|
Magazine
Never a good war or a bad peace
SINCE September 11, we have written and spoken against the United
States Government's plans for war. Many responses have been
positive, but there has been a variety of crude personal attacks
— some calling us cowards, others suggesting that we should
go to Afghanistan (preferably where bombs are dropping). Some are
overtly genocidal, suggesting that all Afghanistan is terrorist
and safety can come only from exterminating all Afghans, if not
all or most of the Islamic world.
Those responses were not surprising; we have long known of the
racism that lurks beneath a polite veneer. More disturbing are
responses from people who simply do not want to think. Some wish
to continue in their blissful ignorance of American history and
foreign policy. Others, including opponents of the war, think we
should focus on good thoughts and not be so "confrontational".
Many antiwar activists have assessed how U.S. policy in West Asia
and Central/South Asia is relevant to understanding the
terrorists' motivations and, hence, to fashioning an effective
response. For this, we are often attacked, sometimes in the very
place where one would expect such discussion, a college campus.
For example, at a New York City University, faculty members were
explicitly told by administrators not to discuss in class
anything political that might make students feel uncomfortable.
But, of course, the most learning takes place exactly when
students are made uncomfortable, forced to challenge their pre-
conceived notions.
The depth of ignorance most Americans have about U.S. foreign
policy can be difficult for an outsider to understand. When one
gently suggests that the killing of 6,000 civilians, while a
horrible crime against humanity, pales in comparison with various
acts of our Government, the most common refrain is "Give me one
example, just one, where we killed innocent civilians". This in
the only country to use nuclear weapons, on civilian populations
in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
In the post-World War II era it is actually more difficult to
find one example where innocent civilians were not targeted by
the U.S., in direct wars (such as Vietnam), by proxy armies (such
as the Contras' attack on Nicaragua), and by U.S. client states
(the death squads of Guatemala and El Salvador). Recent episodes
such as the Gulf War and the war on Serbia have featured the
deliberate and near-complete destruction of the civilian
infrastructure, so that the killing continues long after the
bombing is over as malnutrition and disease take their toll.
Many in the U.S. have been asking, "Why do they hate us?" One
commentator suggested, "They hate us because we do not know why
they hate us," to which we must add, "And because we still do not
want to learn."
Though frightening, this ignorance is easy to understand. The
mass media give little background, and what they do is carefully
expurgated. Pre-university education is no better, and university
education only slightly better. And, most important, since
Vietnam Americans have not felt that U.S. foreign policy affected
them.
With the Internet and a wider variety of information sources,
however, more Americans than ever before are being exposed to
such truths. And the destruction of the World Trade Center ought
to have suggested that we are not invulnerable.
But anyone who tries to discuss the sources of terrorism can
expect to be denounced. This suggestion that anyone criticising
current government policy is un-American, along with the
continued unwillingness to delve beneath the surface, shows a
frightening intellectual void at the core of our society, a void
with deadly consequences. It allows leaders to whip up war fervor
even when questions about the morality and effectiveness of a
military strike have not been asked, let alone answered.
For example, one poll showed that while 63 per cent believed that
a military strike would probably spark more terrorism, 90 per
cent supported such strikes as a response to terrorism. What does
one say to a public that endorses an action they believe not only
will not solve, but exacerbate, the problem?
Bush administration officials, like all American politicians,
count on this wilful ignorance when they plan public-relations
campaigns. Take the way in which the bombing of Afghanistan was
sold as a humanitarian effort.
When the sympathies of the American people were touched by the
plight of the long-suffering Afghan people, public opinions swung
towards helping them. In response to this, the administration
concocted the most shameless and cynical cover story for military
strikes in recent memory. The idea went like this:
The Afghan people are starving. So, we need to do food drops.
(Never mind that all those experienced in humanitarian aid
programmes are opposed to food drops because they are dangerous,
wasteful and preclude setting up the on-the-ground distribution
networks necessary to effective aid.)
We need to destroy the Taliban's air defences so that transport
planes will be safe.
Because the Taliban has many of the Stinger anti-aircraft
missiles that the U.S. supplied the Mujaheddin in the 1980s when
they were fighting the Soviet Union, the Afghani air defense is
mobile.
So, we have to bomb all over Afghanistan to feed Afghanistan.
Predictably, the bombing hindered existing aid efforts, which
helped millions, while the airdrops could help thousands at most.
The chaos and violence created by this bombing — combined
with a projected assault by the Northern Alliance — forced
aid personnel temporarily to withdraw, with disastrous effects
for the Afghan people. One week after the bombing, the World Food
Programme began reporting the first civilian deaths from
starvation.
The success of the Bush propaganda is a failure of our
intellectual culture. We do not mean "intellectual" in an elitist
sense, restricted only to those in professions based in thought
and writing. We are talking about the way in which people are
trained to think, or avoid thinking. That process includes the
schools, universities, corporate public relations and
advertising, journalism — all of which are steeped in the
same American ideology. The core of that ideology is that, unlike
any other nation in history, the U.S. acts in the world to
promote peace, freedom, and democracy.
What Americans are reluctant to acknowledge — but is taken
as given throughout most of the rest of the world — is that
the U.S. is the new empire, and it acts as empires throughout
history have acted: To consolidate and extend its power in the
quest to control resources. And just as in other empires, the
people must come to believe that such dominance is justified.
In Great Britain, it was the White man's burden to "civilise"
India. In the U.S., we talk of bringing our freedoms to others.
That the world which has to deal with the empire sees it quite
differently is to be expected. People who face power are
typically much more clear about that power than the ones wielding
it.
Unfortunately, Americans are not the only ones who suffer from
prejudice and wilful ignorance; some of our hate mail came from
Indians.
To see India — long a staunch opponent of America's imperial
adventures and a consistent voice calling for national
independence based on nonalignment — reduced to among the
most abject, craven supporters of this current military
aggression is deeply saddening.
The Indian Government has much to answer for. Its support for
Bush's dangerously insane national missile defence policy —
which would severely compromise India's security by giving China
an incentive to build more, bigger and better bombs — was
criminal. Offering logistical support for current operations
makes it a party to the killing of innocents in Afghanistan.
Detaining students for distributing anti-war leaflets imperils
Indian democracy. Even with all these sacrifices of principle,
India is currently in the comical position of having rushed to
the U.S. side only to find Pakistan there first.
Much of the populace must also question itself. Public opinion
polls (no doubt reflecting at best urban middle-class sentiment)
indicate that Indians are second only to Israelis and ahead of
Americans in support for U.S. military aggression. No doubt, it
has to do with the growing Hindu fundamentalism of the urban
middle class.
It may be tempting for Hindus to believe that Islam is different
from other religions, since it breeds fundamentalism and
terrorism. To counter that, one need only remember the Bombay
riots of 1992 and 1993, where 500 — 1,000 people, mostly
Muslims, were killed mostly by Hindus, while the police watched.
With India and Pakistan engaging in renewed skirmishes, the time
to learn the lesson that entire communities should not be
targeted for the acts of a few extremists is now.
There are signs of hope. More Americans than ever are interested
in learning the truth about our foreign policy and the peace
movement is reaching new audiences every day, including people
who had been apolitical before September 11.
We can only hope that the same is true in India, that many are
newly galvanised to face the greatly increased threats of
sectarian violence and nuclear brinksmanship.
Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
Magazine
|
