War on Christmas, the Agacher strip clash

 

President Sankara in front with beret visits Agacher during conflict in December 1985

 

On Christmas day 1985 the West African nations of Mali and Burkina Faso found themselves in a military conflict. The dispute was called by some African leaders as "the war of the poor" due to the economic conditions within both countries and became known commonly as the Agacher strip War. The Agacher strip was a territory bordering both nations, in the furthest north of Burkina Faso and as part of Mali's southern border. The clashes lasted five days before the International Court of Justice arbitrated. Casualties are had to accurately but are estimated as high as 300 including civilians and military. 

The situation was essentially powder keg next to an open flame. Agacher was a porous border, people living their often crossed what was suppsoed to be the recognised border. Cattle farmers would trespass to graze their cattle on the best lands in the area. And the territory was beleived to be rich in natural resources. Both nations had been pursuing their claims to the territory for many  years with sporadic shooting in 1974. But relations between Mali and Burkina Faso were especially poor by 1985. Burkina Faso's leader Thomas Sankara had publicly urged on revolution in Mali during a period of unrest 

“The other peoples who are on our borders also need a revolution […] I want to talk about Mali. […] The revolution of the people of Burkina Faso is available to the people of Mali who need it. Because he alone will allow him to fight against hunger, thirst, ignorance; and to fight above all against the forces of neocolonial and imperialist domination”.

Speech from September 1985, machine translated from French

Meanwhile Sankara suspected Mali's leader Moussa Traore of working with Burkinabe exiles and the Ivory Coast against him. Further aggravating the situation was the Burkina Faso census being conducted at the time which included the communities in Agacher and border settlements claimed by Mali. Burkina Faso also deployed soldiers to the area without notification resulting in confrontation with Mali authorities. Burkina Faso announced it would withdraw its soldiers but had not done so by the time the conflict had started.

On the 25th of December Mali launched its offensive, over five days its forces successfully occupied a large part of the strip with the Burkinabe forces lead by Blaise Compaore forced to disperse and resort to ambush and delaying tactics. On December 30th a truce sponsored by African leaders was struck and held. In January 1986 the two countries began desecalting, prisoners were exchanged and eventually a time table for withdrawing forces was agreed. Both governments accused each other, Burkina Faso stated it was the victim of aggression while Mali maintained that its operation was to protect its territorial integrity. By that December the International Court of Justice had decided to split the territory roughly in half with Mali taking the West and Burkina Faso the east. Both nations accepted this proposal and that was the end of hostilities between the two countries.

The reason I'm outlining this short conflict is the connection to Thomas Sankara. Thomas Sankara was Marxist revolutionary and statesmen who came to power through a coup d'etat in the former French colony of Upper Volta in 1983. In 1984 as part of Sankara's reforms the country was renamed to Burkina Faso. Sankara's charisma, interventionist policies and lack of readily available information about him or his time in government (in English anyway) and his tragic end, deposed and killed in 1987 in another coup d'etat by his close colleague and fellow band member Blaise Compaore, created the perfect conditions for a posthoumous cult of personality. Sankara is extremely popular today amongst certain left-wing circles and while its difficult to find information about in English, its almost possible to find even mild criticism.

So, I think the Agacher Strip, both the long running dispute and the conflict it birthed are an excellent demonstration of reality. It is possible that Thomas Sankara was truly as selfless and brilliant as he is presented by his admirers. But he was also the leader of a government and a nation state and an active participant in the international community. This means that ultimately his personal qualities aren't of much importance because both he and the Burkinabe revolution he promoted had to work within a system that constrained and limited them. 

As seen by the dispute over territory in Agacher. Two nations wanted to augment their security and natural wealth fought over a territory both had claimed. While Sankara had encouraged Malians to oust Muossa Traore in speeches and print there was no serious attempt to link the struggle for control of Agacher to a revolution in Mali. And Mali despite gaining the upper hand against the armed forces of Burkina Faso made no attempt to deliver a serious blow to Burkina Faso, its forces remained within the territory that was disputed. And after the International Court of Justice recommended splitting the territory both sides agreed and scaled back their aggressive measures. Both governments came to an agreement they could live with at the cost of a few hundred of their citizens. 

Furthermore, despite Sankara being an open Marxist with close co-operation with Cuba the Cold War dynamics of East vs West played no role in this conflict. Moussa Traore had taken steps to improve relations with France but his regime and especially its military relied heavily on the Soviet Union. The air force that bombed Burkinabe positions and villages flew Mig-21s and its tanks and equipment were also from the Soviet military. There were at least 50 Soviet military advisers present in the country at the time of the conflict offering support as well.

MiG-21 in the service of the Malian air force

Ultimately it didn't matter that Sankara was in power at all. The tensions between the two nations predated him and they were fought by means that trump ideological postures and by diplomacy and force, the tools available to all states and endorsed by the international authorities so long as they occurr in the proper manner.

On Change and ballots

 “If voting did anything, they’d make it illegal.”

This often repeated and attributed quote has caused a great deal of argument for many years. Its often attributed to Emma Goldman though attempts to find the source haven't succeeded and sometimes the quote is attributted to other thinkers like Mark Twain. But while its not clear that Goldman said those words I doubt she'd disagree with it. 

A common line of criticism especially from people who live in the United States of America is "but they are making it illegal". The USA and many other countries do have restrictions on eliigibility for voting. In the segregationist South Black Americans were barred by poll tax requirements and ridiculous and rigged tests they had to pass before being allowed to cast a ballot. And to this day in many states the act of gerrymandering of electoral districts continues and multiple states have passed increasingly stringent laws on the need for identification and restrictive lists for what counts as identification. 

This was just one of hundreds of such tests used in the US South.

And its not just the United States. The presidential elections in Brazil this year saw Federal police intervene to close polling stations early and turn buses full of voters away on one flimsy pretext or another. So it does seem like voting is increasingly becoming illegal or at least blunted by heavy restrictions.

So, does this mean the qoutation is incorrect? I would think no, and although we don't know if Emma Goldman said this phrase I think she is still a good example of the phrase's meaning. Emma Goldman was a committed Anarchist-Communist and advocate for social revolution. To her, changing things meant systemic change, the kind of change that rebuilds society from the ground up. To date, while elections and referendums have brought about changes they haven't brought about the systemic change that Goldman advocated. 

For example, let's look at some passages from her essay on Woman Suffrage. 

Woman’s demand for equal suffrage is based largely on the contention that woman must have the equal right in all affairs of society. No one could, possibly, refute that, if suffrage were a right. Alas, for the ignorance of the human mind, which can see a right in an imposition. Or is it not the most brutal imposition for one set of people to make laws that another set is coerced by force to obey? Yet woman clamors for that “golden opportunity” that has wrought so much misery in the world, and robbed man of his integrity and self-reliance; an imposition which has thoroughly corrupted the people, and made them absolute prey in the hands of unscrupulous politicians.

...

 As to our own States where women vote, and which are constantly being pointed out as examples of marvels, what has been accomplished there through the ballot that women do not to a large extent enjoy in other States; or that they could not achieve through energetic efforts without the ballot?

Bolding my own.

For Goldman economic and social conditions and power relationships between classes and individuals were the important thing. And for her there were many ways to available to achieving gains along those ends, while expanding the franchise to women didn't automatically lead to any progress as far as she could see in the United States of America. 

But, nevertheless, the right to vote or to be more accurate acess to the vote is being restricted in many parts of the world. So, why? Well I think we can answer this question by looking at who is trying to make it harder for people to vote. In the United States currently much of the hostile legislation and policies enacted by state governments towards voting have been carried out by the Republican party*. In Brazil the Federal police are known to overwhelmingly support former President Bolsonaro and most of the reports of their inttereference were carried out in parts of Brazil were his opponent Lula had a strong lead.

They aren't trying to prevent the coming revolution, these are members of specific political factions targeting the voting blocks of their opponents to suppress their electoral opposition and secure their positions in power. Passing a law that requires identification while voting and at the sametime restricts what forms of ID are acceptable to types that are less common amongst the demographics that vote for other parties helps one party in particular win elections. 

Revolutions and even major reforms are often driven by non elective means. The Voting Rights Act that abolished the restrictions on Black americans from voting in the South was passed in 1965 after the civil rights movement had sucessfully used direct action to desegerate many businesses, services and schools. And the passage of the act did not end the struggles for racial equality and justice in the United States. The African National Congress formed a government in 1994 by being the largest party in the South African parliament, but that was only possible through decades of mass disobediance campaigns, boycotts and armed struggle. Meanwhile the dictator Napoleon III passed male suffrage, the Brazilian dictatorship maintained a congress with political parties that stood for elections. And in Australia its a crime to not vote in elections.

And in much of the democratic world change through ballots alone are usually limited by a political orthodoxy established by two or more large political parties that compete to form a government. Yes, we have the right to vote for any candidate we wish, but that doesn't lead to more radical change. You vote for the incumbent and thus more of the same or you thought for the largest opposition which will implement a few changes along their manifesto plan. Some nations have tried to address this issue by switching electoral systems and changing thresholds for representatives or implementing recall mechanisms but these haven't widened the scope for change much.

So, I suppose if we had to criticise the qoutation it would be that "voting on its own doesn't change anything substantial, which is why politicians who fear growing unpopularity but barriers in place to make it as difficult as possible to do".

* I have on occasion seen allegations of similar behaviour leveled at Democratic party administrations but the overwhelming number of cases involve the Republicans.

Strike Season

 

The news has started calling 2022 the year of the strike, which is a good indicator of the decline of industrial action in a country that used to be famous for it. I honestly could not keep up with the number of strike ballots that have passed. The transport unions on the bus and railways across the country have been picketing since the summer, the Royal Mail have started a series of strike days, and the dockers at one of my former workplaces also came out on strike after years of building grievances. 

Now nurses are striking and ambulance drivers are preparing to take action as well. The union branches in my area didn't vote to strike, well they didn't vote at a high enough margin stipulated by the industrial relations legislation, but it is a national health service so it is still having an effect. 

Overall its quite a turn around from the slow decline of industrial action and unionisation that's dominated the UK economy. I'm not surprised we've reached boiling point, I broke my ankle in a road accident in late June. I don't have a bad word to say about the treatment I recieved both the ambulance crew who got me within minutes of being called and the trauma team and the nurse who oversaw my discharge were professional and quick and kind. They were also extremely hardworking, I spent roughly 8-9 hours in A&E before being discharged and hobbling out of there on a pair of cructches a walking boot and a syringe of morphine. During those hours everyone who was present when I went in was still working when I left and they were working. After checking me they went straight to another patient and then another and another before back to me. Once it became clear from my CT scan that there was no neck or back injury they wheeled my bed into different arrangments to make room for others. It never stopped, for everyone patient discharged three or four took their place.

The CT scan was a bit like the lines at the factory I was working at, as soon as one scan was done out you go and in goes the next person, the demand was incredible high, I was extremely lucky that I was second in the queue. My parents were waiting for me in the discharge room, the line was outside the hospital, and they were doing triage in the line to find the most serious cases. When I left at 9pm the line was still stretching outside. The official capacity for the Accident & Emergency ward at my local hospital was 30, on that day they had managed to squeeze in over 60 at its busiest, and that left a lot of people outside or stuck on a chair for hours. 

And this may be a minor point but I include it anyway for completeness sake, I spent 8 hours staring at the ceiling that day. I wasn't allowed to move until the all clear from the scan. Every single ceiling I saw in that building had large holes in it, and when I went back for physiotherapy I noticed that all the floors at bits that had given way and had been patched up, you feel it when your still trying to bend your leg and lift your foot properly.

Both myself and my parents left feeling relieved the injury wasn't worse but extremely dismayed and angry at what we saw. My sympathies are always with fellow working people when struggling against exploitation and the powerful, but I especially support all the health care workers including the social care workers in these struggles. These people are dedicated and are worked relentlessly, meanwhile their service has been strangled and allowed to degrade and stagnate into this present crisis. And they've been doing this for decades. For years Health Ministers have claimed to have increased spending and ring fenced health care and so on. And yet during that time the service has declined, and Doctors, nurses have been vocal about how the government has kept staffing levels and new applications at the same level year after year, and hasn't approved infrastructure expansion or equipment modernisations so procedures take longer and some of the latest treatments simply aren't available. And the influx of private companies and service providers have meant even more bureacracy, and a further decline in the services as cost cuts and profit incentives are introduced. The fees for using the hospital car park are very high, the revenue goes to a private company and not the hospital. When my mother was in hospital for an operation all the beds in the ward had an overhead monitor with a TV built in. No-one was watching them because they charge for them now, they were free when they were introduced. And insult to injury the monitors are owned by another private firm who collects the money. As bad as parking and tv rental fees are that they don't even raise revenue for the improvement of the health service is just spit in the eye.

The government wish to frame the conflict as just another pay dispute with the unions being greedy with the typical argumentative soundbites "not an unlimited pot of money" and "they're already paid more than x" but if they lose this fight the health system will collapse and the public will be in a crisis. My injury wasn't life threatening but it very easily could've been, it could've been a veterbrae that snapped instead of an ankle joint, and even with an ankle fractue without prompt attention and ongoing support I could've damaged the leg permantly and lost the ability to walk. 

I still have to do regular exercise and walk with a cane for support half a year later. There's no way I could afford this under the private model pushed by the government. So I wish to support them and all other striking workers as much as I can. I decided to share some details to show my appreciation. 

Farha

 

I watched Farha, as a film its very good. The sets, locations costumes and acting are very convincing, I could say I enjoyed the movie very much, but that feels wrong. Fahra is about a young Palestinian girl trapped in the nightmare that was 1948s Nakba, the massive campaign of violence that destroyed many Palestinian communities. So it feels wrong to use wordslike enjoyment and liked. The beginning of the film was pleasant enough seeing Fahra and the village children playing in the last days of the Mandate, but the conflict isn't far a way and many sequences are brutal and extremely unpleasant to watch. 

I recommend watching it, but only if you're in an appropriate mood to do so, its hard viewing. I wasn't planning on watching it, I had not heard about it until yesterday. I was browsing social media when I saw the tail end of the argument about it. Several screenshots of article titles and journalists reacting very hostilely to it. In particular I remember a screenshot of some journalist I didn't recognise making a statement that pushed to seek out the film. I've tried finding it again but that's an impossible task so from memory it went like "I have no issue with criticism of Israel. I just don't like seeing all Jews being depicted as bloodthirsty monsters" or words to that effect. 

That comment decided me for a couple of reasons, firstly I doubted that Netflix would stream a film that did depict all Jewish people as monsters, but more seriously because I understand the sentiment. I also really don't like it when communities and groups I'm connected to or feel connected to are shown to do horrible things. But, here's the issue its a film about the Nakba, and is based on the accounts of a survivor of the Nakba who ended up in a refugee camp in Syria.

From the credits of the film

After watching the film I looked up background details, and found that the director Darin J. Sallam was told of the account by her own mother. So while I can understand not liking how the Israeli soldiers are shown to be behaving, in fact I would be alarmed to encounter someone who wasn't disturbed by their behaviour. Like all films based on true accounts the film adds or changes details, unless we get a recording we'll never know for sure that the real Farha or Radiyyeh saw the murder of a family of refugees while the officer cracked jokes about it. But even if that's an embellishment, we do know the depiction of how the soldiers are behaving was accurate to the time, not only because of the testimonies of the Palestinians, 800,000 refugees is a lot of witnesses, but also the testimony of Jewish people and Isrealis. 

One of the most popular entries on this very site is a 1948 open letter to the New York Times by Albert Einstein, Hannah Arendt and a dozen other prominent Jewish people denouncing the campaign of terror being carried out in the villages. 

A shocking example was their behavior in the Arab village of Deir Yassin. This village, off the main roads and surrounded by Jewish lands, had taken no part in the war, and had even fought off Arab bands who wanted to use the village as their base. On April 9 (The New York Times), terrorist bands attacked this peaceful village, which was not a military objective in the fighting, killed most of its inhabitants—240 men, women and children— and kept a few of them alive to parade as captives through the streets of Jerusalem. Most of the Jewish community was horrified at the deed, and the Jewish Agency sent a telegram of apology to King Abdullah of Trans-Jordan. But the terrorists, far from being ashamed of their act, were proud of this massacre', publicized it widely, and invited all the foreign correspondents present in the country to view the heaped corpses and the general havoc at Dein Yassin. The Deir Yassin incident exemplifies the character and actions of the Freedom Party. Within the Jewish community they have preached an admixture of ultranationalism, religious mysticism, and racial superiority.

Bolding my own.

And as time has gone on, more and more accounts have surfaced of similar atrocities in the other 400 villages that were attacked and pillaged.

“The Jewish soldiers who took part in the massacre also reported horrific scenes: babies whose skulls were cracked open, women raped or burned alive in houses, and men stabbed to death,” the historian Ilan Pappe wrote in his book, “The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine,” describing accounts of a massacre that took place in the Palestinian village of Dawaymeh.

The Intercept 

So even if the Israeli militants weren't present in the original story they're conistant with the period.

And while I can't be 100% certain of every word in the reaction I did note it said Jews, and not Israelis. Which is an interesting substitution. Not every Jewish person is Israeli, and to be blunt not every Israeli citizen is Jewish, there's strong overlap but the Venn diagram isn't a circle. In Fahra there are less than a dozen onscreen Israeli characters. They're all armed and they're pretty nasty people doing horrible things, but I would argue that has more to do with them being members of a radical military organisation that's open aim was to expand its borders by driving out its neighbours, then being Jewish. I don't have to qoute the Einstein-Arendt letter again do I?

I do understand why Israelis don't like this movie and wish to belittle and minimise it. While there was an existing Israeli movement and identity, and a network of communities in the Mandate it was the military campaigns of 1948 that cemented the existence of Isreal as a nation state. This means that the campaigns of violence were integral to its establishment and its founding myth. So acknowledging the darker parts of those episodes is an attack on the nation itself.

But that's just nationalism. There is nothing unique about Israel and its national history nor its people's sensitivity to criticism. Americans venerate their war of independence and founding fathers and really don't like people talking about slavery, and wars with the natives. British nationalists take pride in the Empire but will not be pleasant if the conversation goes beyond train travel and military vigour. Irish nationalists love the 1916-22 generation of heroes but will not welcome an accurate accounting for the campaigns of terror by the Free State. Algerian nationalists are proud of their nation's hard won battles against the domination of the French, but aren't interested in discussion the legacy of independent Algeria's discrimination and forced expulsions of its minority populations that were deemed not Algerian nor loyal enough to stay.

Keep going with the nationalist group of your choice, it does not matter which one you pick it never ends. If watching Farha makes you feel targetted then the problem isn't the movie, the problem is nationalism and the divisions and misery it causes. 

Palestinians are allowed to explore and come to terms with their traumas and their history just as Israelis and everyone else is. I've seen comments by Palestinians praising the film for helping them do that which to me is the best praise it can get.

This is a perfect summary of the emotional experience of Farha.