Thursday, September 08, 2005
Why was New Orleans turned into a war zone? posted by Richard Seymour
Some questions we know the answer to. We know why aid was withheld, roads blocked and communication lines cut. We know why the Canadians beat the US army to a New Orleans suburb. It was all because they were taking the time to build up a sufficient force to storm the city. Witness the following exchange at a DoD press briefing between General Blum and a reporter:Q: One quick follow-up. Is it fair to say, using the convention center as an example, that one reason it took until Friday to get aid in is the National Guard needed time to build up a response team with military police to ensure law and order because the New Orleans Police Department had degraded so much?
GEN. BLUM: That is not only fair, it is accurate. You've concisely stated exactly what was needed, and I told you why. We took the time to build the right force. The outcome was superb. No lives hurt, nobody injured. It was done almost invisibly.
That was on Saturday September 3rd. The same day, the Bush administration sent Louisiana Governer Blanco a memo demanding the full transfer of control of the state's National Guards and police units, citing the Insurrection Act. When the local governor would not hand over control, the government merely side-tracked Posse Comatitus, and "dispatched Lt. Gen. Russell Honore from the US Northern Command to develop a parallel command structure overseeing active duty troops." The World Socialist Website draws attention to the fact that a number of designs for martial law in the event of emergency had been designed by the US military's Northern Command, and posit that this was a trial run for bigger things(Article here).
Insurrection. As noted before, the army had no delusions about their remit - it was not to secure human life and bring supplies, but to suppress an "insurgency". It would involve "combat operations" turning the city into a "little Somalia".
What we don't know the answer to is: what the fuck is all this "insurgency" gibberish? One assumes the Army Times uses the language that army personnel have been instructed to use in talking about the situation. So who encouraged them to consider New Orleans an insurgent city? Here's one thought, all the better to prompt others: the New Orleans police could not, and would not on the whole waste their time defending shops and marts. The police fell apart because they could not bear the stress of having to fight with people who needed diapers and food. Having been ordered by Ray Nagin to stop searching for the living and start protecting property, hundreds left and a number committed suicide. The state having lost its monopoly of violence in the city, unable to defend property and presumably under enormous pressure by business leaders, decided to "re-take" the city under the rubric of an armed invasion. But they could not justify this except in terms of the Insurrection Act. They had to be dealing with an "insurgency".
People trying to feed themselves and stop their kids from dying: this is what the US Army called an "insurgency". Incidentally, Mr Nagin called for this in his infamous radio outburst - he demanded the introduction of troops and the full imposition of martial law to 'restore order'. None but the lowliest heads are likely to roll over this, but if there was to be any justice a tumbrel would also be reserved for him.