Al Shaab market has also been hit. A father and son are incinerated, roads are pock-marked with craters, the smoke takes hours to clear. Forty five people at least have been wounded - many of them have died.
"The bandages which encase (Munib's) legs are yellow and foul-looking. He's fighting gangrene and is still in danger of losing his legs. 'How can I work in future?' he asked, 'I am a car mechanic. I think I am finished.'"
Schools are closed, power cuts increasing, fresh water supplies intermittent.
"Nowhere, nowhere is safe."

March 28

"Last night's bombs were so immense I could see the flashes from inside a room with the curtains drawn... The building swayed like a treehouse in the wind."
Today the city is "mummified" with a "thick crust of sand". People are running out of money and supplies, because they cannot work.
They cannot understand why they are a target, why their families are being killed and their city ruined.
"How did it ever come to this? How did we surrender our power so completely that an entire world of people screaming 'No' is not enough?"
Jo is in Iraq, documenting the realities that face the bombed residents of Baghdad, at her own expense. If you can help her out with a donation send it to: Jo Wilding c/o ARROW, 5 Caledonian Rd, King's Cross, London N1 9DX.

Huge public sector strike rocks Israel

by Paul Stewart

An indefinite strike of 150,000 public sector workers has swept across Israel in response to the government's planned savage public sector spending cuts.
The Israeli government had sanctioned cuts worth $1.5 billion, claiming that the country was overspending.
If carried out, 10,000 public sector jobs will be lost and pensions and salaries will be cut.
The United States has promised an extra $10 billion, in addition to the $4 billion it contributes annually, if the cuts happen.
But extra money has still been found to build further settlements on Palestinian land and fund higher military spending as Ariel Sharon's government, with former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as Finance Minister, continue their oppression of the Palestinian people.
Around 50,000 government ministry workers walked out on Sunday, with a further 100,000 joining them on Monday, affecting refuse collection, welfare services and education.
Israeli unions hope to intensify their actions over the next few days.
The strike represents one of the most dramatic developments since the beginning of the new Intifada.
This action, if successful, may force military spending increases to be forfeited.
Combined with internal and external pressure, it could leave the government with no choice but to come to a settlement that meets the demand of the current Intifada - the creation of a sovereign Palestinian state.

Insider dealing

Last week the US administration adviser and reknowned 'hawk' Richard Perle suddenly resigned from the influential and shadowy Defence Policy Review Board.
This board, and Perle himself, was key in persuading George W Bush to attack Iraq.
The charge was one of straightforward conflict of interest. The New York Times had reported that Perle stood to reap a fat fee as a consultant to the bankrupt telecommunications company, Global Crossing.
The aim of the consultancy was to effect a sale of the company that would place it under Chinese ownership - something about which the US government had grave misgivings on national security grounds.
Ironically Perle didn't resign because of his alleged dealings with Saudi Arabian arms dealers.
Saudi Arabia is an oil-producing state in the Middle East. According to US intelligence, the ruling regime has proven links with al Qaeda
The country is described by Amnesty International as a society "permeated by secrecy and fear, where victims and witnesses are too terrified to talk".
Political parties and trade unions are banned. No public dissent is allowed.
But they are the most important trading country with the US and the UK in the Middle East. Arms and oil worth billions of dollars change hands every week.
Enough for both governments to turn a blind eye to the human rights abuses and terrorist links.

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Mr McConnell and his New Labour war party in Scotland are rattled and worried.
He and glove puppet Jim Wallace used their last double-act before the start of the Scottish election campaign to fire a double salvo at the SSP and our elected Press Officer Hugh Kerr.
We are obviously causing concern at the highest level.
Hugh Kerr was asked by a journalist how the war would affect the Scottish elections and the SSP.
Hugh committed a cardinal sin - he replied honestly. Telling the truth in peacetime is bad enough, with the masthead dailies eager to distort and demonise.
But to speak honestly during war is tantamount to treason.
The SSP is now considered Scotland's fifth political party. Of the five parties, only the SSP opposed the bombing in Afghanistan and the terrible loss of human life.
The most reliable civilian death toll suggests over 10,000 died in the name of 'freedom'.
Of course Osama bin Laden and his al Qaeda network is still alive and well and the world is now less stable than before.
We stood against the Afghan slaughter when allegedly most people were in support.
Now we oppose the slaughter in Iraq, not because it has no UN support or because it is opposed by a majority, but because it is unjust, immoral and illegal.
Will more Scots vote for us because of our anti-war stance? Probably because people respect principles, courage of conviction and honesty, particularly when you are consistent.
We are the most consistent anti-war and pro-peace party in Scotland.
Does it make us cold and callous for admitting that more Scots may vote for us because of our anti-war stance?
Of course not. It makes us honest. Our support was already sitting four times higher than 1999 on 8 per cent before the war. We neither want nor need this war to improve our support.
But now that it is underway we make no apologies for targeting the pro-war parties and urging Scots to make May 1 a referendum on the massacre in Iraq.

We must never allow the Bush and Blair axis of evil to reduce a nation of 26 million to one man.
Saddam Hussein is not Iraq. He was imposed on the Iraqi people by various US and UK governments who armed and financed him.
Incineration is not the route to liberation, as the US/UK troops are now discovering across Iraq.
Consider the double standards of the US and UK who continued to support and trade with Iraq after Saddam had chemically bombed Halabja on 15 March 1988 with the loss of over 5,000 Iraqi Kurd lives.
Iraq posed more of a threat to the world then than now, but yet action in 2003 is taken against a relatively defenceless nation who pose no imminent threat to either the UK or the US.

Make the New Labour warmongers and lap dogs of Bush and Blair pay for the lies, the deceit, the distortion.
Most of all make them pay for the loss of innocent lives of predominantly women and children under the rubble of Basra and Baghdad.
Make them pay for the lost lives of Scottish and UK troops ordered to engage in an immoral and illegal conflict to secure more oil reserves for Bush and his extreme right-wing administration.
This conflict in Iraq is not a war, let alone our war - it is a massacre for US oil and global domination.
Make the politicians who ordered and support this slaughter pay on May 1.
Not with their lives, like the Iraqi children and our armed service personnel, but with their careers.

On Sunday April 6 an unwholesome assortment of professional Scots, pseudo-Jacobites and junketeering charlatans will celebrate the modern day cringe that passes for "Tartan Day".
It will rekindle the ignorant and embarrassing traditions of tartan kitsch so skilfully exploited by the likes of Sir Harry Lauder and shortbread tin manufacturers everywhere.
But this is what happens to a country when it is assimilated - by military force, by economic blackmail, and by the acquiescence of Scots politicians - into the imperialist construct of the so-called "United Kingdom".
Or in the words of Robert Burns Scotland was betrayed by a "parcel o rogues... bocht an sold for English gold."
For the last three centuries the London government, through their placemen in our education system and universities, have denigrated, sanitised and marginalised our own history, language and cultures.
Nowadays most Scots, especially those ale-swilling rugby types who masquerade as 80 minute patriots, couldn't even tell you where the origin of tartan kitsch came from.
Until 1822 there were no dinky wee tartan kilts with their pull-up socks and daggers, no individual clan tartans as such, no sporrans and waistcoats nor any of the other Harry Lauder regalia.
These were all invented - by Sir Walter Scott and his chums - for the visit of King George IV to Edinburgh in that year. This was the first British monarch to visit Scotland for 170 years and the first to visit since the Act of Union was passed.
The legacy of that infamous royal visit still haunts the modern day perception of Scotland. It should never be forgotten that the invention of tartan kitsch in 1822 had a political purpose.
The massacre of Culloden in 1746 was the turning point in modern Scottish history.
Without a clear understanding of the events and processes that lead up to Culloden - plus its brutal aftermath which repressed at gunpoint the language and culture of the Highlands - much of Scottish history since then doesn't make much sense.
When Anglicised historians claim that Scotland voluntarily became part of Britain they conveniently ignore the widespread riots and civil disobedience of 1707, plus the armed Jacobite uprising of 1745 that preceded Culloden.
As well as ignoring the brutalities that followed the massacre.
These included the burning of Highlanders' homes; the torture and rape of those suspected of hiding Jacobite soldiers; the executions of Jacobite sympathisers; plus the banning of Highland dress, language and culture.
Followed later by the Highland Clearances.
In 1822 the scars inflicted upon the Scottish psyche by the massacre of Culloden were still fresh in the memory. Resentment against the English government was widespread.
In order to try and heal these wounds the royal visit was conceived whereby King George IV would appear in Edinburgh in splendid tartan finery, present himself as one of us, and we all would live happily ever after in one big United Kingdom. So went the theory.
In reality it is this unionist pageant of 1822 that is celebrated on "Tartan Day" by Jack McConnell and the rest of the modern day parcel o' rogues.
For those interested in searching for a proper understanding of Scottish history, and its relevance today, forget "Tartan Day".
Why not head up to Arbroath on Sunday April 6 - meeting at 2.30pm at King's Gate - for the event organised by Scottish republicans to commemorate the signing of the 1320 Declaration of Independence.
The current war against Iraq poses the question of Scottish independence as sharply as ever.
The embarrassment of being considered British is to be equated with warmongering oil pirates and lickspittle Mini-Me toadies of American imperialism.
Part of our fight against the war in Iraq and against the sort of US militarism we see in the Holy Loch has to be for the break up of the Union and the dismantling of the British state.
Which is why May 1 should also be treated as a referendum on Scottish independence as well as a referendum on the war.

Since the first day of the invasion of Iraq, most tabloids and many broadsheets have been turned into frenzied pro-war fanzines.
The biggest bombing atrocity of the war so far - when over 60 people were blown to pieces by a Tomahawk cruise missile in a Baghdad market place - received not a single sentence in the Sun newspaper.
But as media expert David Millar from Stirling University explains in these articles, it's not just the rabid tabloids that falsify news in times of war.

In past wars, including the 1991 Gulf War, the pool system has been the main means of control of journalists 'in theatre' - a propaganda term adopted by many journalists.
The pool allows the military to control every movement of journalists and almost everything they see.
In 1991 the Pentagon tried to bully journalists not to operate outside the pool.
Since then, the Pentagon has got more sophisticated and more determined to eliminate the possibility of independent reporting.
They have pressurised journalists into leave Baghdad so they cannot report the impact of the bombing of the city.
By mid-March, around half the 300 journalists based there had left, including many of the key UK and US journalists (from US networks such as NBC and ABC and UK press such as the Times and Telegraph) who would likely have more credibility in their own countries.
The rules issued by the Pentagon are themselves part of the spin process.
They are presented as voluntary and appear to some to offer "unprecedented freedom to report the facts".
But on closer inspection, a number of clauses buried in the text indicate the iron fist in the velvet glove.
One section notes that "if media are inadvertently exposed to sensitive information they should be briefed after exposure on what information they should avoid covering".
A security review also becomes compulsory if any sensitive information is released deliberately.
In a classic passage attempting to present strict censorship rules as voluntary, the Pentagon notes that "agreement to a security review in exchange for this type of access must be strictly voluntary and if the reporter does not agree, the access may not be granted".
The pool this time has a further new feature known as 'embedding' - which means reporters are attached to military units.
They are not allowed to travel independently and some suggest that control of the technology of communication will be in the hands of the military too.
These new rules mean that journalists don military uniform and protective clothing and, the Pentagon hopes, start to identify with the military.
According to reports, there are 903 journalists embedded with US and UK forces, six times the number of journalists in Baghdad.
At US military headquarters in Qatar, the daily briefings are delivered from a huge press centre complete with a mocked up studio with five large TV screens to show accurate bombing runs.
This is topped off by tastefully deployed camouflage-netting, installed by a specially flown-in Hollywood designer. The entire centre cost of the media set is in the region of $250,000.
In a little-noticed interview on Irish radio, veteran BBC war correspondent Kate Adie argued that the Pentagon is "entirely hostile to the free spread of information".
She said: "I am enormously pessimistic of the chance for decent on-the-spot reporting."
But the threat to independent journalism is potentially more severe.
Adie reported being told by a "senior officer" in the Pentagon that if broadcasters' satellite uplink signals were detected by the military, they would be "targeted down" even if there were journalists there.
"Who cares... they've been warned," said the officer.
Journalists also suffer from the malaise of getting too involved. According to widely respected Middle East reporter Robert Fisk many are back to "their old trick of playing toy soldiers".
The former Daily Telegraph editor Max Hastings admits he got too close in the Falklands war:
"I was accused of getting too involved with the troops - I have to plead guilty to that."
In Iraq now he worries for younger colleagues:
"TV stations and newspapers tend to get over-excited in wars... It's a case of boys with toys, but the hardest thing to remember is that this is ultimately all about lives".

The attack on Iraq will be the most censored conflict of modern times.
The US is determined to eliminate independent reporting and will go to unprecedented lengths to ensure that its propaganda and spin will dominate media agendas in the UK and US.
The US and UK governments have shown themselves adept at learning propaganda lessons from successive conflicts.
The role of the media in the Vietnam war was believed by many to have been a key factor in the defeat of the US and the victory of the Vietnamese.
But the US media only started to feature dissent after the US ruling elite became split on the war.
Nevertheless, America's future war planners decided not to risk uncensored press coverage of their own conflicts, especially after Vietnam.
During the last Gulf War in 1991, journalists based in the Saudi desert were isolated from the fighting.
Newsrooms were supplied every day with new footage of 'precision' bombs hitting their targets.
This was the new clean war in which civilians would not be harmed as 'smart' technology enabled 'surgical strikes'. This was a systematic charade.
Only 7 per cent of the ordnance was 'smart'. The other 93 per cent were indiscriminate weapons - including weapons of mass destruction.
Even the smart technology missed its target in 40 per cent of cases according to official figures.
Needless to say we didn't see any of the footage of either the 'dumb' bombs or the smart bombs which missed.
But even when the smart weapons hit their targets, civilians died, as in the case of the al-Amariyah bunker in Baghdad which was not a military installation but an air raid shelter.
This time, the US and UK are claiming that most bombs will be of the smart variety and that the technology has been improved.
According to the British Ministry of Defence, "greater attention to precision-guided weapons means we could have a war with zero civilian casualties".
This statement was proved false on the first night of bombing when between three and five Iraqi civilians were hit by shrapnel.
Since then hundreds of civilians have been killed in US bombing raids.
The emphasis on the 'clean' war again is an attempt to divert attention from the fact that weapons of mass destruction such as depleted uranium tipped shells and 'bunker buster' and 'daisy cutter' bombs will be used.
Conjuring up the smell of freshly mowed grass, the daisy cutter is actually a bomb the size of a small car which destroys everything in an area the size of a football pitch.
It is said to resemble a small nuclear bomb.
As war started, the first signs of patriotic censorship appeared.
The owner of more than 100 weekly newspapers across the UK, Sir Ray Tindle, wrote to the editors of all his papers asking them "to ensure that nothing appears... which attacks the decision to conduct the war".

On the first day of the attack, Iraqi missiles fired into Kuwait were unequivocally reported on the main BBC bulletins as consisting of Scud missiles, even though this had not been confirmed.
BBC News 24, the globally available service, continually repeated this propaganda. BBC reporter Ben Brown repeatedly used the word "Scud" without any qualification. As many news outlets pointed out, the use of Scuds would be a material breach of UN resolution 1441.
The missiles were not Scuds, as was confirmed the next day.
But by then the damage was done and the correction did not receive the prominence of the original reports.
This is all a familiar pattern from previous wars, where the BBC bulletins seen by the mass UK audience follow a distinctly propagandist pro-war agenda.
As war approached in the UK, the government attempted to eliminate dissent by arguing that past differences must be put aside to "support our troops".
Dissent had already been under pressure from at least the beginning of February when the Director of News at the BBC, Richard Sambrook, issued a confidential memo to senior BBC management.
Quickly leaked by angry BBC staff, the memo showed that even before the biggest ever demonstrations in British history, the BBC was attempting to marginalise the broadcasting of anti-war voices.
Too much dissent was being broadcast, it claimed, which "forces our presenters to put the Bush/Blair position to callers - sometimes making us appear to be siding with government. Not true in all cases."
A tacit admission, if ever there was one, that much BBC output is shaped to support war.
The hackneyed phrase maintains that truth is the first casualty of war - but this does not explain nearly clearly enough that the reason truth is a casualty is that the US and UK governments are making a concerted attempt to destroy it.

Speaking on Breakfast TV news early on Sunday morning, SNP leader John Swinney attacked Robin Cook's call for British troops out of Iraq.
Now that the war has begun, we have to see it through to the end, he told viewers.
Both the Lib Dems and the SNP have now fallen into line and are backing Bush and Blair's savage invasion and bombardment of Iraq.
Even Robin Cook has now backtracked on his initial call for troops out of Iraq. He now says that the war must be fought out until Saddam Hussein's regime is removed.
Identical arguments were put forward during the early stages of the first world war and the Vietnam War.
As soon as the first shots were fired, politicians who had previously argued against going to war capitulated before the pressure of the media and public opinion.
There were heroic examples of those who refused to be infected by war fever.
For example, Keir Hardie, before his death in 1915 defied the leadership of the party that he had founded to denounce the so-called Great War as "a crime and Britain's part in it wicked and foolish".
John Maclean, Jimmy Maxton and other Clydeside socialists stood against the tidal wave of public opinion to oppose a war which even right wing historians now concede was a monumental catastrophe for humankind.
The German Kaiser, nicknamed in Britain 'the Son of Satan', was as much of a tyrant as Saddam Hussein today.
But that was only an excuse then - and it's only an excuse now. Like the First World War, the war in Iraq is a war for control of wealth and resources.
The words of Keir Hardie in 1915 are exactly applicable to Britain's role in Iraq today.
Like Keir Hardie, John Maclean, Jimmy Maxton and others, the SSP has been frenziedly denounced by the establishment for refusing to remain silent now the war has begun.
In the course of these denunciations, SSP statements have been grotesquely falsified by politicians and by sections of the media.
Typical was the article in last week's Sunday Mail which began: "Tommy Sheridan sparked outrage last night by saying UK servicemen would be as guilty as the Nazis tried at Nuremberg if they did not lay down their arms."
Tommy Sheridan made no such statement. The SSP does not blame rank and file soldiers for the war crimes being committed against the Iraqi people.
These mainly working class men and women have been placed in a dreadful position by politicians who would never dream of sending their own sons and daughters into the hell of war in the desert.
Down through the ages, the poor and powerless have slaughtered one another on behalf of the rich.
It is not the people firing the bullets who are the war criminals.
It is the politicians and the generals who, from the safety of Washington, London and Qatar, send young men and women to the killing fields of Iraq.

Give us your opinion
YOUR VOICE is your chance to give us your opinions on any issues we’ve covered.
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Letters, columns and signed articles which appear in the Voice do not necessarily represent the editorial view of the Scottish Socialist Voice or the Scottish Socialist Party

Kids are condemned for demo
I'm 13, I go to Creiff High School and on Thursday March 20 all the pupils in the school organised an anti-war protest. At 10am, about half the pupils in the school piled out onto the school field and held up banners and chanted. The local newspaper had been called but they didn't show.
At 10.45am the rector came out and told us to go inside or we would be excluded. About 50 people went away but the rest of us stood firm. Then more teachers came out and demanded we return to school. My mates and I broke off and protested further down the field while the main group went up the street and protested.
The rector said there was an official one at 1pm tomorrow but that was at lunchtime. We got chased back to class and got punishments. I ask you, is this fair?
We were demonstrating our opinion and we were condemned for it, as the protest the next day was cancelled.
Alex Warrington,
Perth and Kinross

Stand up and sit down - carefully
I wish to express my support for the continuing campaign against the war. However I do not believe that sit down protests on main roads, however spectacular, are likely to convince anybody. Indeed they are likely to be counterproductive, at least for the motorists involved.
Sit downs should be targeted as part of a boycott of US products.
The most obvious and literally flag carrying product is aircraft. I suggest asking airfields to cease accepting US carriers and if they do not do so arranging sit down blockades of the entrances to airports (and if anybody is brave enough - runways). The economic effect of this would be far greater than on main roads but would not hurt ordinary people.
If copied worldwide it would have the effect of low level sanctions, but much more humiliating and imposed not by the Security Council but by the people of the world.
Neil Craig,
Glasgow

US rules
Now that the United States of America has decided to change international law and make it perfectly legal for one country to decide to attack another if it feels threatened by it, how can the American administration dare criticise if another country follows their lead?
For example, if Pakistan attacks India, because it feels threatened, that would surely be okay? Or if Russia blasts its way into Georgia, because it feels that they "harbour terrorists", that is acceptable?
No? Silly me! Of course not! For it is one rule for the USA, and another for any other country.
The Americans and their followers have set a precedent that will no doubt come back to haunt them, and sadly the entire world.
L Thomson,
Largo, Fife

Five star generals
I note that Robert McNeil in The Scotsman has drawn up a performance assessment of all our MSPs on the final day of the first Scottish Parliament in 300 years (Friday March 28).
Robert's ratings go from one star (Couldn't rule an allotment) to five stars (Could rule the world).
It is interesting to note that, of all 129 MSPs, only two were given the ultimate accolade of five stars. No surprises for guessing who the two are:
Tommy Sheridan: "Without a doubt the most exciting member... Unexpectedly good parliamentarian, able to deal with interventions and trounce hecklers. Riveting contributions...", and Margo MacDonald: "A magnificent presence in the chamber... When she speaks, Scotland listens. Unfortunately the SNP does not."
Come on Margo - it's about time you signed up to the SSP. Between yourself and Tommy and the new bunch of MSPs waiting in the wings, we really could change the world!
Sheila Connolly,
Fife

Independence isn't the answer
Where exactly is the logic in Donald Anderson's argument for Scottish independence (see your voice, Voice issue 128)?
I fail to see why an independent Scottish parliament would automatically tackle such issues as health better than a UK parliament.
The real issue is who is elected to govern and put their party's policies into action. After all you could (in theory!) have a Tory government leading a Scottish parliament, with a socialist government in the UK parliament. Which would be better for ordinary people in Scotland?
Ultimately, re-drawing state boundaries just to make it easier to get socialism in Scotland is little more than gerrymandering.
That is the problem with nationalism, this notion of solving "our problems at home" to quote Donald's letter. I thought the workers didn't have a homeland, anyway?
Finally, equating the slogan 'all power to the Soviets' with 'all power to the Scottish parliament' was quite amusing. I don't think councils of workers are the same things as parliaments!
Graeme Kemp,
Edinburgh

off the air
Colin Bell

Homer Simpson's Iraqi Odyssey

Well, things are going pretty much according to plan. Just about our only remaining challenge, as I write, is to sink one of our own ships, but I feel sure that Mr Hoon has that under urgent consideration, and will get around to it just as soon as the wrong sort of sand stops interrupting progress.
Meantime, of course, the glorious coalition has established beyond all doubt that Saddam has indeed built up secret stockpiles of weapons of mass derision, even now being deployed by the cartoonists of the world, and targeted on Dubya and his hapless Deputy Dawg.

West End warriors

In between the vast slabs of coverage of the current war, I've caught a couple of episodes of a documentary series called The Real Tartan Army, which purports to tell the stories of Scotland's Regiments. Up to a point, it does - the point, of course, being where the archive film runs out.
Television directors would always rather use a piece of ancient movie, however meaningless, bland or irrelevant, than rely on the power of narration and script to tell the story, so we've been treated to rather a lot of fading newsreel of regiments getting the Freedom of Auchenshuggle, or getting on and off troopships, and not a lot of information about what they did before the camera was invented, or what they got up to when the guns were actually firing.
More irritating, since this series was actually made in Scotland for a Scottish audience, is that the brief snatches of autobiography, or from letters, have all been read in the same drama-school all-purpose Scottish accent. Seaforths from Ross-shire, Cameronians from Ayr, Gordons from Buchan, all sounding as if they'd been recruited on the Byres Road. Which, in a sense, I expect they were.

Pelters For Iraq

Try as I might, I still can't find an answer to the most puzzling question of all: if Gordon Brown can't afford to borrow money to build our own schools, roads, bridges, hospitals, and insists we use Private Finance, how come he can find untold millions to bomb somebody else's schools, roads, bridges, hospitals - and even buses?

On their marks...

Just had my first piece of election literature - full marks to the SNP, and to Christine Grahame MSP. Well, almost full marks.
The leaflet invites me to contact her constituency office "in Edinburgh at the address overleaf", where it states quite clearly that Christine's office is in Galashiels.
I wonder where the leaflet was drafted - and printed? Wick.

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page nine

cultural resistance

War on Scotland?

by Keef Tomkinson

What if it was Scotland, not Iraq, under attack. How would Scottish society react? This is one possible vision...
The Year 2005: A huge oil reserve has been discovered under Airdrie. To allow for oil exploration the population is resettled in Coatbridge.
Jeb Bush, the newly elected American President (narrowly defeating Hilary Clinton in a stone, paper, scissors play off) demands that Scotland opens its oil up to his brother's recent acquisition, Iraq ltd.
In Scotland a minority SNP government led by one of Sean Connery's wigs declines the offer. President Bush gives Scotland seven days to comply.
A national government is formed. Opposition MSPs with small majorities join up.
With one day left on the deadline, President Tony Blair addresses the Scottish people:
"At this late time I must admit that all attempts of diplomacy have failed. North Britain has refused to cough up its oil and President Bush has told me to sever links with the Jocks and prepare for war."
As the bombing begins friendly fire takes its first casualties. American missiles miss Govan's shipyard and instead hit a lame mule in Azerbijan. Within days Glasgow's A&E departments overflow with the wounded as life goes on as normal.
Scotland's media clicks into war mode. Patriotic music is played on radio stations with Big Country, Deacon Blue and Andy Stewart dominating the airwaves.
On television, Reporting Scotland and Scotland Today concentrate on human interest stories and Old Firm gossip. In between - Gregory's Girl, Brigadoon and Braveheart (with the alternate 'we win' ending) are also repeated.
Fearing invasion the public start hoarding goods. Stocks of Irn Bru and Tunnock's Caramel Wafers immediately run out.
In Washington, a Scotch-government in exile is paraded. The 15 strong group is fronted by Sheena Easton. She promises that, with American help, Scotland can become the next Mexico.
Meanwhile, dissident Scots led by Tommy Sheridan head to the hills to begin guerrilla warfare. Tragically his troops are distracted by an array of rural pubs and distilleries.
With American and British troops massing on the border, the international community await the impending slaughter. In Rome, the Pope makes a last ditch appeal for a penalty as Roma face defeat against AC Milan.
And then the miracle. A people's uprising - started in Carlisle - spreads across England, Europe and the USA. Government buildings are set aflame and the armed forces mutiny.
An unholy alliance of anti-war activists, anti-anti-war activists, football supporter's associations and TV addicts unite under the banners 'Reschedule Murder not Footie', 'War Means Hippies on our Streets' and 'Cancel War not EastEnders'.
With the war over, the national government leave their safety bunker in the South of France to a reception saved for the likes of Fred West. A post-war election returns 129 single issue candidates. Scotland is free again.

Heavens above

Far from Heaven directed by Todd Haynes. In cinemas now

by Mairtin Gardner

I've got a feeling that the only Oscar Julianne Moore will ever get will be the one given for Lifetime Achievement.
Yeah that's the one - the Academy's apology for giving the award to some pointless, gushing Welsh hoofer or some, ahem, strawberry blonde actress from that sweeping majestic Australian epic BMX Bandits!
Well, okay, so Nicole Kidman's performance in The Hours was outstanding. So Moore, also outstanding in Far from Heaven, was on a loser there but why she was passed over for best supporting actress for her role in The Hours is astonishing.
Seems yet again that if it's commercially successful, then it's good. How else would you explain Chicago winning so much?
But what about Far from Heaven? It's a beautiful, gentle, pastiche on the 50s American melodrama. Like Guess Who's Coming to Dinner and Victim.
It's the story of Frank (Dennis Quaid) and Cathy Whitaker's (Julianne Moore) seemingly model marriage in 1950s Hartford, Connecticut.
This is no hackneyed assault on the easy target of southern American prejudices, but rather an assault upon the so-called 'decent 'liberal' north. Theirs is a marriage depicted in television ads. A magazine features photographs of Cathy as a model homemaker and citizen. But beneath the surface of the perfect American family, Cathy and Frank hide scandalous secrets.
Frank has been hiding his homosexuality, and after his wife intrudes on him in "clinch", he is talked into seeing a doctor for a heterosexual conversion.
Whilst Frank continues to undergo the humiliation of the 'treatment', Cathy finds solace in the friendship and company of their black gardener Raymond (Dennis Haysbert).
For the gossips, this is too far a step for even the cause-driven Cathy to take. Not only is he black, but he is poor. The scene in the art show drives home the petty class prejudices that only compounds the racial prejudice that existed then and still exists in so-called 'liberal' America.
It could be argued that Far from Heaven has tried to cram in too many themes. But it works.
Todd Haynes attacks the kind of venal prejudices that still pervade American society.
The film seems to try just a little too hard. A 50s storyline that bases itself upon not one but two of the more noxious prejudices in society might seem a tad ambitious. But in fairness it is carried of well.
Moore and Quaid are excellent. How Quaid didn't even get an Oscar nomination is as puzzling as Moore's failure to win any award this year!

'A torch upon future struggles'

by Gerry Cairns

In April 1320 Bernard de Linton sent a document to the Pope. De Linton was the abbot of Arbroath as well as Chancellor of Scotland. His letter contained the seals of eight earls and 45 barons.
This letter is a key event in Scottish radical history. Six years had elapsed since Robert the Bruce's victory at Bannockburn.
Edward the second of England still claimed suzerainty over Scotland. The Pope seemed to be the main man in recognising Scottish independence at this time. Indeed, Bruce should know.
He had been excommunicated at the turn of century for murdering John Comyn in a church in Dumfries. Papal power, it may have been called.
It is true that socialists do not usually commemorate the handiwork of earls and barons! However the Arbroath Declaration was different.
In the words of John Prebble:
"From the darkness of medieval minds it shone a torch upon future struggles which its signatories could not have foreseen or understood."
Scottish independence was asserted in a truly revolutionary way. The rights of the people came first. That nebulous term, freedom, came before Bruce and the Pope himself. Should the king try to subvert that freedom he too would be deposed.
The king of England should leave us Scots in peace, who live in this poor little Scotland... and covet nothing but our own.
This document was about more than Scotland's independence; it was about class and developing theories of political and social power.
Much was made of the link to the American Declaration of Independence in last year's press. Less is made of the challenge to monarchial power that occurred during the Scottish Reformation.
Republicans like George Buchanan were influenced by that Appeal to the Pope in 1320. The link extends to the Covenanters (well, some of them) who challenged absolutism in the seventeenth century.
In 1920 John Maclean chaired a meeting in Arbroath of the Scots National League (a left nationalist organisation). In his own inimitable style he stated that he was there to protest that in that year Scottish boys dressed in the garb of the English government were being used to suppress the Irish struggle for independence.
Are not Scottish soldiers still dressed in the same garb in Iraq where they have no quarrel with the people whom they are fighting?
Scottish socialists should remember this progressive declaration in our struggle for an independent socialist Scotland. That is why some of us will gather at Arbroath on April 6 to protest that Blair and Bush get out of Iraq.
Almost 700 years later, let us maintain the pressure to leave the Iraqis in peace to covet nothing but their own.
We need a new progressive declaration of Scottish independence - to get rid of the weapons of mass destruction from the Clyde, to withdraw all Scottish regiments and to fight British imperialism, not its victims.
n Gather at Arbroath Abbey, 2.30 pm, Sunday April 6.
Bus leaves from George Square at 10am (price: adults - £10; children - free.) There is a social in the Foundry Bar afterwards.

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page ten

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page eleven

anti war

Edinburgh rocks

by Mick Napier, Edinburgh Stop the War Coalition

Over 15,000 people demonstrated against the invasion of Iraq, on the streets of Edinburgh on Saturday March 29.
Earlier in the week, Assistant Chief Constable Dickson intervened politically against the march, calling on parents of young children, as well as young people, to keep away from the march.
Dickson issued an implicit threat by saying that he "could not guarantee the safety of the march" since it was "unauthorised".
But the march passed off entirely peacefully. Police in Edinburgh even praised the demonstrators after the event.
During a sit-down opposite Edinburgh Castle on Princes Street, protestors observed a minute's silence for the innocent civilians killed in Iraq so far.
The mood of the demonstration was determined. Speaker after speaker - including Tommy Sheridan, Elaine C Smith, Robin Harper and John McAllion - called for the immediate end to the invasion and the return of British troops from their war against the people of Iraq.
Susan Karim, an Iraqi, bitterly condemned the outrage of the raising of the American flag on conquered Iraqi soil.
Fresh from a phone call to her family inside Iraq, Susan described the horrors committed against ordinary Iraqis by the invading American and British forces.
This demonstration was one of a series on the streets of Scotland over the last two weeks.
Another Edinburgh protest at the start of the invasion involved over 3,000 school students striking and marching to the US consulate to protest.
Others have joined together almost seamlessly to prove Tony Blair's latest reckless gamble will miscalculate; this anti-war movement will not collapse because the invasion is under way.

n No More Blood for Oil!
Protest/blockade of Grangemouth Oil Refinery
Saturday, April 5 at 12 noon
Near Polmont Station on main Glasgow-Edinburgh line.

Make war a burning election issue

by Allan Green

Tony Blair once infamously compared the Scottish Parliament to a parish council.
But when Scotland goes to the polls on May 1, we all have the chance to make resounding anti-war statement.
The anti-war movement in Scotland is well aware who is responsible for the war.
To prove it, there have been enormous national demos at Labour conferences in Glasgow and Dundee.
The prospect of the Scottish Parliament elections becoming a virtual referendum on the war terrifies New Labour.
They had been hoping for a quiet election campaign and even had the Scottish Labour conference on the theme 'don't mention the war'.
Jack McConnell, in desperation, has resorted to slanderous attacks on Tommy Sheridan and the Scottish Socialist Party.
He even claimed that the SSP rejoices in the bombing of Baghdad.
This is typical of the hypocrisy behind the war - the warmongers turning reality on its head with their sick claim that those who oppose the war are those who celebrate it.
The tabloid press has been quick to promote this campaign of slander and distortion. The SSP are now under attack for campaigning to bring the troops home.
The hysteria is all designed to try and stop the SSP and others from making the war an election issue. However they will not succeed.
We are a party of principle that is willing to stand up against this imperialist slaughter whether Jack McConnell and his cronies in the media like it or not.
We have consistently opposed war - in Kosovo, in Afghanistan and now in Iraq. Unlike some other parties, we do not wait until there are millions on the streets before we voice our opposition.
The anti-war movement in Scotland is turning up the heat on the warmongers during the Holyrood election campaign. A national demo has been called in Glasgow for Saturday April 12.
It is vital that every SSP member and supporter helps to build this demo. Tell the warmongers - you will pay on the first of May.

Police tactics are polls apart

by Nick McKerrell

The ultra-heavy police presence on the anti-war demonstration on March 22 in Glasgow seemed to mark a change in tactics for handling peaceful protest against the carnage in Iraq.
Protestors were stunned at the numbers of police present, many kitted out in riot gear. There have been calls for a public inquiry into the way they handled the protest.
In the two years since the appointment of Willie Rae to the position of Chief Constable of Strathclyde Police, direct action protest has had to deal with invasive, provocative police activity.
August 2001 saw a near-riot caused by the police when they moved in to close Govanhill Pool - which had been the scene of a peaceful protest for months.
Rae had to concede an 'independent' inquiry, carried out by Fife CID, into the police's action on that day.
Their report is thought to be highly critical, but no-one knows because publication of it was refused.
Incredibly one of the leading officers responsible, Ricky Gray, gained promotion to Assistant Chief Constable and is now in overall command of public order incidents in Strathclyde!
The protests at Faslane have witnessed an ever increasing number of police and mass arrests at a level unprecedented in Scottish legal history.
Three SSP members arrested on those demos were refused entry to Italy to participate in a mass protest in Genoa, based on information passed on by Strathclyde Police.
Following the Govanhill events, information was leaked to the press that several members of the SSP were under surveillance both before and after the protest.
But it wasn't always so. Police took a fairly light-handed approach to mass demonstrations against the Poll Tax and the illegal demos against the Criminal Justice Act.
All that seems to have changed in Strathclyde in the last two years.
Questions need to be asked of the provocative tactics of Gray and Rae to make sure that protestors are safe from police attack in the anti-war movement and other direct action struggles.

World against war

by Frances Curran

You wouldn't know it from the TV, but we are part of the biggest anti-war movement in history. Anti-war protestors are in the majority worldwide.
Over 5 million people swept onto the streets on the first weekend after war was declared, to register their opposition.
Across Athens, Rome, Madrid, New York, London, Berlin, Lisbon and many more cities and towns, millions of ordinary people, speaking in different languages - but with one voice - called for an end to the war on Iraq.
Reports of these demonstrations have been suppressed in the media, no doubt because the full realisation of the scale of protest internationally would severely undermine support for this war.
Last weekend, the isolation of Blair and Bush was reinforced as millions took to the streets in the capitals of the Arab world. These huge protests are set to intensify.
In Spain, school and college students have already staged strikes of protest. And 25,000 young people registered their protest by striking on March 26 throughout Australia.
The anti-war movement has been attacked by governments curbing the human rights of protestors, 450 of whom in Belgium have been placed under 'administrative arrest' to prevent them protesting.
Thousands were arrested in Cairo and in San Francisco. Laws have been invoked in Turkey to deny the right of assembly, and tear gas, water canons and batons have been used in Greece and Spain.
Such are the attacks on legitimate protest, Amnesty International have issued a call for all governments to respect the rights to freedom of expression and assembly.
What have governments got to fear from the peace movement except exposure to the truth behind this illegal war?
Anti-war protest is set to continue across the globe.

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page twelve

voice at work

Train guards strike against slashing of rail safety role

Scotrail and other train operating companies (TOCs) are refusing to take the safety of passengers and workers seriously.
The Rail, Maritime and Transport union (RMT) have been forced into the recent strike action by TOCs plans to downgrade the safety training and role of guards.
Yet, as if to undermine their disregard for safety, untrained managers are acting as scabs to replace guards.
And the government is subsidising this reckless approach. The Strategic Rail Authority will underwrite all TOC losses incurred during the dispute.
This breaches their operating franchise agreement - TOCs are supposed to pay a £40 fine for each minute they run short of the organised train schedule.
Scotrail have had access to the media to promote their arguments for downgrading the guards' role.
In contrast, Lord Cullen's report on the Ladbroke Grove train disaster, where 31 people died, has been ignored.
He stated: "Every person on a train irrespective of who they are including contractors should be trained on evacuation and operating procedures."
Scotrail's argument stresses importance of the guards' responsibility for the customers inside train in the event of a mechanical failure.
But they are intent on ensuring guards are no longer certified to go on to the tracks. If this happens job cuts are sure to follow with public safety put into further jeopardy through the employment of cheaper untrained staff on driver only trains.
Many of the train operating companies backing the RMT's case have already suffered train crashes. They know the importance of the role of the guard in train protection.
Unfortunately TOCs, putting profit before safety, are given the support of Alistair Darling's Department of Transport. The tragic consequence is likely to be further loss of life on the railways.

FBU rejects deal

by Richie Venton

Firefighters are rejecting the government's latest 'final' offer almost unanimously in the run-up to a further FBU recall conference.
If their democratic will is ignored by Blair's dictatorship, the FBU leadership should lead them into strike action and appeal for solidarity action by other unions.
Paul Wilson, a firefighter in Barrhead and SSP council candidate in Johnston, told us why FBU members resent their treatment by New Labour:
"John Prescott is trying to split the FBU by imposing a settlement on England and Wales, knowing he can't do that in Scotland and Northern Ireland.
"Now he is demanding we hold a democratic postal ballot but then if democracy doesn't suit him he will impose a deal anyway. That's shocking from a Labour government.
"This is the same rubbish offer as before with the same strings. They're promising to look at the control staff and retained firefighters' wage structures but with no guarantees of parity. Last November parity was guaranteed.
"We'd be destroying the fire service if we accepted it and people would die. The campaign on pay ended months ago.
"This is now about keeping a fire service that works for communities.
"Strathclyde Firemaster Jeff Ord has said he will be the beacon for the government's cuts as proposed by Bain.
"He wants to cut crews on engines which is the most dangerous thing that could be done. Ord is threatening to sack people who resist these ludicrous cuts."

Left union member stands for secretary

by Richie Venton, SSP workplace organiser

SSP members in the General, Municipal and Boilermakers union (GMB) are campaigning to elect Paul Kenny, the left candidate for general secretary.
A former gardener with Hammersmith council, he has served the union as shop steward, branch officer and on its national executive.
Paul has been an outspoken critic of New Labour's treatment of the firefighters, where he warned it could "create civil war within the labour movement".
His election platform includes "a union more accountable to the members", with promises of votes by the members before any pay offers or recognition agreements are reached with the employers - a blow to 'sweetheart deals'.
He calls for action to "end the disastrous sale of public services to the lowest bidder"; to "end boardroom immunity when workers are killed through management negligence"; to end "the scandal of women paid 25 per cent less than men" and for "a state pension fit to live on."
Paul Kenny's election would be another body-blow to New Labour, whose Thatcherite assault on GMB members in both the public and private sector needs united resistance, not a union leadership in bed with the Blairites.

Health union opposes cuts

UNISON's Scottish Health Committee has unanimously voted to recommend outright rejection of the stitch-up Agenda for Change proposals.
Where NHS workers have access to the truth they are refusing to accept this assault on their rights.
Modernisation, in return for some modest gains, as promoted by Agenda for Change, would have a devastating effect on the pay, conditions and rights of NHS workers.
The effect of the reforms would be an expansion of private sector involvement in health service provision, at a time when the majority of staff and patients have realised the dangers of trying to make a profit from the treatment of illness.
UNISON will ballot on the issue at the end of April.
The Scottish Health Committee is calling for a Scottish ballot. UNISON's Scottish conference will debate a motion from the North Glasgow Branch calling for full and democratic Scottish bargaining machinery.
Carolyn Leckie, branch secretary of North Glasgow Hospitals Branch of UNISON is scathing of the proposals:
"The leaderships of most trade unions at UK level are trying to railroad this through.
"They want to deliver peace in the NHS for the government. Agenda for Change is the same plan the government has for the Fire Service.
"The key to defeating Agenda for Change is in making sure all trade union members have all the information and don't vote on the basis of government spin.
"Agenda for Change would further entrench low pay in the NHS. Staff would be expected to work round the clock for less and a wedge would be driven through a workforce who rely on teamwork to look after the public and save lives."
n Full information on the potentially devastating effects of the Agenda for change can be found at the UNISON web site: www.unison.co.uk