NZ Politics Daily - 1 September (liberation)

One of the most significant trends in New Zealand’s recent military history is to promote the state’s foreign military interventions in liberal terms. Where once it might have been termed ‘imperialism’ or just ‘going to war’, these days New Zealand governments intervene abroad under the cloak of a more sophisticated sales pitch. Hence New Zealand’s intervention in all sorts of developing countries is promoted as being ‘peace keeping’, and the foreign occupations are deemed to be ‘reconstruction’. It’s all a type of very modern liberal nationalism, and it’s very Orwellian. It doesn’t just happen under National governments either. The Helen Clark Labour Government apparently intervened in more overseas military ‘imperialist’ adventures than any previous government (just as Tony Blair’s New Labour government was much more Hawkish than the average Tory government).

Slowly much of the real nature of this foreign military intervention is being uncovered. Following on from Jon Stephenson’s very good work on NZ’s role in Afghanistan, we now have Nicky Hager’s new book, Other People’s Wars: New Zealand in Afghanistan, Iraq and the war on terror, just released today. You can see details on Hager’s own website, or in the following stories: John Armstrong’s 'Kiwi Camp' a CIA base – Hager and Vernon Small and Tracy Watkins’s Kiwi base 'hid CIA', Hager book claims. Although much of the focus is on the dodgy behaviour in the Defence Force, the book will also be particularly embarrassing for both Labour and National, who have presided over it all. Hager’s book isn’t going to have any sort of major impact on this year’s election, but will help discredit some of the dishonest ways that Labour and National use to sell their ‘war on terror’ to the public. [Continue reading below for a full list of the highlights of NZ Politics Daily]

Below are the internet links to all the NZ politics material from the last 24 hours that are either informative, insightful, interesting or influential. This list and the links are taken from a fuller document, NZ Politics Daily, which is emailed out, Monday to Friday, to various researchers, academics, journalists, MPs and so forth. The document is purely for research purposes only, and if you would like to be on the subscription list, please email: [email protected]

Nicky Hager’s Other People’s Wars

John Armstrong (NZH): 'Kiwi Camp' a CIA base – Hager

Vernon Small and Tracy Watkins (Stuff): Kiwi base 'hid CIA', Hager book claims

Lloyd Burr (TV3): Hager's book analyses NZ role in 'war on terror'

Keith Ng (Public Address): Other People's Wars

No Right Turn: Our rogue establishment

Nicky Hager: Other People’s Wars