Apa kesudahanya orang Melayu.

Bangsa Melayu terkenal dengan sifat merendah diri, lemah-lembut, sopan santun dan kuat beragama. Namun akhir-akhir ini kita dapat melihat perubahan pada orang-orang Melayu dengan cara yang mendadak. Perubahan ini bukan dari segi kenaikan taraf hidup ataupun kejayaan. Perubahan pada orang-orang Melayu ini pada kerutuhan akhlak, keciciran, keganasan serta perbuatan-perbuatan yang tidak senonoh.

Selama mana kita akan menghadap semua ini? Orang-orang Melayu semakin hari semakin leka, orang-orang Melayu semakin hari semakin malas, orang Melayu semakin hari semakin bodoh. Apa yang boleh kita banggakan dengan anak-anak Melayu sekarang ini? Sedikit pun tiada apa yang boleh di banggakan. Melepak sana-sini tanpa tujuan. Merewang sana-sini. Membuat kacau bilau umpama seluruh kawasan mereka yang punya. Anak-anak sekolah berpeleseran di kompleks-kompleks membeli-belah, menhisap rokok tanpa segan-silu, berperangai tak tentu hala bagai orang yang kurang siuman. Mana pergi orang-orang Melayu yg takut pada tuhan, yang sopan santun dan yang berakhlak? Siapa yang harus kita persalahkan?

Aku orang Melayu, aku sedih dengan bangsa ku, aku rintih melihat anak-anak bangsa ku yang keciciran. Siapa nak aku salahkan? Bangsa yang dahulunya kaya dan bermartabat tapi sekarang menjadi bangsa merempat dan bangsat. Aku malu dengan bangsa ku. Apakah ini warisan bangsa yang hendak kita banggakan? Bangsa bangsat bukan bangsa aku. Bangsa merempat bukan warisan ku. Melayu makin hari makin layu. Kutu-kutu jalanan yang bekudis dikaki, berkurap dibadan kebanyakannya bangsa Melayu. Samseng-samseng bermotosikal berlumba saban hari kebanyakannya bangsa Melayu. Inilah bangsa yang bangsat. Mak bapak tak tahu nak nasihat, dah terjerat baru nak ingat. Bohsia-bohsia betina lepak-melepak ditepi-tepi tembok, kebanyakannya bangsa Melayu. Hari-hari tunggu masa untuk ditebuk. Bila dah gemuk baru terjeguk-jeguk nak cari mana dia siberuk.

Melayu tak ada maruah tapi cerita macam gah. Apa cerita orang Melayu? Nak menipu tak sudah-sudah……Aku Melayu, tapi malu nak mengaku Melayu.....Rintihan JATT

US troops terrorize Baghdad in “Operation Law and Order”

By Kate Randall
20 February 2007

Thousands of US troops went house to house through mostly Shiite areas in northeastern Baghdad February 13 in the opening phase of Operation Law and Order, the “surge” plan announced by the Bush administration January 10.

The plan aims to deploy an additional 21,500 US combat troops, the vast majority going to the Iraqi capital. The operation reportedly will involve a similar number of US support troops.

Additional Kurdish and Iraqi troops are being brought in from other parts of the country. At least 3,000 US troops and 2,000 Iraqis have arrived thus far, with the full increase in troop numbers not expected until May.

The aim of Operation Law and Order is to move into strongholds of resistance throughout Baghdad, arrest or kill insurgents, and occupy the neighborhoods.

The “surge” is part of US imperialism’s broader effort to extend its domination over the entire Middle East. The US has two aircraft carrier groups stationed in the Persian Gulf, the largest military presence since 2003, and Patriot missile defenses have been installed in other Gulf states as the US ratchets up its preparations for a military strike against Iran.

Early Monday, an attack by three suicide car bombers killed two American soldiers and eight Iraqi officers at an Iraqi police headquarters that is being used as a US base in Tarmiya, 25 miles north of Baghdad. The US military also confirmed that 17 US troops had been injured in what it referred to as a “coordinated attack.”

Attacks on such vulnerable bases—and the deaths of more US troops—can be expected to increase as the US counterinsurgency operation proceeds. The death toll of US troops now stands at 3,144.

The vast majority of Iraqis see the American military as their enemy and occupier. Recent polls show that the majority of Iraqis believe that killing American soldiers is justified.

Despite these well known facts, the US government and a compliant American media portray the US operation as a benevolent effort to protect the Iraqi people from what they often call “anti-Iraqi forces.” The absurd premise is that the American military, which is ultimately responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, is “pro-Iraqi,” while those Iraqis who resist the colonial conquest of their country and oppose the US-backed puppet government are, by definition, terrorists and criminals.

As the counterinsurgency operation got underway, with thousands of US troops sweeping through neighborhoods, supported by US fighter jets flying overhead, thunderous booms could be heard across the city. American forces set up small bases in the middle of communities, where they will be stationed instead of returning to their fortified bases in the Green Zone and elsewhere.

New checkpoints were set up around the city, with individuals frisked at gunpoint and cars and motorbikes searched from top to bottom. The US military announced on day two of the operation that it had cleared several areas of the capital in “intelligence-focused searches.”

British and Iraqi forces closed two border crossings with Iran in southern Iraq, blocking the gates with large metal shipping containers. They also expanded coastal patrols to monitor maritime traffic into southern Iraq. Basra, Iraq’s second largest city, was ringed with checkpoints in an operation the British military said would last for 72 hours.

In preparation for a major assault, security forces sealed off Sadr City, the densely populated Shiite slum in Baghdad that is a bastion of support for the Madhi Army of anti-American cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.

Haidar Karam described to the Los Angeles Times how some 50 troops suddenly emerged and circled his Shaab neighborhood in the city’s northeast. About 15 minutes later, a half dozen Humvees arrived and US snipers took up positions on rooftops. Troops stopped vehicles from moving. The US military reported capturing 16 suspects and seizing three Kalashnikovs in the largely Shiite neighborhood.

The predominantly Sunni Dora neighborhood was also one of the first to be hit, with US troops targeting the Abu Disheer Shiite enclave. With Humvees and armored vehicles protected by aircraft, US troops set off stun grenades before smashing down doors and storming houses in search of insurgents.

The Los Angeles Times reported that in Sadiya, a nearby Sunni neighborhood, an Iraqi soldier searched a home for weapons, harassing a woman in her 70s. “What, grandma,” he said, “don’t you have any rocket-propelled grenades or roadside bombs?”

In the downtown Yarmouk district, streams of unmarked SUVs filled with masked security officers drove by, pointing assault rifles at motorists. Police pickup trucks patrolled the streets, with plates of armor attached in makeshift fashion to the vehicles’ sides.

American officials have released no estimate on the total number of arrests and casualties in the Baghdad operation.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made a surprise half-day visit to Baghdad on Saturday to underscore the Bush administration’s determination to carry through the operation in the face of popular opposition in the US and a non-binding resolution passed the previous day by the House of Representatives opposing the escalation. Her visit was also intended to increase pressure on the Iraqi government of Prime Minister Mouri al-Maliki. “How the Iraqis use the breathing space that [the operation] might provide is what’s really important,” she said during a 10-minute address in the heavily fortified Green Zone.

Those assembled for Rice’s brief talk included Maliki, a Shia, President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, and Vice President Tariq Hashimi, a Sunni. The US has long demanded that Maliki confront the Mahdi Army and Al Sadr, upon whose support the prime minister has depended to retain his shaky hold on power.

Rice reiterated administration warnings that the “surge” would produce increased bloodshed. “There are going to be bad days for the Baghdad security plan,” she said, “when violence is up—not down.”

While in the initial days of the operation sectarian violence and deaths appeared to decline, by Sunday the death toll was nearing the 100-per-day Baghdad residents have come to expect. Three car bombs exploded in mainly Shia areas of the city, killing at least 67 and injuring more than 120.

The increased violence followed a video conference with President Bush last Friday in which Prime Minister Maliki described the first days of the operation as a “brilliant success.”

Since the US invasion, some 2 million Iraqis have moved outside the country and another 1.7 million have been internally displaced The International Organization for Migration reported last Friday that another 1 million Iraqis could be expected to flee the country by the end of 2007 as a result of the unrelenting violence and the economic and social catastrophe resulting from the US occupation.

The US media has provided virtually no coverage of the actions of American soldiers in Operation Law and Order The major media outlets are colluding with the Bush administration to keep the true nature of the operation from the American people.

Nevertheless, there is considerable anxiety within sections of the US ruling elite over the policy being pursued by the Bush administration Earlier this month, the Council on Foreign Relations published a policy brief entitled “After the Surge: The Case for US Military Disengagement from Iraq.” The statement noted that the US intervention in Iraq “triggered the collapse of the Iraqi state, plunged the country into a civil war that brought about the deaths of tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians, wrecked the country’s already debilitated infrastructure, and spurred violence sectarian rivalries that threaten to spill over into the broader Middle East.”

It continued, “The crisis has now moved beyond the capacity of Washington to control on its own. The results of the midterm elections show that public support for the present course has buckled. The United States lacks the military resources and the domestic and international political support to master the situation.”

The main factor on which the war cabal around Bush depends in pursuing its reckless and incendiary policy is the cowardice and complicity of the Democratic Party. Leading Democrats, even as they criticize Bush’s “surge” on tactical grounds, repeatedly avow their “support for the troops” and opposition to a cutoff of funds for the war.

US 'empire' in crisis Pt 4

Iran
Over Iran, the US has been compelled to reverse its policy of 27 years in offering talks with a regime described by Bush as one of the "axis of evil". Although US Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice, declares that there is no 'grand bargain' on offer to Iran, it is clear that the US has miscalculated. Its sabre-rattling has not succeeded in eliminating Iran's nuclear programme. One observer commented that the US's approach towards Iran over its nuclear programme and the possibility of nuclear weapons in the future amounted to an ultimatum: "Please hand over your gun and then I'm going to shoot you."

Although there is mass internal opposition to the mullahs' regime in Tehran, given the history of imperialist intervention and the nationalist resistance to this by the Iranian people, the majority of Iranians are implacably opposed to the threats of Bush and US imperialism.

Contrary to the expectations of Bush, the intervention in Iraq, rather than weakening Iran, has enormously strengthened its position as a regional power in the Middle East. Through its contacts with Hezbollah and because of the retreat of Syria from Lebanon, it is now a major player there. It has also stepped in to finance Hamas in its conflict with the Palestinian authority.

Record oil prices and an increase in trade with Russia, China and India have allowed Iran to shrug off the pressure of the US to give up its nuclear programme. There are sections of the US administration - led, it seems, by Vice-President Cheney - who still wish to resort to a military solution. But a full-scale military invasion of Iran, three times the population of Iraq, is ruled out. The bombing of Iran's nuclear facilities, however, is still an option which 'remains on the table', such is the deranged outlook of the Bush administration.

However, due to the opposition of other capitalist powers, the US looks as though it has been forced to put even this plan into cold storage, preferring to rely on Europe in particular, and China and Russia, to pressurise Iran to come to some kind of compromise.

We oppose the resort to nuclear energy by Iran, never mind the acquisition of nuclear weapons. Nevertheless, it is sheer hypocrisy for the US to denounce the Iranian regime while Iran is surrounded on all its borders by nuclear powers - some, like Israel, armed to the teeth by US imperialism.

Weakening
The changed approach of the US over Iran signifies the weakening of its position, a setback for the underlying philosophy of the Bush administration of unilateralism and 'pre-emptive strikes' against the perceived enemies of the US.

Its military prowess is not underwritten, as was the case in the past, by its dominant economic situation. It has been enormously weakened by the hollowing out of its economy through deindustrialisation and its dependency on Asian capitalism, particularly China, to plug the 7% deficit in the US's balance of trade by buying up its dollar assets. How long this will continue is another matter, as we have explained in previous issues of the socialist.

One thing is clear: the writ of US imperialism has not gone unchallenged, either in the neo-colonial world or elsewhere. In fact the world design of US imperialism's domination has been severely checked. The mass strikes on the issue of immigration in the US, together with the growing discontent of the American workers, are also indications of the colossal social opposition which is brewing domestically in the US. Internationally, protests in France and now Chile show the massive worldwide opposition to capitalism and imperialism.

This is fuelled by the huge wealth divide, which is now being challenged by workers and the mass opposition demonstrated towards the Iraq War and the bellicose international actions of US imperialism. This has not yet found an organised political expression in the formation of a distinct mass workers' party of the US working class, but the actions of the Bush regime are preparing the ground for precisely such a development.

The brutal Roman Empire provoked the slaves' revolt - this modern 'empire' will do likewise. However, the slaves of Rome could not offer a higher form of production and development of society. The modern wage-slaves of capitalism, both in the 'advanced' and the neo-colonial worlds, represent human progress, the future of socialism and a world planned economy in answer to the militarism and barbarity of US imperialism and the world system it defends today.

US 'empire' in crisis Pt 3

Hatred
Iraq will never be democratic or free on a capitalist basis. This was underlined by Bush's visit to Iraq on 13 June. He told the new Iraqi prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki: "I have expressed our country's desire to work with you but I appreciate you recognise the fact that the future of the country is in your hands." Yet, the 'independent' Iraqi prime minister received precisely five minutes notice of Bush's flying visit, a clear demonstration of the relationship between 'Caesar' and his pro-consul in Iraq.

However, neither the Iraqi people nor the neo-colonial masses that were meant to be brought to heel by the 'war on terror' have been cowed by this. The slogan of Roman leaders towards their colonial slaves was "let them hate us as long as they fear us" (oderint dum metuant). This was the real philosophy of Bush and his gang in the aftermath of 9/11. As a consequence of the US's actions since then, the masses in the neo-colonial world continue to hate the US even more intensely but they no longer fear them!

Somalia
Events in Iraq, Somalia, Afgh-anistan, Iran and elsewhere, underline this. The victory of the 'Islamists' in Somalia, backed by the local capitalists and the masses desperate for any alternative to the unending chaos, represents "a staggering defeat for the US strategy of counter-terrorism by proxy" in the Horn of Africa [the Guardian].

Since the ousting of the dictator Mohammed Siad Barre in 1991, the country has been under the heel of corrupt warlords who have accumulated vast wealth through the control of ports, roads and airfields with no recognised national authority. The US backed these despots to the hilt because of the fear of the danger of the 'Talibanisation' of Somalia. Their miscalculation now threatens to achieve precisely the outcome they wished to avert.

Bush has made threatening noises about preventing a "new base for al-Qa'ida" but after the ignominious retreat of US forces from Somalia under Clinton in 1994 it will not be able to directly intervene militarily. The Islamists, on the other hand, will no more be capable of opening up a new road of peace and prosperity for the suffering Somali people than the Taliban were able to do in Afghanistan.

American and British military intervention in Afghanistan was supposed to extirpate all remnants of the barbaric Taliban, smash the power of the warlords and sweep away the feudal rubbish, including the persecution and discrimination against women. Yet, four and a half years after the invasion, 'Iraq' has spread to Afghanistan, with suicide bombers in Kabul, poppy production fuelling the drugs trade at its highest ever and the return of the Taliban in the south.

Afghanistan
The writ of President Karzai, contemptuously described as the 'Mayor of Kabul', does not run beyond the capital. In the south and the border country between Afghanistan and Pakistan, "the Taliban rule the night". Medieval barbarism has returned as schools have been burnt down and terrorised women are forced back into their homes. The thin line of US and British troops are incapable of holding the situation in the battle against the Taliban. Therefore the Karzai government, in desperation, is attempting to forge an alliance with the 'narco-warlords' and their militias to combat the Taliban.

The 23,000-strong US contingent of troops, together with 9,000 NATO troops, are incapable of securing the country. In fact, it is estimated that a 'foreign legion' of 150,000 troops would be necessary just to hold the south of Afghanistan! The complete collapse of the charade of 'democratic' government under the Karzai administration, propped up as it is by US and British bayonets, is posed. In desperation, Karzai is attempting to come to an agreement with the Taliban, or a section of it in the south, much as Pakistan has done.