Weapons of War

• Trumpet blowing
• ‘Chip-frying’
• Liberté, Egalité, Pretzels
• Opinion-leaders
• Pop wars: bin Laden versus hammer
• Thought for the week
• Quotes of the week

Trumpet blowing

Two weeks ago, on 7 March, openDemocracy sent its weekly email out to its members under the title THE MOTHER OF ALL BOMBS.

As you will know, the phrase referred to the Massive Ordnance Air Burst (MOAB) bomb, planned for use by the US military in the war on Iraq.

The email alerted readers to the weekly column by openDemocracy’s Global Security Correspondent, Paul Rogers. It was titled ‘The Mother of all Bombs – how the US plans to pulverise Iraq.’

Then, on 11 March, the US Air Force (USAF) successfully tested the MOAB at Elgin Air Force Base in Florida.

Over the next week, the bomb made headlines, as news organisations, media outlets, and academic institutions all talked of the ‘Mother of all Bombs’.

The phrase became universal.

On 12 March, BBC Radio 4 said the MOAB “is universally nicknamed the ‘mother of all bombs’”. On 13 March, the New York Times said, “the initials [MOAB] have already been recast to name it ‘The Mother of all Bombs’.”

Most other news organisations followed suit: ABC said MOAB was “unofficially called the ‘Mother of all Bombs’”, Al-Jazeera ran the story through the foreign news wires, the state-owned Egyptian daily Al Ahram made it front-page news.

The Sydney Morning Herald, the St. Petersburg Times, the New York Post (“Saddam’s worst nightmare”) and the Boston Globe, among others, also used the nickname, and the New York Daily News ran a story under the headline “Mother of all bombs blows them away”, which explained the real meaning of MOAB, but added “Grunts have another name for it: The Mother of all Bombs.”

From the University of Goteborg to genslab.com blog (whose ‘baconslab’ blogger wrote “The MOAB was so-called by some smart-ass clerk so it would acronym out to ‘Mother of all Bombs’”) the phrase was everywhere. Even the ex-servicemen at navycorpsmen.com referred to the “unofficial” nickname.

Grunts? Smart-ass clerks? Well, actually, from what the Diary can tell, the origin of the phrase has never been sourced.

Until now, that is.

We believe we got there first. If you think, or think you know, otherwise, please contact the Diary at Dominic.Hilton@openDemocracy.net.

‘Chip-frying’

Sticking with the bomb theme, the latest weapon to mesmerise the media is the so-called e-bomb.

The e-bomb emits high-powered microwaves that take out an enemy’s defences, known as “chip-frying”. It discharges a huge wave of electricity that fries the inside of computers, communication systems, and “decapitates” anything that runs on electricity. The US Air Force has tested a weapon that releases one billion watts of power in one millionth of a second. The result, say the optimists, is minimal, if not zero, loss of life.

According to the International Herald Tribune, the US military is eager to test the weaponry. It quotes Robert Hewson of Jane’s Air-Launched Weapons as saying, “We know there are certainly people itching to get them out of the labs and try them out as quickly as possible.”

But will they use them?

The development of the microwave weapons has been about as secretive as it gets. The IHT warns that “rolling out the weapon for the first time could trigger an arms race not seen since the dawn of the nuclear age ... the United States would be showing its hand in the development of a type of technology that might ultimately be most harmful to itself and other developed, wealthy nations.”

Anyway, there might be one deciding factor. The London Evening Standard of 18 March reported that “the effects of a pulsed weapon attack on the network could affect hole-in-the-wall cash dispensers in, of all places, France.”

Apparently, because the French helped Saddam install the main Iraqi computer networks (which run his air defence system), an attack on Saddam’s communications networks “could have ripple effects on the French mainland.”

As the Standard points out: “Given the state of relations between Washington and Paris right now, that is unlikely to lose the Pentagon any sleep.”

Liberté, Egalité, Pretzels

So what about those Franco-US relations? Well, conveniently, we go from one type of contentious ‘chip-frying’ to another.

Iraq aside, all talk in Washington’s political circles this week has centred on the question of what a patriot should order on the side of his or her burger.

No, not business as usual, but an order by US Congressman Bob Ney of Ohio to replace all “French fries” on restaurant menus in the three House of Representatives office buildings with “Freedom fries”, and all “French toast” with “Freedom toast”.

Representative Bob Ney teamed up with Congressman Walter Jones of North Carolina to make this “small, but symbolic effort to show the strong displeasure of many on Capitol Hill with the actions of our so-called ally, France.”

The Diary learns from the Arizona State University Press that the “ridiculous symbolic” renaming originated in Cubbies restaurant in North Carolina. Cubbies was inspired by the decision in the first world war to replace sauerkraut with “liberty cabbage”, dachshund with “liberty dogs”, hamburgers with “liberty steaks”, and German measles with “liberty measles” (source: Slate).

According to Time magazine, two days after Ney and Jones’ “symbolic effort to show ... support for American troops protecting freedom abroad” (their words), “a Florida congresswoman proposed a bill to help American families pay to exhume the remains of their war dead from Normandy and other patches of French soil.”

Mmm...

The French, meanwhile, have responded. An anti-war website www.bretzelforbush.com has “launched a campaign to bombard the White House with pretzels” (BBC).

Users are asked to donate seven euros, six of which will be used to send pretzels to the Washington, and one of which will go to the Global Movement for Children.

Why a pretzel? Because it is “the US’s most wanted criminal”, of course. In a fake FBI communiqué, the site says “The Pretzel ... is wanted for attempted murder of the President of the United States as the latter was peacefully watching a football match. It is a killing machine that knows no pity.”

Opinion-leaders

More on the celebrity fall-out from the war.

An earlier Diary reported on the strong anti-war stance taken by the actor Martin Sheen, who plays fictional US President Jed Bartlet in hit TV drama The West Wing.

This week, Sheen has further angered those who reject his ‘unpatriotic’ (read ‘unPresidential’) opposition to the campaign in Iraq, by defending his views in the Los Angeles Times.

“Whether celebrity or diplomat, cabdriver or student, all deserve a turn at the podium,” he wrote, angered by people attacking the views of actors “solely due to our celebrity status.”

Meanwhile, the Dixie Chicks are also finding that criticism of the President is not necessarily good publicity. Lead singer of the girl group, Natalie Maines, told an audience in London last week: “Just to let you know, we’re ashamed the president of the United States is from Texas.”

Oops!

Maines is from Lubbock. Her apology read as so: “I apologize to President Bush because my remark was disrespectful. I feel that whoever holds that office should be treated with the utmost respect.”

But the International Herald Tribune says that “Radio stations across the United States are boycotting the Dixie Chicks,” and show no signs of letting up.

One station, WDAF-AM of Kansas City has put trash cans outside its office for listeners to dispose of their Dixie Chicks CDs.

And it took a war to do it!

Pop wars: bin Laden versus hammer

And speaking of commercial pop chicks, remember bin Laden?

He’s the guy many think the US President should be focusing his military efforts on.

Well now, in his family’s latest offensive, Osama’s niece, Waffa Binladin (same thing, different spelling), is said to be ‘working’ with Madonna’s producer Nellee Hooper, and looks set to become the “new pop sensation”.

Waffa, of course, lives in London, and, so the Diary hears in its A-list socialite circles, lives in a $1 million apartment near High Street Kensington.

One fears that, unless there is a major shift in the world’s fortunes, or an end to its infinite bizarreness, we might be set to hear more Binladin yelling out of our TVs and radios.

For some, this might just be the final straw.

Of course the US has evoked a pop secret weapon of their own. In his rallying call to the troops Vice-Admiral of the US Fifth Fleet Timothy Keating, said “Make no mistake: when the President say go, look out, it’s hammer time,” thus calling on the spirit of long-forgotten, unlamented baggy-trousered hip-pop hero MC Hammer. Hammer also known as Stanley Burrell, currently a gospel preacher, had a hatful of hits in the late 1980s, including Please Hammer, Don’t Hurt Them

Time for a 2003 Baghdad Remix?

Thought for the week

Ambassador Trentino of Sylvania: I am willing to do anything to prevent this war.

Rufus T. Firefly, Leader of Freedonia: It’s too late. I’ve already paid a month’s rent on the battlefield.

(From the Marx Brother’s film Duck Soup, Paramount, 1933)

Quotes of the week

“We have an expression in Texas that says ‘Show your cards.’ France has shown its card. Now we have to see tomorrow what that card meant.”
President George W. Bush at the Azores summit press conference.

“France is a long-time ally. We’ve been together for more than 225 years, and we’re going to be together for a long time into the future.”
US Secretary of State Colin Powell.

“The first image of this war will define the conflict.”
Major Chris Hughes, a Marine spokesman. Basra, possible scene of jubilant liberation, is likely to be the target of the first ground campaign.

“The proposal should be that Bush leaves office in America, he and his family.”
Uday Hussein, Saddam’s eldest son.

“In a free Iraq, there will be no more wars of aggression against your neighbours, no more prison factories, no more executions of dissidents, no more torture chambers and rape rooms. The tyrant will soon be gone. The day of your liberation is near.”
President George W. Bush.

“My question has been and remains: does the scale of the threat from the Iraqi dictator justify the launch of a war that will certainly bring death to thousands of innocent men, women and children? My answer in this case has been and remains: No ... I am deeply moved by the fact that I know my attitude is shared by the overwhelming majority of our people, and also by the majority of the UN Security Council and the world’s peoples.”
German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder.

“They send them here to make them become men of honour, to make them practice, because in America there is not that feel for values, there is no more respect.”
Mafia supergrass Antonio Giuffre, explaining why the US mafia are sending aspiring bosses for master classes in Sicily.

“What you have started will not change. We will continue, not as wisely and efficiently as you have done, but we will try to follow this rhythm and we will not change direction.”
Zoran Zivkovic, speaking at the grave of Serbian prime minister Zoran Djindjic who was assassinated last week. Zivkovic has been nominated to be the next leader of Serbia.

“Lithuania risks becoming the laughing-stock of the world for the next five years.”
Lithuanian daily Lietuvos Rytas, lamenting the behaviour of President Rolandas Paksas who has links to a Siberian faith healer, dubbed the ‘Lithuanian Rasputin’. She wraps her patients in toilet paper.

Contact the Diary Editor: Dominic.Hilton@openDemocracy.net