War, Free Speech, and the Internet

Wars often start and are prolonged through misinformation, as can be seen from our wars with Vietnam and Iraq.  Fortunately, it is possible counter misinformation and head off ill-advised wars by ensuring the openness and integrity of our great new medium, the Internet. 

Our invasions of Vietnam and Iraq depended largely on the Administrative branch of our government misleading the Legislative Branch by providing misinformation to the American press and public.  But in both cases, the truth was/is readily available from foreign news sources.

In the late '60s, a few American newspaper stands carried the London Times and the Hanoi Press.  Both papers accurately reported the true carnage of the Vietnam war.  But at that time, our press was claiming false victories and talking about "the light at the end of the tunnel."

The true extent of the carnage in Iraq is now available from, of all places, an online British medical journal, the Lancet.  Their published research soundly refutes Administration claims about the nature of the war in Iraq.  But a recent CNN story invited further reenactment of our blunders in Vietnam, saying

"Under President Richard Nixon, American troops were gradually withdrawn [over a five year period] and replaced by Vietnamese soldiers ... ultimately leading to the diplomatic breakthrough that allowed Nixon to claim he had secured 'peace with honor.'"

In reality, American troops were gradually replaced with North Vietnamese soldiers, and Saigon fell as our last choppers fled the city.  A false pride that fruitlessly kills thousands of innocent people holds neither peace nor honor.  Ultimately, it is no diplomatic breakthrough whatsoever.

Without unfettered universal access to the global Internet, we are probably doomed to go on repeating these disasters until the world has weakened us beyond repair.  The necessary safeguards for ensuring unfettered access are referred to as Internet Neutrality.  Simply put, Internet Neutrality is the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution upgraded to the Internet.

Shockingly, telecommunication companies oppose Internet Neutrality as an obstacle to maximizing profits from their exploitation of the Internet infrastructure.  For details on the role of the telecoms, see Bill Moyer's page, the Net at Risk. 

While Internet Neutrality is essential for our culture to prevail over special interests and ill-advised wars, achieving it requires electing national candidates that will enact Internet Neutrality legislation. 

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Jim Williams  10/20-11/2, 2006