Here Today... Gone To Hell!

A new phase for Arms Control in the world will take place in 2008, as recently 3 NGO's released a study pointing out that Fifteen years of conflicts have cost Africa around $300bn.
http://www.saferworld.org.uk/newslist.php?lang=en&id=374


http://thereport.amnesty.org/eng/A-year-in-campaigning/Control-Arms

" In 2006, activists achieved a major victory when the UN voted overwhelmingly to start work on a treaty. This marked a massive victory for AI and its partners in the Control Arms campaign, Oxfam and the International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA). After three years of campaigning around the world and three weeks of concerted campaigning in New York before the vote, 139 governments were persuaded to vote in favour of a UN resolution to start work on an Arms Trade Treaty. In December, 153 governments voted for the resolution’s formal adoption by the UN General Assembly, with only one state – the USA – voting against "

How is that possible?
Why do the United States (and most of the time the 51st state Israel) never play team?
We can't even list how many treatees and UN projects the USA have voted against ALONE.
But arm control ... come on ....

Discuss?

Your answer is right here:


One nation's cost is another's gain.

A good first step would be to cast the criminals out of D.C.

I have a feeling there is more to the story than what is posted.

Anyway, why would we be reducing our arms, we're fighting 2 wars!

This is about controlling weapon business across the world, and specifically when directed to poor countries that are facing civil wars and such.
It's not about asking the USA not to have arms, it's about asking rich countries to behave a stop spreading killing machines across the globe.

As polluxlm said, it's about money.

But what stikes me, is the USA voting No, alone. 153 countries say yes, and the USA say no. Don't they get a hint?

UN votes are dictated by the White House.  No further explanation necessary, I think.

Without knowing why the USA voted no, there is no sense in even discussing it.  Does anyone have a link to the explanation from the USA? 

We dont have all the facts on this one - some are so quick to condemn America's actions.

The campaign is aimed at passing an arms trade treaty as part of a process that began in the U.N. General Assembly last year when 153 countries voted in favor, 24 abstained and only the United States voted against starting work on one.

At the time, the powerful U.S. gun rights lobby, the National Rifle Association, or NRA, rallied its supporters to oppose the treaty.

Washington Post (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/09/AR2007100901850.html)

how nice for them, they dare to be different.

So when everybody vote yes, and one country votes no, you still want "explanation" ?

It would be fair enough if this was a tight debate, but the USA (and israel, and sometimes some phony islands lost somewhere in the ocean) have a habit of voting NO to many many treatees and decisions coming from a very large majority: environement, arm control, palestine, economy control ...

When so many countries (and therefore experts) agree on several issues, it is always to see one player playing alone like that. We're on the same planet, and ONE country still plays alone.


ps: if you still need explanation, i have provided you with links ...

As part of the ?100 days Countdown? before the crucial General Assembly vote, representatives from 70 AI Sections around the world travelled to New York to campaign and lobby a UN Review Conference on small arms and light weapons. Control Arms activists lobbied with a campaign report, The AK-47: The world?s favourite killing machine (AI Index: ACT 30/011/2006), and a booklet entitled Compilation of global principles for arms transfers(AI Index: POL 34/004/2006) published by AI and its partner organizations.

 ? ?Maybe it's because the UN is biased, corrupt and usually votes againts the US on every other matter. ?Especially when they cry that the US doesn't give more money to the general fund. ?Albeit the US is the country that gives the most through the UN and w/o going through the UN and they serve as the host nation which is costly. ? 1) Maybe they were making a point and 2) maybe it also has to do with enforcing the makers of guns and weapon parts not to export their product and whats to stop others from shipping them after a legal shipment.
 ? As for the first point 1)Maybe, The point the US is maybe making, is that when they decided to send arms to Pakistan to help fight in Afganistan the neighboring country India became angered and started buying more weapons from Russia, China and Syria without a problem. ?Another reason could be because of the oil for food debacale was so scandelous (Yes so scandelous) and while there was a strict embargo and sanctioning of Iraq, that after the war had started, some 20 new Russian MIGs were found buried in the sand. ?Advanced avionics and missles and other goodies were found within and around the fighter jets. ?Those parts were made in of course Russia, Germany and who else? oh yeah France. ?All 3 were also big playa's in the oil for food scam. ?The second part 2)I just recently watched something on msnbc stating this; ?If the US can't enforce it's own parts (recievers) makers and their customers/agents and the other countries around the world aren't walking the walk by stopping arms shipments then why bother with the false hope of reducing small arms weapons.
 ? ?Again the weapon of choice in all these "nations" is the AK-47/Kalashnikov type rifle. ?They are mass produced and delivered to these countries either straight up or through other countries or their agents from countries other than the US. ?I say other than the US, because there are approx. 15 different companies that make a US/Russian AK-47 and/or parts in the U.S. and they tend to self enforce themselves as best they can. ?Most of these companies have Mr. Kalashnikov's "stamping" of approval with legal rights and styled production, unlike other countries who make these style of weapons.
 ? ?Basically it's political wrangling. ?The UN can't enforce any country to do anything. ?There looking to justify their exisitence or get their greedy hands involved. ?It is up to the individual countries to enforce themselves and form treaties with other countries and use sanctioning to those that do not adhere to the boundries of the treaty. ?These countries who form treaties usually get other countries to join in by providing them with arms, weapons and money so go figure? ?All the above part of my post is just informational or worthless I guess.

Is that a bad thing?
Promoting bills against arm business is a bad thing? Surely for a country at war.

I do agree with your first remark on the UN, but you should know that the council of security (where the US is sitting) is actually a big part of the problem.
The UN is biased and corrupt? The UN is composed of representative from countries, so you're saying the world is corrupt?
What does "votes against the US" ? Who votes against the US? The world?
You are starting with an (http://ab hominem) argument (which, amazingly, applies to the country you are defending too ..) to actually reflecting my original remark towards the us the other way around ...


You would be surprised to know what dark truth lies behind the billions of Aid "rich countries" "give" to the poor world ....
Again, it's often not about money but about changing habits.

Please

? 1) Maybe they were making a point and 2) maybe it also has to do with enforcing the makers of guns and weapon parts not to export their product and whats to stop others from shipping them after a legal shipment.

I dont understand how does all these escuse voting no on this project?
The idea is to limit, control and monitor arm transfer and business in order to prevent (poor) countries who are facing internal conflicts to fuel these wars.
I know the USA are not the only evil country out there (France has a lot to do with many on going conflicts), but it is known that the USA are regularly fighting proxy wars and using local armies/movements to work on their worldwide strategy.
I think the USA are afraid to lose :
- many expensive contracts with "local armed forces"
- some strategic regional levers

And on top of that, this project actually states that it will not prevent the international community on "legal" arm transfer for peacekeeping or defence actions.

That is what i call beeing a "teamplayer"

Then why voting against a bill that will mainly affect the ak47 and such weaponry?

It's either you are a hardcore liberal individualistic person (who has been raised like that by parents and social culture) who thinks that problems can only be solved by the individual and that the group effort means nothing ... or you have no clue in how the world works , because that is exactly how the world works right now and that is why it is so fucked up.

The UN can't enforce anything? Because 5 countries rule it, and there is often one of them who says no to everything.

Your advice on multiplying multi-lateral cooperation at a country level is going against everything Peace makers are trying to do for the world.


But THAT IS THE POINT OF IT ! That's the beauty of it.
The world is saying " we've been doing this and this wrong lets stop". And the USA says " no, lets continue". Thats the basic story.

But you know it's not only about arm controls
It went the same way on geneva convention and prisoners of war conventions.
The USA change the rules to fit their strategy.
Too bad for them the geneva conventions was there before the craziness of your country strated and also after a big world wide shock (genocide). But they still found a way to get around it (guantanamo, bagram, abu grahib ...)

So it's now a habit for them to say no to everything because they want all their doors open "in case of". That is the DEFINITION of beeing egoistical prick.

 I have probably more years of worldly teamwork then you have years alive.? You, indirectly call me an egotistical prick?? You believe that your an intellectual?? Please, your a person of good fortune yet feel you must down play it because of guilt or envy of others.? Based on this and your previous posts in various threads, you can't disguise your contempt for others yet you believe others are in the wrong and you hold the view of world opinion.? I call that conflicted and unrealistic.
? ? I think that others who post on this fan site know how I post, be it in a rational and realistic open for discussion or a humorous point of view.? You may think otherwise.? Perhaps this quote is the way you think:? "Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let people have guns .. why should we let them have ideas?"? Stalin
? ? I don't know you so I really don't like to make a statement to either insult you or brand you due to your beliefs or the way you interact with others especially while at your keyboard.? I try not to judge people that I don't know personally however there are the exceptions to every rule.? I do tend to have a gut feeling about people and most times I'm sadly correct.

So not to get lost in translation:
J'ai probablement plus d'ann?es de collaboration de ce monde alors vous avez des ann?es vivantes. Vous, indirectement m'appeler une piq?re arrogante ? Vous croyez que votre un intellectuel ? S'il vous pla?t, votre une personne de bonne fortune se sent pourtant que vous doit le jouer en bas ? cause de la culpabilit? ou ? cause de la jalousie d'autres. A bas? ceci et vos postes pr?c?dentes dans les divers fils, vous ne pouvez pas d?guiser votre m?pris pour les autres pourtant vous croyez que les autres sont dans l'erreur et vous tenez la vue d'opinion de monde. J'appelle qu'oppos? et peu r?aliste. Je pense que les autres qui postent sur ce site de ventilateur savent que je poste, l'est dans un rationnel et r?aliste ouvert pour la discussion ou un point de vue amusant. Vous pouvez penser autrement. Peut-?tre cette citation est la fa?on que vous pensez : ? Les id?es sont plus puissantes que les fusils. Nous ne laisserions pas de gens ont des fusils.. pourquoi les nous permettent d'avons des id?es ? ? Staline je ne vous sais pas si je n'aime pas faire vraiment une d?claration ? ou vous insulte ou vous marque en raison de vos convictions ou la fa?on que vous r?agissez r?ciproquement avec les autres surtout pendant qu'? votre
clavier. J'essaie de ne pas juger de gens que je ne sais pas personnellement cependant il y a les exceptions ? chaque r?gle. J'ai tendance ? avoir un boyaux se sentant des gens et de la plupart des temps que je suis tristement correct.

Don't want to make a statement/insult or brand me? Well that's who you started.
Dont want to judge? That's what you did?
Gut feeling over the internet? nice try.

I didnt called you a egoistical prick, i labeled what you put forward as solution for world interaction.

I believed that i am an intelectual? play down? guilt ? envy ? what the hell are you talking about?
Oh ! It's because i have a nintendo wii and go out to parisian nightclubs therefore i cannot express my sentiments on world's injustice? hum .... ok.

Again, i answered on what you wrote, not on what you are. Now if what i wrote is too stupid to trigger a response from you, fair enough, but leave the internet fights for others.

...crickets chirping...

Of course I want an explanation.  Democrats criticize some of Bush's vetoes while his reasons for those vetoes were prefectly within reason.  And Republicans criticize Bush haters as anti-American when they have very good reason to hate Bush and are as American as they come.  If you're willing to make up your mind on an issue without hearing both sides, that's just not good.  That Washington Post article still didn't give the USA's side from their perspective.  No offense to the rest of the world, but I'm damn glad we don't just go with the majority on everything.   Now the USA could be dead wrong on this issue (again I have no real knowledge of the reasons or events leading to the 'no' vote), but I wouldn't just condemn the USA for their vote without knowing all the facts.  Some people in this country are all too eager to see the USA cast in a poor light or to see the USA fail (lots of people on this board from what I can tell).  Makes me sad actually.  The left in our country (of which I am from time to time) is just so negative on occasion.  And the right in this country (of which I am from time to time) is just too hateful on occasion.  It makes me yearn for a third party to step up and challenge the two shitty parties we now have. 

^^ Good post.

Not sure if we'll ever see a 3rd party candidate with a chance unless something drastic happens though. The republicans and democrats control a lot of money.

Ron Paul.

As i said the explanation is behind the links i gave.
Well i'm not from the usa, so i'm not intricated in national politics.
I can't help you on the difficulties or internal politics, all i wanted to say is that i am often shocked my american policies.

My opinions on the usa have been mapped on many years of recieving information from various sources, but when i hear about

secret cia prison
secret flights
european missile strategy
guatanamo
torture and killing (abu grahib and bragram)
giving medals to monsters (general miller)
trying to destroy the geneva convention
unconditional israel supporting
links with egypt
all the history of state terrorism
voting to NO to most of all international treatees that gather worldwide agreements

now i know france and many rich countries are also to blame (the netherlands just recently transfered a "prisoner" to algeria to be ... "terminated" . reported by amnesty).

i don't know what else to tell you ...

You bring up some good points.  One that peaks my interst is the 'tourtue and killing' item.  Have you ever seen the movie 'A Few Good Men"?  Not that Hollywood is the real world, but there is a moment in that movie that just resonates with me.  When Jack Nicholson's character has his monologue on the witness stand where he declares that "you want me on that wall", I can't help put feel that I do want guys like that on the wall.  I believe there are just things that happen outside the pervue of the American public that NEED to happen to keep us safe.  Let me ask you guys this question, and apologize if this has been covered on the board in the past.  If we could save say 4,000 innocent lives by torturing one would-be terrorist, would you condone it even though it goes against established treaties?  I know I'll get lambasted here for my point of view, but I'd not only condone the action...I'd full out support it as long as it never becomes public knowledge.  I hope that government does everything within its power to keep our public and other nation's innocent lives safe.  This is just one of those issue where I pop up on the right hand side of the isle.

On the flip side: How many future lives does it cost us to condone the torture? This exercise is already used as a recruiting tool for Jihad nutjobs around the globe. Innocent or guilty, in their eyes, we're out there picking up Muslims and torturing them.

That's why I qualified my statement by saying "as long as it doesn't become public".  It doesn't work in my eyes if the world knows you're doing it.  Good point however.

In secret? Sounds like a good idea. How would it work? Should we trust the government to only torture bad terrorists?

Doesn't sound like land of the free to me.

I didn't see that part, sorry.

I'd still disagree with it on moral and legal grounds.

I remember Chris Wallace saying to Ron Paul "So are we going to take marching orders from AQ now?" (Paraphrasing, I don't remember exactly.) While that was a cheap shot, and Wallace was wrong, most people missed the irony in that statement. By condoning torture as an intelligence gathering tool (Which most military experts say is unproductive and does not work), we are lowering the bar, which was set by AQ-we are allowing them to set the standard, essentially taking orders from them. To me, torturing ( public knowledge or not) is taking marching orders from AQ and a wet dream recruiting method for Bin Laden.

My two cents.

So you believe that the use of torture by the US is a relative new technique?  I doubt it SLC.  I think we have probably used torture since our inception as a means to gather intelligence.  I have no proof, just my opinion of how the system we have in place must work.

When did I say it was a new technique?

My argument simply counters those who claim that "This is not like any war we have fought in the past" so therefor torture is a method we must now embrace. I say it is against the law, immoral, and the experts say it is not useful and only adds more fuel to the fire.

You are welcome to disagree with my position, but not create one for me and then attack that....

im glad you brought that up.
I will quote Dostoyevsky (i know, classy? ;D) , who basically summed up your paradox.

"Imagine that you are creating a fabric of human destiny with the object of making men happy in the end, giving them peace and rest at last, but that it was essential and inevitable to torture to death only one tiny creature - that baby beating its breast with its fist, for instance - and to found that edifice on its unavenged tears, would you consent to be the architect on those conditions? Tell me, and tell the truth?"
- Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Brothers Karamazov

As Slcpunk, i disagree, from my heart, on moral and ethical ground (legal is pointless here as we human write these laws).

But, on that specific matter, as we are not talking about a metaphorical situation as Dostoyevsky writes (eternal paradise, magical torturing of a baby). We are talking about the real word. With real issues and complex situations, where you must know, things aren't black or white.

Who are the guys you are torturing? Who says they are bad? Who judge their actions? And as bad as their actions might be, how do you know they are not just a truthful reaction to some other evil your country has done?
There are millions of parameters in the current issues, and unlike what the media in the media want to say, it's really not about fanatism, religion, evil, and good, it's about politics, freedom, humiliation, inustice and social situations. Things are really not understandable in 0 and 1's.

Then again, on torture, funny we're talking about that, i was at the premiere showing of Ghosts of Abu Ghraib (an HBO documentary about the insanity of american policies regarding the law and worldwide human rights) - http://www.hbo.com/docs/programs/ghostsofabughraib/index.html - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0912585/ -
It was part of a 2 day festival in paris on "politically engaged cinema", and we got to discuss with two specialist of Amnesty International, specialist on torture.

Torture has been used by many countries and still is today.
It is used openly in "edgy" countries (hardcore ones, but also turkey and such "normal countries")
It is also used by classic "modern" countries such as France (no evidence) , and other EU countries (the netherlands ...)
it is used massively by the USA (with link that even go as far as Syria ! yes? the cia transferred people in Syria .... to disapeear ...)

The "French technique" developed during the algerian war is pretty famous and very trendy in south america in the 60/70s. The military people also of course went to classes in the USA to learn about many interesting interogation technique ... like the "brazilian" technique of standing on a box, hood on head, fingers attached to electric nodes .... if you remember the fancy pictures of abu ghraib ...

Anyway. The United States of America have worked very hard in the past few years to find their way around the Geneva Convention and all Human Rights principles. These amazing texts, who originated from the horror of WWII, texts that the USA signed quickly because they knew it was a way to give protection to their soldiers across the world ... they are now destroying it.

The usa have tried to redefine torture, with memos, actual memos, passed along the military trying to redefine the - i admit vague - text who just say : do not torture, do not humiliate, just treat humanly.
I would be ashamed of my country. And ask for empeechment
Donald Rumself even hand wrote a little funny note at the bottom of one of these memos regarding the current limitation of 4 hours of being forced to be standing up " i stand 8 to 10 hours a day, why can't they do the same ?" - i'd like to see you standing 8 hours with dogs barking at you, naked, electric node on your testicles, and your bones crushed ....

Anyway, abu Ghraib just shows one thing, how high level orders and policies go down and create horror. It's not about 4 or 5 crazy trailer park kids lost in iraq, it's about actual policies that come from the white house.

I'm not even discussing the usefulness of torture to get info ... look where your army is right now ... great job.

But your last sentence is interesting, because you are actually justifying what al-quaeda is doing. They are doing everything they can to achieve their goals (as obscure as they can be). The dead bodies in round zero are the tortured in aby ghraib and the caged human being in guantanamo.
They are the palestinians stuck in Gaza and the african kids suffering from years of wars funded and armed by rich nations. Every injustice in the world brings, and will bring a violent reaction, and so far we only have dealt with the violent reaction, injustice continues (do not tell me about the billions of dollars of aid please ...)

Peace

Studies show that torture does not work. The only information obtained, is what the tortured thinks his captors want to hear. So, hell no, I would never condone torture. I think all the turds in Washington that authorise this brutal practise should be in prison. Hopefully, someday, someone will get the balls to indict those criminals.

I'm certainly not pro-torture, but to play the devil's advocate, here, I have a question.  In these studies on torture, what exactly do they say about the success rates of torture on getting quality and true information?  The idea that it "doesn't work" intrigues me.  If a cancer drug took patients to remission 80% of the time, we'd call it successful.  And, as a generality, that would be true, despite the fact that 20% of the time this result didn't occur.  But what percentage of the time (or on what percentage of individuals) does torture "not work"?  I doubt it's 100%...few things are. 

Also, I'm curious how one studies torture, scientifically.  Do they simply take the information they received from the tortured and see if it can be verified in some way?  How often does someone tell what is believed to be the truth, and yet it's false information?     

Where does 'truth serum' fall?

Its not really torture. But you are drugging someone.

great anthrax song about sodium pentothal

I dont see how it would fall under torture, but might be forbiden by other articles of the geneva conventions (humiliation? deprevation of sense?) - but clearly "truth serum" were widely used by hollywood and public imagination, altho it is really not something used at all
- it doesnt work
- what info do you really get
- where would it lead us ? (more serum? what would people say? what would be the use in other fields of society ...)

PBS is airing a documentary tonight at 9 o'clock entitled "Cheney's Law."

Looks really interesting :beer:

Unfortunately, he will probably die of a heart attack before indictments are ever returned against him. Here is hoping for Bush's longevity.;)

I don't know..

Cheney is like a cat.

A cat who still has a few more lives ;)