Empty.

Iran's president announced today that the country has started to produced enriched uranium on an industrial scale, which is a process that could create weapons-grade uranium. The U.S., along with its allies, has been trying to get Iran to suspend its uranium enrichment program, with little effect (some would say with no effect, which seems a pretty accurate way of describing the situation). U.N. sanctions have not done anything to slow down the process, it seems--which is more telling about the weakness and ineffectuality of the organization than anything else, a weakness that is a result of a lot of the hypocrisy inherent in its structure and conduct. But let us save that for another day.

India and Pakistan were able to become nuclear powers, a goal the U.S. had little ability to deter them from achieving. More recently, while the Bush administration issued a lot of tough rhetoric, the North Koreans tested a small nuclear device. Now the U.S. is in the process of negotiating with the North Koreans, and is agreeing to one of their major demands, which is the release of its funds from a bank in Macau. While poking fun of the North Korean leader's appearance is de rigeur in the media, it should be pointed out that he is smart enough to know that the U.S. only respects strength.

This is in contrast to Taiwan, a U.S. ally and democratic country, which suspended its nuclear program under U.S. pressure. More recently, the U.S. has been making numerous concessions to China, which has around 1,000 missiles pointed at Taiwan, and has passed an "anti-succession" law to justify attacking the country. The U.S. is bound by law (via the Taiwan Relations Act) to arm and help defend Taiwan in the event of an attack by the China.

So Ahmadinejad simply looked around and saw how the U.S. bullies those who do not defy it (and instead cooperates), only respects strength, and has an aversion to diplomacy, at least until it is forced to confront a defiant adversary who has succeeded in achieving its stated goals--goals which the U.S. government had stated they would not allow. It's easy to see how he would reason that, if countries such as India and Pakistan are "allowed" to have nuclear weapons, why should a big, important country such as Iran not possess them. And why shouldn't they, from their point of view, since the U.S. is developing so-called "bunker-busting small nukes" and threatening Iran with carrier groups in the Persian Gulf (which obviously happened after the nuclear issue had arisen, but a contingency they had to prepare for given the relative readiness the U.S. had shown in invading a Middle Eastern country such as its neighbor Iraq). They need something to defend themselves with and to act as a deterrent. Simple logic (from the other's point of view), which is something the Bush administration seems unable to take into account in their formulation of policy, and subsequent rhetoric and actions.

I see little that would indicate that Iran will suspend its nuclear program. Unless the Bush administration is willing to start another war to prevent it, in all likelihood Iran will join the elite "nuclear club" in the not too distant future.

Repeat.

They say that those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it. It might be more accurate to say that the occurrence of tragic events are more the result of circumstances, than the lack of knowledge of history.

An article in the New York Times ("Relatives of Interned Japanese-Americans Side With Muslims," April 3rd, 2007) talks about a class action suit, Turkmen v. Ashcroft, that was brought by people, mainly Muslims, who were swept up and detained after the Sept. 11 attacks. The reasons for their detention is suspicion based on their national or ethnic background, and overstayed visas.

Three descendants of Japanese citizens who were interned after the attack on Pearl Harbor have filed a friends-of-the-court brief urging the Manhattan appeals court to overturn the sweeping language of the judge's ruling on the case. The article described his ruling last year this way:

The judge held that under immigration law, "the executive is free to single out 'nationals of a particular country.' " And because so little was known about the 9/11 hijackers, he ruled, singling out Arab Muslims for detention to investigate possible ties to terrorism, though "crude," was not "so irrational or outrageous as to warrant judicial intrusion into an area in which courts have little experience and less expertise."

A bit of history (also excerpted from the article):

By 1940, he was one of 47,000 Japanese immigrants who lived in the 48 states, nearly 90 percent on the West Coast. They had remained aliens because federal law forbade naturalization of any person of Asian ancestry. Since the law also forbade Japanese immigration after 1924, the United States had been home to all of them for at least 17 years on Dec. 7, 1941, when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor.

Two months later, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, decreeing that West Coast residents of Japanese ancestry — whether American citizens or not — were "enemy aliens." An 8 p.m. curfew was imposed on them; roundups sent them to desolate internment camps.

A law wasn't enacted until 1988 apologizing for the internments and offering compensation of $20,000 each for the survivors; "the law was intended partly 'to discourage the occurrence of similar injustice and violations of civil liberties in the future.'"

It has only been 65 years since President Roosevelt signed the executive order that resulted in the internment of American residents or citizens of Japanese ancestry, and only 19 years since Congress enacted a law apologizing for the internments. 65 years is a blink of an eye in the scope of history. Yet the story is repeating itself, and high-level officials like this federal judge, John Gleeson, are justifying and sanctioning the detention of people (after the Sept. 11 attacks) for months before they were cleared and released.

So when injustices occur, it is more a result of the circumstances being a catalyst for it, then any lack of knowledge of history, as one can assume the judge is aware of the history of the internments and the Holocaust. The situation in post-war Germany created the rise of the Nazi party and the Holocaust. The attack on Pearl Harbor allowed for the internment of the Japanese living in the U.S. And the Sept. 11 attack created the circumstances for the sweeping, indiscriminate detention of Muslims in the U.S. and at Guantanamo Bay. One common thread of all these events is the racial or ethnic component. The most obvious example was how German Americans were not interned during WWII even a lot of them returned to Germany to join the Nazi army. Throughout history, when a country is attached, or when a society is in decay, it is "standard procedure" to persecute a minority group as the scapegoat. Understanding history has nothing to do with it. Circumstances dictate the action.

The situation in which many Muslims are being detained in America is, to many, reminiscent of the internment of the Japanese during WWII. No one should be under the illusion that something like that, and other crimes, could not occur in the U.S. The images after the Sept. 11 attacks of white Americans standing on the side of the road yelling at those who appeared Middle Eastern to go home is evocative of a different ear. But it is topical. And just as circumstances, such as the Sept. 11 attack, has been a catalyst for this, another crime could easily occur, at any time, as long as the "right circumstances" exist. That's all it takes, that's all there is to it.

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This country is very patriotic and nationalistic, compared to a lot of European countries. The country tries, and is very successful, in instilling loyalty among Americans. Yet the story of the grandfather of one of the people who took part in the friend-of-the-court brief says a lot about who is considered American and who isn't, when all is said and done. It is a lesson on how one will be better served to be more critical and objective about where one places one's loyalties. You are expected to have utmost loyalty to your country. But who is the country loyal to, and whose country is it considered to be?

In the case of Ms. Yasui's grandfather:

"In the case of my grandfather, the tragedy was multiplied by the fact that he was a hero in the eyes of his children, a leader in the Japanese-American community of Hood River, and had always counseled his compatriots to be '200 percent American,'" Ms. Yasui said. "And look what it got him: arrested and dragged out of his house a few days after the attack on Pearl Harbor, transferred from one military prison to another for years, and not released until several months after the war was over." She was only 5 when he died in the 1950s, she said, but she later learned that he committed suicide, after days of hallucinations in which he imagined that the F.B.I. was after him again.

The history of this country contains many examples of groups of citizens showing more loyalty to this it than it has shown them. This is seen in the service of African-American soldiers during WWII, in which they sacrificed their lives for a country that still did not give them equal rights and protection under the law, as well as in the service of Japanese-American soldiers during the same war. The disappointing thought is that this is still the case, in many respects.

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Postscript: The article, speaking of the three Japanese citizens, grandparents of the three who brought the brief to the appeals court:

By then, courts re-examining the cases of the three Japanese-American litigants found that the government had suppressed evidence that security fears were overblown. For example, what the Army had suspected were signals sent to Japanese submarines from California hillsides had actually come from "farms where people used flashlights to go to outside toilets," a former Justice Department lawyer testified.

Savagery.

I have to admit, I'm a big fan of the show Globe Trekker. Through it, one can travel the world vicariously and learn a lot about other cultures and histories. In an episode, La Ruta Maya: Belize, Yucatan and Guatemala, the traveler mentioned how the Mayans had invented the concept of zero centuries before the Old World, and used a calendar that is more accurate than the one we use today.

During the 13th century, in what is considered the Dark Ages in Europe, the Mayans cleared dense jungle, built canals and large structures, all without the aid of steel tools, the wheel, or beasts of burden, in the area of Caracol. The population of that ancient city is greater than that of present day Belize.

Yet these people were considered savages by the Europeans who came into contact with them when they arrived in the 16th century. Something to consider.

"You go back to the 17th century, when the commercial and industrial centers of the world were China and India. Life expectancy in Japan was greater than in Europe. Europe was kind of a barbarian outpost, but it had advantages, mainly in savagery." (Noam Chomsky)