MESSAGE TO OUR READERS

Commentary

Dear WW4 REPORT Readers:

This marks a third year of bringing you cutting-edge on-the-scene stories from the Terror War fronts, as well as reviews, digests and analysis--providing news and perspectives available nowhere else.

In 2004, our contributor keith harmon snow brought you first-hand accounts from the forgotten war zones of Africa. In a major exclusive (later reprinted by Z Magazine), he uncovered the genocide being carried out against the Anuak indigenous people in Ethiopia to clear their lands and crush resistance to oil operations. In the December issue, he files a gripping report from Congo, visiting remote areas to document the still officially-denied invasion of the resource-rich African giant by US-backed Rwandan forces.

Again this year, our contributing editor David Bloom has traveled to the occupied West Bank, bringing back the most in-depth reportage anywhere on the mechanics of Israeli land theft from Palestinian farming communities under the guise of the "security fence"--or "apartheid wall." His exclusive reports from the besieged Palestinian village of Jayyous have been picked up by The Nation and Electronic Intifada.

Following my controversial essay in 2003 decrying the anti-war movement’s failure to seek leadership from progressive Iraqis who oppose both the US occupation and the jihadi armed resistance, I pledged that I would find such dissident voices. This year, I made good on that pledge, providing comprehensive interviews with Yanar Mohammed and Khayal Ibrahim of the Organization of Women’s Freedom in Iraq, Issam Shukri of the Union of the Unemployed in Iraq, and Samir Noory of the Worker Communist Party of Iraq. These critical, principled voices are still heard nearly nowhere else--alas.

You’ve also received:

*Wynde Priddy’s ongoing series on the Darfur genocide and the politics of oil, terror and interventionism in Africa’s Sahel.

*Nirit Ben-Ari’s dissection of the March coup d’etat which ousted Jean Bertrand-Aristide in Haiti, picked up by Alternet.

*Raven Healing’s documentation of grave rights abuses in Russia’s counter-insurgency war in Chechnya.

*Sarah Ferguson’s analyses of the state of the anti-war movement.

*Hakim Bey on radical Sufism and the historical roots of the new Jihad.

*WBAI radio personality Robert Knight on George Bush’s politicization of NASA and announced drive to reach Mars.

*My own monthly updates on Colombia, following up on my first-hand reportage from the war-torn country last year.

*And, in the December issue, Carmelo Ruiz Marrero’s report on the biotechnology industry’s agenda for Iraqi agriculture under US occupation.

We are doing what we are doing because we fill a vital niche. We seek to expose corporate and imperialist agendas, but also to seek out local contexts--political, ethnic and ecological--for the myriad wars of the new global conflict. We endeavor to find anti-militarist, pro-autonomy voices we can loan solidarity to, especially those of land-rooted indigenous peoples. We are committed to covering the forgotten wars outside the media spotlight--whether in the Colombian Amazon or the tribal lands of northeast India. Above all, we are committed to real journalism--not the mere opinion-spewing so much in vogue in left media these days.

Recognizing that the Cold War was in fact World War 3, we are changing our name with the first edition of 2005 to WORLD WAR 4 REPORT--and hope to launch our first print edition shortly thereafter, producing it as a quarterly "best-of" with national distribution. We need to expand in 2005 to reach the point where we can pay our writers, have an ongoing visible presence in national bookstores, and become truly sustainable.

And we want to do all this on YOUR donations--not by going hat-in-hand to the foundations. Again: we aren't grant-sucking liberals--we are proudly independent radical journalists.

If we are going to make the leap we hope to make in 2005, we need to raise a minimum of $10,000. This ambitious but necessary goal means that our EVERY reader must send SOMETHING. We would rather get 1,000 donations of ten dollars each than get on the foundation tit and compromise our intransigence and independence. Our survival and allegiance to our mission depend on YOU.

If you gave last year, please give again this year. If you’ve never given before, please give what you can. Just follow the suggested guideline below. You know who you are.

Minors, indigent and prisoners: FREE
Students, fixed-income and unemployed: $5
Working class Jane/Joe: $10
Professionals with health insurance: $25
Trust-fund rads: $50
Upwardly-mobile liberals: $75
Rich liberals: $100
Very rich liberals: $200
Confused Republicans who like us because we're "anti-government": $500
Mike Ruppert: $1,000
Woody Harrelson: $5,000
George Soros: $50,000