William Bowles – Essays
-
Fallujah – Where is the outrage? The story the mainstream media won’t tell you By William Bowles
Although reported by a handful media outlets at the time, the mainstream media took the official US denials at face value — that there had been no use of the illegal white phosphorus weapons on the inhabitants of Fallujah in December 2004. However the newly released movie (35 mb) from Italy’s RAI News 24 television… Continue reading
-
Syria: Old whine, new bottle By William Bowles
The UN ‘report’ on the assassination of Rafik Hariri, the former Lebanese PM, bears all the hallmarks of yet another set-up, no doubt ‘inspired’ by US pressure as part of the build-up to yet another Middle Eastern ‘adventure’. Even less remarkable is the uncritical, indeed blind acceptance by the Western media of the Report’s conclusions… Continue reading
-
Kiss your ‘democracy’ goodbye (But did you ever have one?) By William Bowles
21 October 2005 There are … potentially desirable limits to the indefinite extension of political democracy … A government which lacks authority … will have little ability, short of cataclysmic crisis, to impose on its people the sacrifices which may be necessary. – 1975 Trilateral Commission Report on the Governability of Democracies Just how pervasive… Continue reading
-
Sleepwalking into Slavery? By William Bowles
The great British public, apparently don’t think that home secretary’s Clarke’s proposed additions to the anti-terror legislation including the 90-day detention without trial, apply to them, at least as far as we know, as nobody has actually asked them. Perhaps they need to be reminded that almost identical laws were passed by the Apartheid regime… Continue reading
-
Awakening the Slumbering Giant By William Bowles
Back around 1991 I was in London for a short visit and I hung out with a South African comrade then living in exile in London. Over (at least) two bottles of wine in a bar on Islington High Street, we commiserated on the demise of the Left, which following the end of the Soviet… Continue reading
-
Mantra politics By William Bowles
Once the state acquires such draconian powers it is unlikely to give them up voluntarily. We need only look at countries that have adopted comparable laws whether it be Mussolini’s Fascist Italy, Franco’s Spain, through to the various Latin American dictatorships and how they were removed, not that removing them necessarily guarantees removal of the… Continue reading
-
‘Green slime’ invades Iraq By William Bowles
THERE’S a phrase set aside in the British army for men like Brigadier Gordon Kerr and it’s “Green Slime’’. Soldiers don’t mince words, and to regular squaddies and military brass, Kerr and his Intelligence Corps are on roughly the same level as pond life. Highly effective, immensely powerful and very dangerous pond life, but pond… Continue reading
-
Iraq: Agents Provocateurs? By William Bowles
Fascinating. No really, the ‘evolution’ of state disinformation has probably never been better displayed than in the case of the two (more than likely) SAS soldiers who were ‘liberated’ after being arrested by the Iraqi police on 19 September by a phalanx of tanks and helicopter gunships that stormed the police station where the two… Continue reading
-
The Gulf of Disbelief By William Bowles
Aside from everything else Hurricane Katrina has blown away it’s also ripped off the mask that covers the real face of corporate capitalism and reveals the stark reality that the US government has as little regard for its own ‘citizens’ as it does for those of Iraq or Afghanistan. Continue reading
-
The lull before the storm By William Bowles
Piper persuaded me to accompany him on a trip on a deep-sea trawler out of Hull, ostensibly to produce the illustrations for a book he’d written on his life as a deep-sea trawlerman. Not an experience I’m ever likely to forget and one which at times filled me with sheer terror, not to mention three… Continue reading
-
Information Clearing House Archive Part 1 1-5 September 2005
5 September 2018 — Information Clearing House [I’ve been archiving ICH digests since early 2003. Unfortunately, an unknown number of the links are now dead, so I can’t guarantee that the link will take you where you want to go. WB] Information Clearing House Digest 1-5 September 2005 Date: Mon, 5 Sep 2005 Charge Him or… Continue reading
-
Some after thoughts on Hurricane Bush and a possible ‘end of days’ scenario By William Bowles
2 September 2005 Had a long conversation with a pal of mine last night about why exactly, the US seems unconcerned about global warming and what, in all likelihood is the imminent climate catastrophe, which I think is worth sharing with readers. Now I’m not saying I necessarily agree with his conclusions but I have… Continue reading
-
Hurricane Bush hits America By William Bowles
Nothing, I think illustrates the insanity of the ‘war on terror’ than the aftermath of the hurricane that hit the Gulf states of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. Continue reading
-
Je sans frontieres? By William Bowles
I am an archetypal ‘red diaper’ baby, raised in the radical political culture produced by the struggles of the first half of the 20th century, that of socialism and the battle against the rise of Fascism. Of course it had its downside as being raised in what was effectively a ‘Bohemian’ environment set me apart… Continue reading
-
(Don’t) Mention the J** word By William Bowles
26 August 2005 Speaking at a memorial for the victims of a Palestinian attack that took place 26 years ago, [Israeli Deputy Defense Minister Ze’ev] Boim said: “What is it about Islam as a whole and the Palestinians in particular? Is it some form of cultural deprivation? Is it some genetic defect? There is something… Continue reading
-
An awful sense of déjà vu By William Bowles
If my folks were still alive I am sure this is exactly what they’d be feeling today. And, as the capitalist system inches ever closer to Armageddon, the question about the causes of war are still not part of the public discourse in a world where following the end of the Cold War, we were… Continue reading
-
The cry now is “treason” or the Star Chamber revisited By William Bowles
Under the Lords Chancellor Cardinal Wolsey and Archbishop Cranmer (1515-1529), the Court of Star Chamber became a political weapon for bringing actions against opponents to the policies of Henry VIII, his Ministers and his Parliament. Then, under James the 1st and Charles the 1st, the Star Chamber Court sessions were held in secret, with no… Continue reading
-
Officer, there’s a hole in your bit bucket By William Bowles
On July 30 I wrote a piece on the murder of Mr De Menezes by an undercover assassination squad on the Northern Line train that as the ‘leaks’ that came into the possession of TV News shows, was a pretty accurate summation of the events on that Friday morning. Continue reading
-
Book Review: ‘War Made Easy – How presidents and pundits keep spinning us to death’ By William Bowles
16 August 2005 ‘War Made Easy – How presidents and pundits keep spinning us to death’ by Norman Solomon. John Wiley & Sons, 2005. Think of Iraq as a military base with a very large oil reserve underneath – Fadel Gheit, oil industry expert In the autumn of 2001, the Bush administration hired Charlotte Beers… Continue reading
-
Many a strange bedfellow By William Bowles
The purpose of this essay is not to try and prove a definitive link between the July 7 (or July 21) attacks and the state but that an historical (and on-going) relationship exists between state-sponsored terror via covert operations of all kinds and the vehicles they use as cover – drug smuggling, money laundering, extremist… Continue reading
The New Dark Age 