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chomsky + friends on the bombings

  
  

Page: 12(3)

 
 
autopilot disengaged
14:28 / 21.09.01
quote:The debate on the implications of last week's terrorist atrocities in the US has provoked a typically unthinking response from sections of the political right: these were acts of pure evil to which a more assertive application of western power is the only necessary response; there are no other conclusions to be drawn and anyone who suggests otherwise is an "apologist for evil".

The proper starting point for any analysis ought to be sympathy for the victims and revulsion for the perpetrators. But it is absurd to claim, as some commentators have, that any attempt to set these events in a wider political context is tantamount to saying America "had it coming".

A mature debate will depend on our ability to separate issues of cause and effect from questions of moral responsibility. Historians have correctly identified the punitive terms of the treaty of Versailles as a factor in the rise of Hitler. That does not turn them into Holocaust deniers. Pointing out that the suppression of a legitimate civil rights movement in Northern Ireland provided the context for the emergence of the Provisional IRA does nothing to justify its 25-year campaign of murder. To explain is not to excuse.

Counter-insurgency experts have long recognised that to be operationally effective extremist organisations need the support, or at least acquiescence, of a wider community of people who don't necessarily share all their aims. Mao Zedong, the 20th century's most successful exponent of what is now fashionably termed "asymmetrical warfare", understood this dynamic very well: "The people are water, the Red Army are fish; without water the fish will die."

We will need to understand and address the deep-rooted alienation from which terrorists derive legitimacy and support in order to deny them their life-stream: tough on terrorism, tough on the causes of terrorism, if you like. It may be true, as Jonathan Freedland argued this week, that those who masterminded these atrocities cannot be appeased since they seek nothing less than the complete destruction of the state of Israel. But it is surely obvious that their ideas would find less resonance among a wider Arab audience if the search for a workable and just solution had not been frustrated by a combination of Israeli intransigence and western indifference.

This is not only a question for America. One of the greatest injustices in the world trade system is the refusal of the European Union to open its market to agricultural produce from developing countries that remain open to our manufactured goods and investment. The next world trade round must put the developing world at the centre of its agenda.

There also needs to be a rethink of relations with the Islamic world. It is no coincidence that Osama bin Laden draws so many supporters from countries such as Saudi Arabia and Algeria. Too often our engagement with the Muslim world has consisted of support for despotic regimes against their own people. The lesson of Algeria is that each time political expressions of Islam are suppressed they reappear in more militant form.

- David Clark (Former advisor to Robin Cook), in The Guardian
 
 
autopilot disengaged
14:41 / 21.09.01
quote:Blair's being "shoulder to shoulder" with Bush means allying this country to a willingness to kill large numbers of non-Americans in pursuit of uncertain immediate goals that has long been a feature of US policy. This list is long. Remember, if you can, the "free fire zones", including the use of chemical weapons, that killed as many as 50,000 civilians every year in Vietnam; the bombing of Cambodia that killed 600,000 people; the unnecessary slaughter of tens of thousands of Iraqis during the 1991 Gulf war, the beginning of a silent holocaust that has since claimed half a million children, according to the UN. For Blair and Bush to say that war has been declared upon America is rich.

During my lifetime, America has been constantly waging war against much of humanity: impoverished people mostly, in stricken places. Moreover, far from being the main perpetrators of terrorism, Islamic peoples have been its victims - more often than not of an American fundamentalism and its proxies.

Blair is acting like a schoolboy who has never seen war and what cluster bombs do to human beings. He and the Queen shed tears for the victims in America; they have yet to shed tears for his - yes, his - victims in Iraq. Nor will St Paul's cathedral be reconvened to mourn the innocents who will die when he and Bush attack the shadows of Osama bin Laden.

In these surreal days, there is one truth. Nothing justified the killing of innocent people in America last week and nothing justifies the killing of innocent people anywhere else.

For the prime minister to behave responsibly, he would have to speak out with a very different voice. He could say: "Our response must not be to sink to the level of this criminal outrage and kill for the sake of killing." He could seize this extraordinary historic moment and call for the redirection of western politics away from war and towards peace - specifically peace in those regions of the world where one type of terrorism is the product largely of imperialism, old and new. Britain is deeply implicated. As John Cooley writes in Unholy Wars: Afghanistan, America and International Terrorism: "It was only Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's British government which supported the jihad with full enthusiasm." The CIA passed responsibility for backing mojahedin terrorism to the British - much of it coordinated by an MI6 officer in Islamabad. Osama bin Laden was given "free rein" in Afghanistan.

After more than a century of invasion, plunder and bombing (since the 20s by the RAF), we in the west owe the people of Afghanistan and the Middle East peace. The start of peace would be the establishment of a Palestinian homeland, as laid down in international law by a 34-year-old UN resolution; the lifting of the horrific embargo on the civilian population of Iraq; and the careful, negotiated ending of Afghanistan's isolation.

A tall order, yes. But these are the root causes of a grievance and rage we can barely imagine, and there is no other enduring solution than peace with justice. Unless real politics replaces the autocratic impositions of power, the understudies of those who murdered so many in America will appear and act; nothing is surer. They cannot be bombed into oblivion. Only justice for the millions of ordinary people, who are not murderers, will bring the peace and security that is, after all, a universal right.

- John Pilger
 
 
autopilot disengaged
08:12 / 22.09.01
quote:At a time like this, the world is defined not only by what it is for, but by what and whom it is against. The United Nations – and the international community – must have the courage to recognise that just as there are common aims, there are common enemies. To defeat them, all nations of goodwill must join forces in a common effort encompassing every aspect of the open, free global system so wickedly exploited by the perpetrators of last week's atrocities.

The United Nations is uniquely positioned to advance this effort. It provides the forum necessary for building a universal coalition, and can ensure global legitimacy for the long-term response to terrorism. United Nations conventions already provide a legal framework for many of the steps that must be taken to eradicate terrorism – including the extradition and prosecution of offenders and the suppression of money laundering. These conventions must be implemented in full.

Essential to this response, however, is that it deepen and not fracture the global unity of 11 September. While the world must recognise that there are enemies common to all societies, it must equally understand that they are not – they are never – defined by religious or national descent.

No people, no region and no religion should be condemned, assaulted or targeted because of the unspeakable acts of individuals. In Mayor Giuliani's words, "that is exactly what we are fighting here." He and President Bush have shown admirable leadership in condemning attacks on Muslims in the United States, and around the world other leaders have done the same. To do otherwise, and to allow divisions between and within societies to be exacerbated by these acts, would be to do the terrorists' work for them, and no one could wish for such an outcome.

Terrorism today threatens every society, every people, and as the world takes action against its perpetrators, we have all been reminded of the necessity of addressing the full range of conditions which permit the growth of this kind of hatred and depravity. We must confront violence, bigotry and hatred even more resolutely. The work of the United Nations must continue as we address the ills of our time – conflict, ignorance, poverty and disease.

Doing so will not end every source of hatred and every act of violence – there are those who will hate and who will kill even if every injustice is ended. But if the world can show that it will carry on, that it will persevere in creating a stronger, more just, more benevolent and more genuine international community across all lines of religion and race, then terrorism will have failed.

- Kofi Annan
 
 
autopilot disengaged
08:21 / 22.09.01
quote:Fundamentalist groups, armed with paranoid anti-Muslim conspiracy theories, accounts of Muslim sufferings in Iraq and Bosnia (and later Chechnya), and even apocalyptic prophecies, were able to convince these impressionable men of the need to go on jihad against the West. It seems to me that this disillusionment with the West, and especially the US, is the heart of the problem. As long as this remains, there will be fodder in this country for hardline and terrorist groups.

It is crucial to remember that "belief" drove these students to go and train abroad to wage holy war, not poverty or deprivation. Unlike the British Muslim youths who have been involved in the race riots in northern England, these are from well-to-do, middle-class backgrounds, people who were studying to become engineers and accountants. Now we know that their backgrounds were uncannily similar to the backgrounds of the suicidal pilots who attacked the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon.

George Galloway, the Labour MP, has argued that bombing Afghanistan will only create a thousand more Osama bin Ladens. That might not be true, but it will certainly create thousands of volunteers who would be glad to train in his camps to wage war against America, by whatever means.

If the West truly wants to rid the world of Islamic terrorism, then it needs to re-examine its relationship with the Muslim world. If Britain does not want a disillusioned and bitter Muslim community in its midst then it should consider carefully what sort of military action it will take against Afghanistan and other terrorist targets.

The Government should categorically state that it is waging war on terrorists, and will draw the line if the US decides to bomb Kabul or Kandahar, as it did Baghdad over a decade ago.

Whatever war will be unleashed in the coming days, it should be waged with caution and justice, and with the support of the Muslim world and the community here. This must be a war against terrorism. It must not be allowed to explode into a clash of civilisations. That would push the young Muslims of this country further away.

- Abul Taher (news editor, Eastern Eye')
 
 
autopilot disengaged
08:41 / 22.09.01
there's a year-by-year summary of the US involvement in the Middle East here. except the link doesn't actually take you to the right place. hey-ho...it's called 'Shalom: Why hate?' - down in the second list of links.

[ 22-09-2001: Message edited by: autopilot disengaged ]
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
13:11 / 24.09.01
quote:Persons who are otherwise perfectly aware of the non-transparency of "feelings" are insisting that this particular event demands some sort of transcendent pre- or post-political reaction, which is odd since there is certainly nothing pre- or post-political about the anti-Arab/anti-Muslim violence or the Bush adminstration's moves toward war. Or is it because the Right is mobilizing around the issue politically (and effectively), the Left is just meant to bask in the purity of our mourning--? Will this win over the patriots?

The national discourse regarding this tragic event in particular has produced a certain set of organizing images and importantly a certain kind of ideal citizen . This ideal citizen -a fantasy in her own right-- is defined by her passive participation in an imagined democracy. That is, she willingly forfeits her "right" to participate as a critical citizen in a working democracy for a sentimental image of community and unity.

A young Asian American woman on a list-serv stated that, "Even though I am a devout Democrat, I believe that what the nation needs now is unity in hunting down the killers, and not dissent. I am an American." The statement "I am an American" is both affirmation of her identification with the nation but also an implicit line in the sand, a move toward exclusion. Clearly those who do not wish to affirm their American-ness in the same manner are therefore un-American; it is a "love it or leave it" proposal which leaves little room to critically participate in the democratic process because somehow, the democratic process is now understood as itself un-American .

- Mimi Nguyen

I think this one is really freaking important. And scary. Because I wonder if maybe the liberal/left/doves lost too much ground in the days immediately after 9/11, by being too tactful and considerate... The conservative/right/hark sector certainly didn't wait until the dust had settled before demanding bloody retribution. And the idea that calling for peace, or an understanding of what American policies contributed to the events of 9/11, is somehow less "political" than calling for retaliation and condemning 'terrorism', is a particularly insidious one which appears to have gone unchecked...
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
21:00 / 24.09.01
quote:Originally posted by Crunchy Mr Bananapants:
"I just think we're a little bit of an arrogant nation, and maybe this is a bit of a humbling experience... it raises the question in my mind, What has our government done to evoke or provoke this action, that maybe we don't know about?"
- The Backstreet Boys (sorry, I don't know which one - Kevin, I think?)

Surprise, surprise - he's retracted his remarks.

[ 25-09-2001: Message edited by: Flyboy ]
 
 
autopilot disengaged
17:50 / 25.09.01
quote:Assuming the unassumable, namely that Bin Laden was responsible and that he and his lieutenants are still in Afghanistan, how would we deal with them? The answer is obvious: let's cut out the world war and go straight to Nuremburg.

This begs the question, of course, of how we would extract the defendants. I believe that this is a lot less complicated than the militarists have made it. Until a few years ago, the Afghan people regarded the western powers as their allies, as they fought to rid themselves of Soviet occupation. We squandered their goodwill when we encouraged the Taliban to move in as an ideological bulwark against communism. But reclaiming it, in Afghanistan's desperate circumstances, is surely only a matter of months.

Vast humanitarian interventions, dragging the population back from the brink of famine, would show the people that, unlike the Taliban, the west is on their side. The Taliban thrive on the fear of outsiders, which, as far as Afghans are concerned, has so far been amply justified. If the outside world proves that it is friendly, not hostile, the regime's grip begins to weaken. As the debilitated population begins to recover, the Taliban's chances of retaining power will be approximately zero. Bin Laden, long hated and feared by most Afghans, would be handed over just as soon as they could grab him.

All this, of course, will take time, and it's not hard to see why the American people want instant results. But justice requires patience, and infinite justice requires infinite patience. The great advantage of this strategy is that it's safe. Far from spawning future conflicts, it is likely to defuse them. Far from immersing a new generation in hatred of the west, it's likely to inculcate a hatred of those who would deprive them of friendly contact with outsiders. Far from triggering off fundamentalist uprisings all over the Muslim world, it could lead to a new understanding between cultures, even a sense of common purpose. The likes of Bin Laden would then have nowhere to hide.

And there is an accidental by-product, which has nothing to do with the west's strategic objectives. Rather than killing thousands of civilians, we would save the lives of millions. Let's make this the era of collateral repair.

- George Monbiot
 
 
autopilot disengaged
17:52 / 25.09.01
this is sooo beautiful.
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
21:35 / 25.09.01
The only problem with this thread is that it could do with some more links to the sources of these quotes - for example, the full text of the George Monbiot column can be found here.
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
21:57 / 25.09.01
More comment from Naomi Klein, on the subject of "collateral damage" (extract follows):

quote:Terrorists, though they often adopt the pose, are nobody's saviours, nobody's freedom fighters. They are, however, expert at manipulating real injustice for their ends. If it turns out that Bin Laden is responsible for the attacks, we will have to look at him as what he is: a figure of diabolical fanaticism, yes, but also the warped and twisted progeny of all of these unintended consequences of wars past and present - a Frankenstein's monster of collateral damage. For terrorists, collateral damage isn't a threat, it is fuel: it creates terrorists.

It's something to remember as we rush to leave fresh new trails of collateral damage around the world: in Afghanistan, where an indiscriminate attack would create yet another country filled with desperate people who needed help to overthrow a brutal dictatorship and suffered further misery instead; in Pakistan, where a US presence would be taken by many as an imperial and religious slight, potentially ripping the country apart; in the occupied territories, where Israeli forces are seizing the moment to step up attacks they wouldn't have attempted two weeks ago; and in our own backyards, where the mood of vengeance, so little informed by fact, is giving licence to rampant racist attacks.

Are we ready for some more collateral damage, or should we first start facing up to the damage already done?

- from The Guardian
 
 
Ethan Hawke
17:49 / 27.09.01
Christopher Hitchens, no friend to US foreign policy (his last book was a case to get Henry Kissinger charged with war crimes, and, as you'll see if you read below, called Clinton a war criminal for the Sudan cruise missiles), slamsChomsky and co. for their views on 9/11:

quotespeaking of the resisting passengers on flight 93)One iota of such innate fortitudeis worth all the writings of Noam Chomsky, who coldly compared the plan of September 11 to a stupid and cruel and cynical raid by Bill Clinton on Khartoum in August 1998.

I speak with some feeling about that latter event, because I wrote three Nation columns about it at the time, pointing out (with evidence that goes unrebutted to this day) that it was a war crime, and a war crime opposed by the majority of the military and intelligence establishment. The crime was directly and sordidly linked to the effort by a crooked President to avoid impeachment (a conclusion sedulously avoided by the Chomskys and Husseinis of the time). The Al Shifa pharmaceutical plant was well-known to be a civilian target, and its "selection" was opposed by most of the Joint Chiefs and many CIA personnel for just this reason. (See, for additional corroboration, Seymour Hersh's New Yorker essay "The Missiles of August"). To mention this banana-republic degradation of the United States in the same breath as a plan, deliberated for months, to inflict maximum horror upon the innocent is to abandon every standard that makes intellectual and moral discrimination possible. To put it at its very lowest, and most elementary, at least the missiles launched by Clinton were not full of passengers. (How are you doing, Sam? Noam, wazzup?)

So much for what the methods and targets tell us about the true anti-human and anti-democratic motivation.

Much morehere and here.
 
 
tracypanzer
18:27 / 27.09.01
Anyone heard from Ralph Nader?
 
 
grant
19:03 / 27.09.01
quote:St. Louis Post-Dispatch


September 24, 2001 Monday Five Star Lift Edition

SECTION: METRO; Pg. B3

LENGTH: 276 words

HEADLINE: NADER CAUTIONS AGAINST TOO LITTLE DEBATE ON HOW TO RESPOND TO TERRORISM ;
EX-CANDIDATE WILL SPEAK AT MCKENDREE COLLEGE

BYLINE: Jo Mannies Post-Dispatch Political Correspondent

BODY:
Ralph Nader says he's concerned that all this "rallying around the president" is getting out of hand. As he sees it, there's too little discussion and debate about the particulars of President George W. Bush's anti-terrorism campaign. "The reasons why governments make mistakes is often that they don't have enough input, enough challenges, enough reminders of history," Nader said in a telephone interview Friday. "The more input, the less likely the situation will be made worse."

Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, he asserted that the only complaints aired in Washington have been "a few squeals on civil liberties." Such reluctance to object reflects what happens in times of crisis, Nader added.

"The arena of permissible debate ... tightens," he said.

Such observations fit in with Nader's continued promotion of the Green Party and other third parties since his failed bid for president last year as the Green Party nominee. If there were more political parties represented in Congress, he said, there would be more "diverse opinions about what should be done" to counter the terrorism threat.

Nader, who made his name as a consumer advocate, plans to offer his latest views on the third parties and other issues in a speech Wednesday night at McKendree College in Lebanon. He said he planned chiefly to talk about "third party politics and the environment."

Nader's appearance is part of McKendree's Distinguished Speakers Series. It begins at 7 p.m., is free and open to the public. A panel of four journalists from news outlets, including the Post-Dispatch, will question Nader. He also will take questions from the audience.
 
 
grant
19:06 / 27.09.01
quote:BEREA, Ky. (AP) - Following a speech at Berea College, former presidential candidate Ralph Nader said President Bush should be cautious when deciding how to proceed against those who waged last week's terrorist attacks.

Nader said the rule of law, and not vengeance, should guide the administration

"The moment we go away from the rule of law ... we will be subject to the rule of mindless violence to all who oppose us, and we will be in the same pit," he said to an audience at Seabury Center on Berea's campus Thursday night.

Nader, also a consumer advocate, was the Green Party presidential candidate in 1996 and 2000.

Earlier in the day, Nader met with about 35 Berea College students to discuss the impacts the attacks in New York and Washington could have on the economy - including the airline industry.


Worth noting: Nader's parents were Lebanese.
 
 
grant
19:12 / 27.09.01
What I was most curious about:

quote:The Washington Post
September 24, 2001, Monday, Final Edition

Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan called the terrorists involved in the Sept. 11 attack on New York and the Pentagon "fanatics who use God as a shield." But, in a speech last night in Southeast Washington, he also suggested that U.S. government policies helped provoke the attack.

"Rip up the cells of terror," Farrakhan said, addressing himself to government officials. "But I hope you look at what your foreign policy has produced in the world.

"People don't hate for nothing. People don't drive airplanes into buildings for nothing," Farrakhan said at the annual men's day celebration at Union Temple Baptist Church.

Hundreds of people attended, overflowing the church sanctuary and listening in the basement and on the sidewalks outside.
 
 
grant
19:24 / 27.09.01
And:

quote:SHOW: FOX SPECIAL REPORT WITH BRIT HUME (18:44)
September 14, 2001 Friday
Transcript # 091406cb.254

NELSON MANDELA, FORMER SOUTH AFRICAN PRESIDENT: The United States must avoid any course of action which would be as unpopular as that of the terrorists.


and

quote:Agence France Presse
September 11, 2001 Tuesday
...Former South African president Nelson Mandela was "stunned" by the news, his spokeswoman said.

"He is watching the events on television and says it is unacceptable that innocent people are being killed in terrorist attacks," she said.

President Thabo Mbeki called on the international community to unite to conquer global terrorism.
 
 
YNH
03:01 / 05.10.01
Chomsky via Quicktime.
 
  

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