All Rock, No Action

We have nothing against those who this month, in a stadium, a street, a park, in Berlin, London, Moscow, Philadelphia, gathered crowds and played guitar and talked about global poverty and aid for Africa. But we are troubled to think that they are so misguided about what Africa’s real problem is, and dismayed by their willingness to propose solutions on our behalf.
We Africans know what the problem is, and no one else should speak in our name. Africa has men of letters and science, great thinkers and stifled geniuses who at the risk of torture rise up to declare the truth and demand liberty.
…
What is at issue is an Africa where dictators kill, steal and usurp power yet are treated like heroes at meetings of the African Union. What is at issue is rulers like François Bozizé, the coup leader running the Central Africa Republic, and Faure Gnassingbé, who just succeeded his father as president of Togo, free to trample universal suffrage and muzzle their people with no danger that they’ll lose their seats at the United Nations. Who here wants a concert against poverty when an African is born, lives and dies without ever being able to vote freely?
But the truth is that it was not for us, for Africa, that the musicians at Live 8 were singing; it was to amuse the crowds and to clear their own consciences, and whether they realized it or not, to reinforce dictatorships. They still believe us to be like children that they must save, as if we don’t realize ourselves what the source of our problems is.

Posted by: b | Jul 15 2005 7:21 utc | 3

Andrew Sullivan on Abu Ghraib and the Schmid report:

The kind of techniques used in Abu Ghraib – sexual humiliation, hooding, use of dogs, tying prisoners up in “stress positions”, mandatory nudity, humiliating prisoners for their religious faith, even the famous Lynndie England leash – were all developed at Guantanamo Bay under the strictest of supervision. What we were told were just frat-guy, crazy techniques on the night shift – had been deployed by the best trained, most tightly controlled, most professional interrogation center we have. The Schmidt report argues that, while some of this was out of bounds, it was only because of some extra creativity, not because the techniques themselves were illicit, or unauthorized by Rumsfeld and Bush. Abu Ghraib is and was policy – just policy absorbed by ill-trained, unprofessional hoodlums. But those hoodlums didn’t get their ideas from thin air. They got them from the Pentagon and the White House.

Posted by: b | Jul 15 2005 8:23 utc | 5

kpnku
sometimes i think i am in that dinghy turning round & round in the deep sea as a moment in a film of angelopolous or jerzog

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jul 15 2005 10:24 utc | 7

Defining “Humane” Down, Part III — The Schmidt Report

More disturbing still is the Report’s repeated assertions that the techniques in question—which included, for example, having female interrogators physically seduce and taunt a Muslim detainee; forcing him to wear a bra and placing a thong on his head during interrogation; tying him to a leash, leading him around the room and forcing him to perform a series of dog tricks; stripping him naked; and pouring water on his head during interrogation 17 times—are not only “humane,” but also are authorized by Army Field Manual 34-52. Field Manual 34-52 has, since the 1960’s, defined the interrogation techniques that are acceptable within the military even for POWs who are entitled to the protections of the Geneva Conventions.

Posted by: b | Jul 15 2005 10:58 utc | 9

@Hannah – With regard to Deutch’s comments, can it be that isolationism is about to stop being a dirty word in American political discourse? I, for one, hope so. It has deep roots in American tradition, and can appeal to a wide spectrum.
Isolationism is growing for quite some time and it will return. The difference is that the US is not self sustained anymore and will never be again without an energy revolution. Oil is the hard need to stay involved.

Posted by: b | Jul 15 2005 13:09 utc | 11

enjoyed that nyt/cameroon op-ed on africa, b. btw, femi kuti is touring the u.s. this month.
if you’re tired of the man
and you want to change his master plan
won’t somebody lend a hand
fight to win

Posted by: b real | Jul 15 2005 14:57 utc | 13

Faiza Jarrar recently visted Vermont, and she found some things very familiar:

In America, I saw a majority of people who are crushed, not comfortable…
I learned that they do not study the history of other nations in their schools, nor their geography, and know nothing about other religions… their information usually comes from the Media, and that media is usually directed, owned by a number of wealthy people, the owners of the big, beneficiary companies…meaning; they deliver the news to the people according to their moods, explaining things according to their private, narrow, visions….
I have seen the TV., and its just like in the days of Saddam Hussein, (as we used to say), repeating the same boring song over and over again, whenever you change the channel, you see the same faces, and hear the same talk…and its all about the war, the army, and fighting terrorism…

Khalid and his family have been speaking out about what is going on in Iraq. Those who have donated to or followed the Jarrar’s medical relief efforts will know that we are talking about a man and his family who are essential to Iraq’s future. This is an attack on Iraqi society, on a person who dares to love.
I am not sure what sort of action here is productive and what counterproductive. The Jarrar’s seem ready to deal with this as a relatively ordinary problem. But at the least, we need to know this and remember.

Posted by: citizen | Jul 15 2005 15:54 utc | 15

b real: yeah Femi is touring. He will be in DC tomorrow night at the famous 9:30 Club. I will be there. I am a huge fan of AfroBeat and High Life and wish there were more African artists out there performing that music instead of R&B.

Posted by: Bubb Rubb | Jul 15 2005 18:10 utc | 17

an extract of my piece for theatre ‘terrible knowledge’ which would seem to constitute the nightly dreams & sweat of mr karl rove:
All this time. I have expected them. When the political winds change. I know they will not forget Heimmann. There have been times when I have expected them to pluck me out. To take me to their sanctuary. To examine me. Like some specimen. They want to hold me up. Hold me up to the world like some ventriloquist’s doll. Heimmann will not do that. He will show this good for nothing scum what he is made of. They will think they have a prize in their hands. No. No. They will have a bomb. A bomb that will explode into their money lending hands. That is certain. I know they follow me. Do they think for one moment that it is possible to fool the man who controlled Europe with an intelligence network the like which had never and has never been seen in human history. In the same hour I could have a man picked up in Lodz. Another in Brussells. A woman in Prague. A teenager in Paris. They could all end up in my office the next day. They could be dead the day after that. That is power. That is strength. Every morning at my desk I would have reports from each of the occupied countries. From their cities. From their towns. From their villages. I had comprimised . I had corrupted. I had debased key individuals If I wanted information it was on my desk. The next morning. The next hour. Looking back it seems I had half of Europe in my debt one way or another. I had corrupted them. They had corrupted themselves. They are still here. Some of them doing very well. Key people. I cannot touch them. In this world who would believe Heimmann. He is not to be believed I can hear them saying. I’ll tell them many things they don’t want to hear. I’ll not end up on the scaffold praying to smaller gods than I am myself. I’ll not tell them I was only following orders. I am not frightened by their puny justice. They’ll try to shut me up but I will speak until I have no more to say. They want to know how such a man is made. I’ll tell them. They needn’t ask. I’ll tell them at once. I’m a man they can only imagine. They all live in my shadow. I know them already. I will know their faces. I will have knoxn their fathers. Mothers. Uncles. Sisters. Brothers. I will have known their relatives. Their friends. I will have taken whole families on my train to their final departures. They do not frighten me. Where are they now ? I can hear them. I have seen them. I am sitting here alone waiting for them. When will they come ? I am not going to run anymore. When we left the railway station Eckstein made no attempt to speak to me. To explain his action. I made no attempt to speak to him. My mind was rushing with many thoughts. There were moments when I felt like I wanted to pull out my pistol and end it there and then. I wanted him. He was simply one more man that I had control over. That was the truth of the matter. He could expect no grace from me. He satin the carriage as if nothing had happened. He passed me some papers that I had given him earler in the day. This man. His sons will try to do business with me but they have another thing coming. I am not an old man they can intimidate like they would an arab in the desert. I’m no savage they can beat into submission. They will feel the sharp whip of my toungue crack them across the face. Who do these assassins of Christ think they are dealing with ? They are not dealing with some flunked doctor now. In a forest. Somewhere on the outskirts of Paris. My men gathered up the entire staff of a particular lycée in Paris that we knew to be the centre of resistance against us. They were gathered up in the middle of the day when they least expected it. It was in full view of the locals. Everybody pretended not to notice. We gathered them on a truck. The entire staff. There were Israelites amongst them. I am certain. They had changed their names but the lycée would have been a natural home for them. Packed off into a truck and driven to the outskirts of Paris. In a forest. They pleaded with us. demanding to know why they had been taken. From their beloved lycée. An old man – a professor came up to me. A Jew of long standing I would have thought. He came to talk to me. He wanted to know why they were here. I told him. Because you serve no purpose. I pushed him back into the throng and my men fired upon them until no one was left standing. An officer. A middle-aged man who was not involved in the shooting came up to me and asked brusquely why we had shot these people. I pulled out my pistol and shot him point blank. I told him – that’s because you don’t understand our purpose. He fell on his knees as if in prayer. We got back in the truck leaving this mess. They think they know why they want me. I am a sinister man – they say. Do they think people have long memories ? People were forgetting as soon as we had done these actions. After the war people’s memories got very distorted. Some of the young do not even know there was a war. They do not want to know. No one wants to remember. I remember everything. People want to move towards a future. What a future we left those we conquered. No sooner had the war finished than the French were in Vietnam. Then in Algeria. Employing the same methods that we had taught them. They were unflinching in their brutality. The English were no sooner out of the Blitz and they were putting the boot into the colonies and giving their own population some punishment. The Americans were in anywhere they could get a fight going so that they may profit. By brutality Israel was founded and by brutality it was maintained. A litany of the occupied becoming the occupier. Their methods were no different except they were less efficient. They followed our rule book as if they had written it. Yet they presented this mimicry as if they alone were saving civilisation. The Russians never pretended civilisation and they renewed their savagery with a fervour with their new satellites. Living here. Watching the globe. I have laughed until my sides split to think that these men think they can judge me. By what laws ? We are the ones that developed those laws. They mirror our every action. They sit on high and tell me Heimmann this world cannot live with a man like you in its midst. Humanity has to rehabilitate itself – they will say. Humanity has to do away with people like you. They will insist. These liars. These frauds. Any one of these countries including Israel would benefit with the service of a Heimmann working for them. Ministering to their needs. No doubts about that. They would do well to employ me. They could not secrete me behind a door in some office. They know they would have to show others their naked face. This they cannot afford. They hide their face behind two penny brutes that they keep on a chain in countries like these. They keep their hands clean. They forever wash them. That’s your trouble Heimmann – they would say — you got your hands too dirty with your tasks. We cannot be contaminated by you they would claim. They are drowned in their own filth. They cannot clean up the filth they have accumulated. They want the benefit of my methods but they do not want to pay the price. Perhaps they think they can make a public spectacle of me then they can go about their business without reference to my deeds. To do away with me is to pretend to do away with the deed. This is the thinking that made America. They will not forget Heimmann and his deeds. They will live on. In both books and life. This world cannot forget Heimmann. He is the door through which they constructed the post-war world. It is to him that they owe a debt. While they destroy town after town. City after city.
Country after country. They can always point to the misdeeds of Heimmann to detract from their own deeds. They are without culture. They are without intelligence. Their reign will not last. When I was a young man. After the First World War. I would look at maps and know that what was there today might not be there tommorrow. That empires were doomed to collapse. That one country would become another. That whole continents would be transformed. I drew on these maps. I imagined new boundaries. The creation of new borders. I imagined this then. Behind every change I saw the chosen ones or some other inferior race that needed to be extinguished. Now every day the world is faced with this reality. It was in the last days of the war that I visited the camp where Eckstein was held. He was still working in the chamber commando. Many of those he might have called colleagues in his task had already gone to join their number. Not Eckstein. He was skin and bone with a sack on top but he was still there. He would go soon. He had been a lucky man. He had seen day turn into night. He had seen the future. I went up to him in the camp. He did not seem to recognise me. I tapped him hard on his arms. He looked up for a moment. Continued with his task except now he was almost unconciouslly mimicking me. He was following my every movement and gesture. The look on my face he mirrored. It was as if he was passing through me. I spoke to him but he could not answer. The man in charge of the camp was about to strike him but I fended off the attack. The weather will finish him off I said. They are the last words I spoke to him. We walked away from him but as I went into the main block I could still see him mimicking me. That’s the last I saw of him. I am alone sitting in my office. I have been told the Red Army are nearing Berlin. They are not far away. I can hear them. In the distance. The others are in a frenzy. There are already some who have deserted and others who have gone to Switzerland to make a peace. There are orders going everywhere. Orders are not being followed. This very day I have seen full uniforms left in piles all over the place. Left there. As if the owners had stripped off and just walked naked from the uniform. Ghosts. This city is a madhouse. I cannot believe this is hhappening. All the shops are either closed or ransacked. My men are staying loyal. They at least give this appearance. I do not know. The means of communication are nearly all gone. Fourteen year old boys travel the city with messages from one leader to another. These boys carry news of what is happening on the front. Without them it would be impossible to get information from one place to another. The leadership seems to be everywhere and nowhere. The radio has gone and rumour has become the deadline. You hear everything. Men I have known throughout our struggle run pass me in the street. No one greets one another anymore. Fear within the nation is greater than I have ever felt. Those who have their wits about them still fear me though they do their best to bypass me. I am not being noticed. Who are these orders for ? Who am I issuing them to ? An order has a short lifespan here if you can find someone to delegate it to. All around me. They all want to save their skins. That’s the politics of our days and nights. We have night no longer. Every night we are being bombarded and light fills what is left of the sky. You cannot believe what I am seeing. Yesterday after the Russians had hit the zoo with mortar fire you could see wild animals prowling through the city. Wild animals. I am situated in the middle of a nightmare. It is happening so fast. There doesn’t seem enough time anymore. I cannot breathe. I need air. The cage is closing in. Why can’t I breathe. My body feels as if it is in convulsion. I go through my files searching out names. I pore over schedules. I seek out names and numbers. Places. It’s falling apart. I’m looking at reports I made in 1934. They are detailed and precise. They speak to me now. My memory serves me well. The whole city is falling apart. These are my people. This is my country. What are we doing? The camps should be burnt to the ground. Lock stock and barrell. I have sent the order. I don’t know whether it’s been acknowledged. Whether there is anybody to acknowledge the order. Our cities look like a collection of rubble. Few buildings are left standing. They’re pummelling our city to ash. We who have brought culture to the world now see that culture smashed to pieces. Opera houses. Theatres. Cathedrals. Galleries. Museums. Rubble. Eckstein and his sons have folloxed my scent though I will smell them first. They are very close. I hear and see. I am not imagining them. I can hear them. I can see them. They are close. So close. I will know them. They will listen to me. I have a story to tell these stamp collectors. They will hear more than their ears can bare. They will hear a word or two that they may have not thought possible to utter. I will utter them. Eckstein will have told his side of the story. That’s certain. A sob story. I would be a large figure in that landscape. No doubt about that. Eckstein will have his lists. My name will be at the top of them. I’ll not hide that fact. That’s what they expect me to do. Hide the facts. I am sitting in this office in a burnt out Berlin while mty men are going to the wall. I am powerless to do anything at all. They would expect my assistance. I have none to give. These were days that I thought all was gone. I hung on to the fact that all men are open to corruption. This is my talent. Our days were not at their end. Someone would do a deal with us. The situation is still open I thought. I am at my best when I am confronted with adversity. I was working without break. Alone. I was surrounded by a building full of information and it was useless. I felt helpless. I have lived in this jungle of a country for too long. Without contacts. Without any network. To have lived in this cesspit and calle dit home has made me feel disgust. I cannot breathe. I imagine this city as it had once been. Ten years ago. The beauty of Berlin had the power to oppress those of limited imagination. It still made all the cities we conquered look insignificant. To be in Berlin was to feel a man again. A man better than other men. Now it was in flames. As far as they eye could see. The buildings I had loved since I was a child ripped apart as if some great giant had held the city in his hand and shaken it all over the place. Emptying it of everything. Including people. It was an unimaginable sight. I cannot see his face. I saw him not long ago. I’m certain. I can’t sleep. I am continually disturbed by all sorts of sounds. I cannot hear myself. The heart is irregular. Covered in sweat. I was put to good use. I put myself to such good use. Ten years. A mammoth task. In ten years I had done to the chosen people what no man order or nation had ever had the strength to do. Not one of their number on the continent would have been untouched by my hands. I had entered their homes. I had emptied their families. A father here. A mother there. A grandmother. A daughter and son. Whole generations and families perished. I closed the door on their future. I turned their past against them. I turned them against each other. I chopped every branch of their culture from the tree and left them on the ground to be collected as firewood to burn the heretics. It will take a million years to rebuild their culture. Perhaps never. There can be no question about t
hat. No question. No devil in their holy books was quite like me. The chosen people of today are different people. Not the same as the ones I did business with. Certainly not. They had built a home where they could despise others as they despised themselves. The only home they deserved was in the camps. Here they had a community. A community like no other. Here the jew of every type was one. Half jew was all jew as far as I was concerned. From each corner the jew was brought ot meet his long lost cousins. Never before such a congress of jews. They only meet in disaster. It is in anguish that they find their brotherhood. In the chambers they went as one enormous family. They were one big family in the pit. Their homes are the burial grounds of Europewe dug for them. Ash bone and earth. I cannot breathe. All the time i’m catching my breath. A pain across my chest will not go away. I feel as if I need a walking stick to stand straight. They are going to do away with me. I know them. I can hear them. Their smell. I know it. They are here. They cannot hide from me. I know they are here. I am a master of their trade. I know they’re here. They cannot hide from Heimmann. I will not walk to them. As they marched happily to the furnace. No. They’ll find me too much trouble. They know that from their fathers. From books. They’ll know what they get when they capture me. Why do they come now ? Why now ? They have left me alone. They could have come here before. They now want me. What use am I to them ?. An old man in the dock. They want me. A young man has come crying to me. He’s no older than eighteen. Perhaps younger. New to the dirty uniform. He told me it had all come to an end. This young man. He had been at the bunker. A guard. They shot themselves four hours ago he said. His death and that of his bride did not disturb me. I remember staring out the window at the searchlights thinking that none of them can face the end. He who faces the end can watch history do the striptease. This man must know the end. I then turned on the boy in a fit of rage. Grabbed him by the coat and swung him against the door. I screamed at him that they had left us. Too scared to hold the flag. We are betrayed at every corner I told him. The swine never sleep in their own filfth. They leave us to embrace the end. I was still holding on tightly to the young man. This boy. It was clear that he was frightened out of his wits. He didn’t know where to turn. I wanted to hurt this boy as I have never wanted to hurt someone in my life. I was holding this child to blame for what was happening. I remember screaming that I needed more time to carry out my task. I was screaming it out so loudly that it seemed to drown the room in sound. The boy couldn’t have known what I was talking about. Just another official going mad before his eyes. He said nothing while I was holding him. He was sweating through the coat with fear. I let him go. Find a leader. Find a leader. I shouted to him as he fled the building to the dust and rubble

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jul 15 2005 19:41 utc | 19

b
it is a six hour monlogue that does not stop & it is that dense howeve perhaps for here i’ll cut it into paragraps of 10 lines & you edit the larger version –
an extract of my piece for theatre ‘terrible knowledge’ which would seem to constitute the nightly dreams & sweat of mr karl rove:
All this time. I have expected them. When the political winds change. I know they will not forget Heimmann. There have been times when I have expected them to pluck me out. To take me to their sanctuary. To examine me. Like some specimen. They want to hold me up. Hold me up to the world like some ventriloquist’s doll. Heimmann will not do that. He will show this good for nothing scum what he is made of. They will think they have a prize in their hands.
No. No. They will have a bomb. A bomb that will explode into their money lending hands. That is certain. I know they follow me. Do they think for one moment that it is possible to fool the man who controlled Europe with an intelligence network the like which had never and has never been seen in human history. In the same hour I could have a man picked up in Lodz. Another in Brussells. A woman in Prague. A teenager in Paris. They could all end up in my office the next day. They could be dead the day after that. That is power. That is strength. Every morning at my desk I would have reports from each of the occupied countries. From their cities. From their towns. From their villages. I had comprimised . I had corrupted. I had debased key individuals If I wanted information it was on my desk. The next morning. The next hour. Looking back it seems I had half of Europe in my debt one way or another. I had corrupted them. They had corrupted themselves. They are still here.
Some of them doing very well. Key people. I cannot touch them. In this world who would believe Heimmann. He is not to be believed I can hear them saying. I’ll tell them many things they don’t want to hear. I’ll not end up on the scaffold praying to smaller gods than I am myself. I’ll not tell them I was only following orders. I am not frightened by their puny justice. They’ll try to shut me up but I will speak until I have no more to say. They want to know how such a man is made. I’ll tell them. They needn’t ask. I’ll tell them at once. I’m a man they can only imagine. They all live in my shadow. I know them already. I will know their faces. I will have knoxn their fathers. Mothers. Uncles. Sisters. Brothers. I will have known their relatives. Their friends. I will have taken whole families on my train to their final departures.
They do not frighten me. Where are they now ? I can hear them. I have seen them. I am sitting here alone waiting for them. When will they come ? I am not going to run anymore. When we left the railway station Eckstein made no attempt to speak to me. To explain his action. I made no attempt to speak to him. My mind was rushing with many thoughts. There were moments when I felt like I wanted to pull out my pistol and end it there and then. I wanted him. He was simply one more man that I had control over. That was the truth of the matter. He could expect no grace from me.
He sat in the carriage as if nothing had happened. He passed me some papers that I had given him earler in the day. This man. His sons will try to do business with me but they have another thing coming. I am not an old man they can intimidate like they would an arab in the desert. I’m no savage they can beat into submission. They will feel the sharp whip of my toungue crack them across the face. Who do these assassins of Christ think they are dealing with ? They are not dealing with some flunked doctor now.
In a forest. Somewhere on the outskirts of Paris. My men gathered up the entire staff of a particular lycée in Paris that we knew to be the centre of resistance against us. They were gathered up in the middle of the day when they least expected it. It was in full view of the locals. Everybody pretended not to notice. We gathered them on a truck. The entire staff. There were Israelites amongst them. I am certain. They had changed their names but the lycée would have been a natural home for them. Packed off into a truck and driven to the outskirts of Paris. In a forest. They pleaded with us. demanding to know why they had been taken. From their beloved lycée. An old man – a professor came up to me. A Jew of long standing I would have thought. He came to talk to me. He wanted to know why they were here. I told him. Because you serve no purpose. I pushed him back into the throng and my men fired upon them until no one was left standing. An officer. A middle-aged man who was not involved in the shooting came up to me and asked brusquely why we had shot these people. I pulled out my pistol and shot him point blank. I told him – that’s because you don’t understand our purpose. He fell on his knees as if in prayer. We got back in the truck leaving this mess.
They think they know why they want me. I am a sinister man – they say. Do they think people have long memories ? People were forgetting as soon as we had done these actions. After the war people’s memories got very distorted. Some of the young do not even know there was a war. They do not want to know. No one wants to remember. I remember everything. People want to move towards a future. What a future we left those we conquered. No sooner had the war finished than the French were in Vietnam. Then in Algeria. Employing the same methods that we had taught them. They were unflinching in their brutality. The English were no sooner out of the Blitz and they were putting the boot into the colonies and giving their own population some punishment. The Americans were in anywhere they could get a fight going so that they may profit. By brutality Israel was founded and by brutality it was maintained. A litany of the occupied becoming the occupier.
Their methods were no different except they were less efficient. They followed our rule book as if they had written it. Yet they presented this mimicry as if they alone were saving civilisation. The Russians never pretended civilisation and they renewed their savagery with a fervour with their new satellites. Living here. Watching the globe. I have laughed until my sides split to think that these men think they can judge me. By what laws ? We are the ones that developed those laws. They mirror our every action. They sit on high and tell me Heimmann this world cannot live with a man like you in its midst. Humanity has to rehabilitate itself – they will say. Humanity has to do away with people like you. They will insist. These liars. These frauds. Any one of these countries including Israel would benefit with the service of a Heimmann working for them. Ministering to their needs. No doubts about that. They would do well to employ me. They could not secrete me behind a door in some office. They know they would have to show others their naked face. This they cannot afford. They hide their face behind two penny brutes that they keep on a chain in countries like these. They keep their hands clean. They forever wash them.
That’s your trouble Heimmann – they would say — you got your hands too dirty with your tasks. We cannot be contaminated by you they would claim. They are drowned in their own filth. They cannot clean up the filth they have accumulated. They want the benefit of my methods but they do not want to pay the price. Perhaps they think they can make a public spectacle of me then they can go about their business without reference to my deeds. To do away with me is to pretend to do away with the deed. This is the thinking that made America.
They will not forget Heimmann and his deeds. They will live on. In both books and life. This world cannot forget Heimmann. He is the door through which they constructed the post-war world. It is to him that they owe a debt. While they destroy town after town. City after city. Country after country. They can always point to the misdeeds of Heimmann to detract from their own deeds. They are without culture. They are without intelligence. Their reign will not last.
When I was a young man. After the First World War. I would look at maps and know that what was there today might not be there tommorrow. That empires were doomed to collapse. That one country would become another. That whole continents would be transformed. I drew on these maps. I imagined new boundaries. The creation of new borders. I imagined this then. Behind every change I saw the chosen ones or some other inferior race that needed to be extinguished. Now every day the world is faced with this reality.
It was in the last days of the war that I visited the camp where Eckstein was held. He was still working in the chamber commando. Many of those he might have called colleagues in his task had already gone to join their number. Not Eckstein. He was skin and bone with a sack on top but he was still there. He would go soon. He had been a lucky man. He had seen day turn into night. He had seen the future. I went up to him in the camp. He did not seem to recognise me. I tapped him hard on his arms. He looked up for a moment. Continued with his task except now he was almost unconciouslly mimicking me. He was following my every movement and gesture. The look on my face he mirrored. It was as if he was passing through me. I spoke to him but he could not answer. The man in charge of the camp was about to strike him but I fended off the attack. The weather will finish him off I said. They are the last words I spoke to him. We walked away from him but as I went into the main block I could still see him mimicking me. That’s the last I saw of him.
I am alone sitting in my office. I have been told the Red Army are nearing Berlin. They are not far away. I can hear them. In the distance. The others are in a frenzy. There are already some who have deserted and others who have gone to Switzerland to make a peace. There are orders going everywhere. Orders are not being followed. This very day I have seen full uniforms left in piles all over the place. Left there. As if the owners had stripped off and just walked naked from the uniform. Ghosts. This city is a madhouse. I cannot believe this is hhappening.
All the shops are either closed or ransacked. My men are staying loyal. They at least give this appearance. I do not know. The means of communication are nearly all gone. Fourteen year old boys travel the city with messages from one leader to another. These boys carry news of what is happening on the front. Without them it would be impossible to get information from one place to another. The leadership seems to be everywhere and nowhere. The radio has gone and rumour has become the deadline.
You hear everything. Men I have known throughout our struggle run pass me in the street. No one greets one another anymore. Fear within the nation is greater than I have ever felt. Those who have their wits about them still fear me though they do their best to bypass me. I am not being noticed. Who are these orders for ? Who am I issuing them to ? An order has a short lifespan here if you can find someone to delegate it to. All around me. They all want to save their skins. That’s the politics of our days and nights. We have night no longer. Every night we are being bombarded and light fills what is left of the sky. You cannot believe what I am seeing.
Yesterday after the Russians had hit the zoo with mortar fire you could see wild animals prowling through the city. Wild animals. I am situated in the middle of a nightmare. It is happening so fast. There doesn’t seem enough time anymore. I cannot breathe. I need air. The cage is closing in. Why can’t I breathe. My body feels as if it is in convulsion. I go through my files searching out names. I pore over schedules. I seek out names and numbers. Places. It’s falling apart.
I’m looking at reports I made in 1934. They are detailed and precise. They speak to me now. My memory serves me well. The whole city is falling apart. These are my people. This is my country. What are we doing? The camps should be burnt to the ground. Lock stock and barrell. I have sent the order. I don’t know whether it’s been acknowledged. Whether there is anybody to acknowledge the order. Our cities look like a collection of rubble. Few buildings are left standing. They’re pummelling our city to ash. We who have brought culture to the world now see that culture smashed to pieces. Opera houses. Theatres. Cathedrals. Galleries. Museums. Rubble. Eckstein and his sons have folloxed my scent though I will smell them first. They are very close. I hear and see. I am not imagining them. I can hear them. I can see them. They are close. So close.
I will know them. They will listen to me. I have a story to tell these stamp collectors. They will hear more than their ears can bare. They will hear a word or two that they may have not thought possible to utter. I will utter them. Eckstein will have told his side of the story. That’s certain. A sob story. I would be a large figure in that landscape. No doubt about that. Eckstein will have his lists. My name will be at the top of them. I’ll not hide that fact. That’s what they expect me to do. Hide the facts. I am sitting in this office in a burnt out Berlin while mty men are going to the wall. I am powerless to do anything at all. They would expect my assistance. I have none to give. These were days that I thought all was gone. I hung on to the fact that all men are open to corruption. This is my talent. Our days were not at their end. Someone would do a deal with us.
The situation is still open I thought. I am at my best when I am confronted with adversity. I was working without break. Alone. I was surrounded by a building full of information and it was useless. I felt helpless. I have lived in this jungle of a country for too long. Without contacts. Without any network. To have lived in this cesspit and calle dit home has made me feel disgust. I cannot breathe. I imagine this city as it had once been. Ten years ago.
The beauty of Berlin had the power to oppress those of limited imagination. It still made all the cities we conquered look insignificant. To be in Berlin was to feel a man again. A man better than other men. Now it was in flames. As far as they eye could see. The buildings I had loved since I was a child ripped apart as if some great giant had held the city in his hand and shaken it all over the place. Emptying it of everything. Including people. It was an unimaginable sight. I cannot see his face. I saw him not long ago. I’m certain. I can’t sleep. I am continually disturbed by all sorts of sounds.
I cannot hear myself. The heart is irregular. Covered in sweat. I was put to good use. I put myself to such good use. Ten years. A mammoth task. In ten years I had done to the chosen people what no man order or nation had ever had the strength to do. Not one of their number on the continent would have been untouched by my hands. I had entered their homes. I had emptied their families. A father here. A mother there. A grandmother. A daughter and son. Whole generations and families perished. I closed the door on their future. I turned their past against them. I turned them against each other. I chopped every branch of their culture from the tree and left them on the ground to be collected as firewood to burn the heretics. It will take a million years to rebuild their culture. Perhaps never. There can be no question about that. No question. No devil in their holy books was quite like me. The chosen people of today are different people.
Not the same as the ones I did business with. Certainly not. They had built a home where they could despise others as they despised themselves. The only home they deserved was in the camps. Here they had a community. A community like no other. Here the jew of every type was one. Half jew was all jew as far as I was concerned. From each corner the jew was brought ot meet his long lost cousins. Never before such a congress of jews. They only meet in disaster. It is in anguish that they find their brotherhood. In the chambers they went as one enormous family. They were one big family in the pit. Their homes are the burial grounds of Europewe dug for them. Ash bone and earth.
I cannot breathe. All the time i’m catching my breath. A pain across my chest will not go away. I feel as if I need a walking stick to stand straight.
They are going to do away with me. I know them. I can hear them. Their smell. I know it. They are here. They cannot hide from me. I know they are here. I am a master of their trade. I know they’re here. They cannot hide from Heimmann. I will not walk to them. As they marched happily to the furnace. No.
They’ll find me too much trouble. They know that from their fathers. From books. They’ll know what they get when they capture me. Why do they come now ? Why now ? They have left me alone. They could have come here before. They now want me. What use am I to them ?. An old man in the dock. They want me.
A young man has come crying to me. He’s no older than eighteen. Perhaps younger. New to the dirty uniform. He told me it had all come to an end. This young man. He had been at the bunker. A guard. They shot themselves four hours ago he said. His death and that of his bride did not disturb me. I remember staring out the window at the searchlights thinking that none of them can face the end. He who faces the end can watch history do the striptease. This man must know the end. I then turned on the boy in a fit of rage. Grabbed him by the coat and swung him against the door. I screamed at him that they had left us. Too scared to hold the flag. We are betrayed at every corner I told him. The swine never sleep in their own filfth. They leave us to embrace the end. I was still holding on tightly to the young man. This boy. It was clear that he was frightened out of his wits. He didn’t know where to turn. I wanted to hurt this boy as I have never wanted to hurt someone in my life. I was holding this child to blame for what was happening. I remember screaming that I needed more time to carry out my task. I was screaming it out so loudly that it seemed to drown the room in sound. The boy couldn’t have known what I was talking about. Just another official going mad before his eyes. He said nothing while I was holding him. He was sweating through the coat with fear. I let him go. Find a leader. Find a leader. I shouted to him as he fled the building to the dust and rubble

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Jul 15 2005 20:27 utc | 21

@Outraged, there’s no reasonableness test here, it’s about POWER. I’m still looking around for an article that gives me the background on why the US would make an issue of Taiwan in the first place, unless again it’s about power or strategic proximity. If you know of any, I’d really appreciate a link.
That said, it’s undeniably stupid to make your country’s first public nuclear threat against another country, when said country is inflamed about selling you one of their oil companies. Or was General implying a quid pro quo of some sort…or a loudmouth over promoted & headed for early retirement.

Posted by: jj | Jul 16 2005 3:54 utc | 23

You’re going to want to see this. Just get a barf bag first!
http://mms.eonstreams.com/fbcs/u227_high.wmv
Found it over at Kos
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/7/15/14534/2499

Posted by: Anonymous | Jul 16 2005 4:13 utc | 25

@r´giap – thanks a lot – a very, very moving piece.

Posted by: b | Jul 16 2005 10:35 utc | 27