war = peace... I'm not seeing that concept, I think it's a hoax played out on people to open doors to new conflicts.
You are one of the rare individuals who gets this. Anyone who justifies war equalling peace is firmly entrenched in illusions. It's the most base psychological problem of the split psyche that is fragmented from itself, and therefore distorts reality. Unfortunately it's a mass-delusion that perpetuates the self-fulfillment of untold numbers of people magnetizing themselves to external manifestations of the conflict they hold deeply within.
People choose and revel in conflict and war. Willfully. And they choose the consequences, too. And then they conveniently forget they chose them.
It is rare to see the truth beyond the self-delusions. A sure sign, however, is double-speak.
Awesome stuff, Roland.
"The opposite of a fact is falsehood, but the opposite of one profound truth may very well be another profound truth." ~ Niels Bohr
i think the problem here is that if America does something in their own self interests, that, in and of itself, is considered an evil act. Nevermind that in this case it was also in Kuwait and the rest of the middle east's best interests (and internationally sanctioned as the right action to take). Because America's interests were also protected, America was wrong to act. Certain people are so conditioned to believe America is always in the wrong (and often we are. see: NOW) that they are incapable of actually thinking the US can act in the right.
i think the problem here is that if America does something in their own self interests, that, in and of itself, is considered an evil act. Nevermind that in this case it was also in Kuwait and the rest of the middle east's best interests (and internationally sanctioned as the right action to take). Because America's interests were also protected, America was wrong to act. Certain people are so conditioned to believe America is always in the wrong (and often we are. see: NOW) that they are incapable of actually thinking the US can act in the right.
History tells a rather candid tale of regime manipulation and military instigation. The problem is it hasn't stopped, it's still going on right this very second.
Self defense is one thing, I'm not seeing that plight. I'm seeing a strong case for imperialism over what I think can be justified.
Progress is not made by everyone joining some new fad,
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
You are one of the rare individuals who gets this. Anyone who justifies war equalling peace is firmly entrenched in illusions. It's the most base psychological problem of the split psyche that is fragmented from itself, and therefore distorts reality. Unfortunately it's a mass-delusion that perpetuates the self-fulfillment of untold numbers of people magnetizing themselves to external manifestations of the conflict they hold deeply within.
People choose and revel in conflict and war. Willfully. And they choose the consequences, too. And then they conveniently forget they chose them.
It is rare to see the truth beyond the self-delusions. A sure sign, however, is double-speak.
Awesome stuff, Roland.
the whole war=peace is jingoistic crap parroted by pacifists to justify their cowardice. its a false comparison. No one says war = peace (except pacifists), they say peace will follow war, which is true. Sure leaders in wars are always preaching about "peace in our time" and that rallying to war will lead to peace, but most sensible people realize that war doesnt mean peace forever.
thats like saying "rain=sunshine" is a stupid idea. the fact is after rain, there will be sunshine, so in that sense it is true. After sunshine is rain.
Eternal peace is the illusion. Peace is the time between conflict. conflict is the time between peace. That duality of conflict and peace is the only thing thats eternal.
War = Peace was made up by those who pass argument that war is in fact necessary to obtain peace.
That would be greedy murdering warmongers, not pacifists.
Same as the "support the troops" gets people to help promote the war through guilt.
Progress is not made by everyone joining some new fad,
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
War = Peace was made up by those who pass argument that war is in fact necessary to obtain peace.
.
What most people would understand to be implied must be spelled out for you, so i will.
war is in fact SOMETIMES necessary to obtain a good peace. there is good and bad peace just like war. As i said, enslavement and complete capitulation is a form of peace. freedom and prosperity is another form of peace (and sadly, often shortterm). When someone decides to fight "for peace" most intelligent, sensible people will take that to mean "fight for a desirable and longlasting peace." Not end all war for all time or some such ridiculousness.
a pacifist plays 'words lawyer" and simply oversimplifies that to "war=peace? that dont make no sense!". most people arent that naive.
What most people would understand to be implied must be spelled out for you, so i will.
war is in fact SOMETIMES necessary to obtain a good peace. there is good and bad peace just like war. As i said, enslavement and complete capitulation is a form of peace. freedom and prosperity is another form of peace (and sadly, often shortterm). When someone decides to fight "for peace" most intelligent, sensible people will take that to mean "fight for a desirable and longlasting peace." Not end all war for all time or some such ridiculousness.
a pacifist plays 'words lawyer" and simply oversimplifies that to "war=peace? that dont make no sense!". most people arent that naive.
I think you explained nothing to me. It akin to support the troops. It's a methodology to get people onboard the conflict, and support it knowing peace will follow, but in reality that's not what happens, unless you practically genocide the opposition.
This prhase is meaningless in todays world, and those that use it are fooling people in to thinking it's a possibility.
Progress is not made by everyone joining some new fad,
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
I think you explained nothing to me. It akin to support the troops. It's a methodology to get people onboard the conflict, and support it knowing peace will follow, but in reality that's not what happens, unless you practically genocide the opposition.
This prhase is meaningless in todays world, and those that use it are fooling people in to thinking it's a possibility.
who is being fooled?!?! who do you know over the age of twelve that really thinks one particular war (assuming at least 2 people survive) will result in everlasting peace? Who would be so foolish as to take that so literally? name one person!
who is being fooled?!?! who do you know over the age of twelve that really thinks one particular war (assuming at least 2 people survive) will result in everlasting peace? Who would be so foolish as to take that so literally? name one person!
You mean who has a crystal ball and can read into the future? Not too many people.
Unless there's a miscommunication going on here, it's passed off by warmongers as a means to an end. The entire phrase is synonymous with the world "solution".
War is not a solution unless you kill man woman and child indiscriminately. That is not an option anymore these days as it was in the past.
The whole terminology has become defunct, and is a misnomer used to fool people into accepting war.
Kinda like dangling the proverbial carrot in front of the mule.
Progress is not made by everyone joining some new fad,
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
the first Iraq war was executed perfectly, so good for Obama.
you may find that this statement is quite debatable and is in fact NOT "common historical knowledge". Iraq was "tricked" into going to war? They had no inclination towards war without us? Once again, this board loves to put the blame for every single evil act on the globe squarely at the feet of AMerica. what a joke.
seriously, what is with the hate for america? i am a liberal and i am so flabbergasted by the way lmany other iberals treat our nation.
yeah. we should have waited for them to regroup since their leaders were fuckups.. its the honorable thing to do right?
please. This isnt a fucking football game where you put your second stringers in when your up 30 points. its fucking war. War isnt honorable. You kill motherfuckers until they give up. thats it.
And sanctions are a failed diplomatic policy, not an aspect of war in this case. Actually, in this case, going straight into a poorly defended iraq and killing Saddam would have been the right thing to do as it would have saved countless lives caused by the failed diplomatic policy of sanctions, but hindsight is 20/20. but i doubt you would have been for that either.
Thing is the Iraqi army had given up. They were trying to retreat to Baghdad and were gunned down anyway. Us military pilots called it a "turkey shoot",
"like shooting fish in a barrel." The army was defeated, militarily, and were still subjected to the firepower of the US military, the deadliest force on the planet.
Yes war is shitty, people die. Yes the US military has awesome firepower. But gunning down a retreating army as they tried to escape down a highway in the middle of the desert is more than war-it is a slaughter. And that's the reality of the situation.
i think the problem here is that if America does something in their own self interests, that, in and of itself, is considered an evil act. Nevermind that in this case it was also in Kuwait and the rest of the middle east's best interests (and internationally sanctioned as the right action to take). Because America's interests were also protected, America was wrong to act. Certain people are so conditioned to believe America is always in the wrong (and often we are. see: NOW) that they are incapable of actually thinking the US can act in the right.
but they could've stopped the war before it ever started!
things to keep in mind to put it in a better context:
-kuwait had been stealin oil from iraq as well as violating opec quotas. iraq went to their friends, the US, who told them we "do not wish to get involved in arab-arab affairs."
-Amnesty International and other groups had issued reports on human rights abuses of Iraq but Bush didn't care.
-w/ the cold war being over the defense budget was slashed, upsetting a certain sector who they are all pretty much working in now
-iraq starts a troop buildup on the border and congress asks the state dept in to answer some questions about our allies, iraq...asked if we would be committed to action if anything happens the answer is 'of course not'
-nothing is done and the next day iraq invades
-the AI and other reports are suddenly treated like scripture to help prove the justifications for action
-defense budget blows up as does war spending
also bear in mind we had told the iraqis we would support them if they rose up against saddam...which they did and we did nothing while they were massacred
standin above the crowd
he had a voice that was strong and loud and
i swallowed his facade cos i'm so
eager to identify with
someone above the crowd
someone who seemed to feel the same
someone prepared to lead the way
i guess you have not been paying attention. americans love to tear people down, especially good people. sit back and watch the arguments against obama. they are the same every time. the far left thinks he is a war monger in progressive's clothing... while the far right believe he is a marxist radical based on some of his associates.
I'm not american, but I have no problem tearing down your politicians. Guess Ill go with the far left on that one.
1. obviously you dont know that kuwait was defensleless, as was saudi arabia, against the military strength of Iraq.
2nd. does anyone know what they are talkign about around here anymore? The UN authorized the action against iraq in the first gulf war... it was carried out by coalition forces from over 30 countries. after ecominic sanctions were imposed and did not work..
1. Do you honestly think that Iraq would have invaded Saudia Arabia? Your military (biggest, best and brightest) is stretched thin trying to occupy Iraq, but Iraq (even in 1990) could have dominated that much territory, in the face of world pressure? Saddam had his own twisted reasons to invade Kuwait, he was not bent on some imperialistic crusade.
2. I rushed my post (from work) and didn't complete my thoughts, mixed up a fact...you could have made your point without being a dick about it.
like in WW2? perhaps you missed the forst gulf war? when the whole world was up in arms? and was terrified that iraq was about to dominate the middle east and take her neighbors by force? or perhaops you are underestimating the chaos that woukld be caused by iraq under hussein taking control of 50% of the world oil reserves. that is a global problem, because the entire fuckign globe runs on ths shit, not just america. .
Or maybe those classified US satellite photos showing the buildup of Iraqi troops on the Saudi border? (the ones that would conflict with Russian photos showing no buildup?) http://www.iraqwar.org/bush.htm
i may be a pacifist for the most part, but i will not let a bully attack me or friend/family or a weaker person. if a bully attacks me, i am going to knock his fucking teeth out. take that how you want to take that..
i subscribe to the gandhi scool of thought, and believe in the power of direct peaceful disobedience. but flowers never stopped a tank.
I want to take it as chicken or the egg. The violence in the region is deep seeded and would probably continue with or without US intervention. This part of your post is consistent with the rah-rah Team American rhetoric you and Mr.Smith are spewing. I'm sure gandhi would love some of your statements in this thread :rolleyes:
You ask what American gained from the first gulf war?
Well...for starters.... They solved a finacial issue (Saddam's claims over oil and land) for a family with $50 billion invested in the American economy. They destroyed a military that was getting big enough to influence policy in the region, and basically neutered it's leader/former asset.
Then there is the increased US military presence, and a reason to move troops into Saudi Arabia and establish bases....which were necessary to 'maintain peace' in the area until a bigger, shinier base was established in Iraq the next go-round ( http://www.monthlyreview.org/0302editr.htm#three )
...Then all the profits made by oil companies, and the MIC....
I still can't believe a supposed "pro peace" "anti-war" candidate is tossing around rhetoric on how absolutely excellent such and such a war was, and this how America should be operating.
uhm...why is he even talking like this in the first place?
totally unreal.
crazy
Progress is not made by everyone joining some new fad,
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
the whole war=peace is jingoistic crap parroted by pacifists to justify their cowardice. its a false comparison. No one says war = peace (except pacifists), they say peace will follow war, which is true. Sure leaders in wars are always preaching about "peace in our time" and that rallying to war will lead to peace, but most sensible people realize that war doesnt mean peace forever.
thats like saying "rain=sunshine" is a stupid idea. the fact is after rain, there will be sunshine, so in that sense it is true. After sunshine is rain.
Eternal peace is the illusion. Peace is the time between conflict. conflict is the time between peace. That duality of conflict and peace is the only thing thats eternal.
"There is no way to peace, peace is the way."
- Gandhi
standin above the crowd
he had a voice that was strong and loud and
i swallowed his facade cos i'm so
eager to identify with
someone above the crowd
someone who seemed to feel the same
someone prepared to lead the way
You mean admit he's a big fat stupid idiot to the world?
I can't imagine him not jumping at the chance...
you have it all figured out my friend :rolleyes:
you are right and 99% of the worlds historians are wrong...
yuo still have not answered my question, and apparently will not answer it
YOU WAKE UP, A 150,000 MAN ARMY HAS JUST CROSSED THE KUWAIT BORDER AND IS GOING TO TRY AND SEIZE HER BY FORCE AND FORM AN OCCUPATION. WHAT DO YOU DO ABOUT IT?
FROM WHAT I HAVE READ, YOU WOULD DO NOTHING. GOOD JOB.
yuo seem to be the type of guy that if an old lady was beign mugged you would walk the other way. the whole idea of saddam being "green lit" is horseshit that has been proven wrong time and time again in the last 17 years
see, the problem with our whole outlook on everything, is that every event to you is based on a concpiracy.
Just remember that under a, overly simplistic Ron Paul style isolationist foreign policy, Europe would be speaking German and the Jews would have been obliterated.
Sometimes it is the duty of the world to stand up and fight.
Take Burma for example. i would justify precise military action against the ruling junta to topple the regime. i guess you guys would just rather mail then some fucking flowers and ask them nicely to leave :rolleyes:
"It is common historic knowledge that U.S. Ambassador April Glaspie tricked Saddam Hussein into invading Kuwait. Glaspie “assured him that the United States considered the dispute to be a regional concern, and that it would not intervene militarily. In other words, the United States government gave Saddam Hussein what amounted to a ‘green light’ to invade Kuwait.” Saddam, of course, was an easily fooled chump
"Various interventions following the U.S. defeat in Vietnam seemed to reflect the desperate need of the still-reigning superpower -- even after the fall of its powerful rival, the Soviet Union -- to establish its dominance everywhere. Hence the invasion of Grenada in 1982, the bombing assault on Panama in 1989, the first Gulf war of 1991. Was George Bush Sr. heartsick over Saddam Hussein's seizure of Kuwait, or was he using that event as an opportunity to move U.S. power firmly into the coveted oil region of the Middle East? Given the history of the United States, given its obsession with Middle Eastern oil dating from Franklin Roosevelt's 1945 deal with King Abdul Aziz of Saudi Arabia, and the CIA's overthrow of the democratic Mossadeq government in Iran in 1953, it is not hard to decide that question." Howard Zinn
the idea that the first gulf war was a conspiracy to weaken saddam and iraq and keep them that way for years until we decided to take him out is bullshit
we could have taken him out in 1991 when we had overwhelming national and world support to do so.
why would they wait? why take that chance? why wait for a future justification?
and if the CIA and the shadows of the US government are all controlling and dictate every world event, then how the hell did the former head of the CIA lose the election in 1992?
"Various interventions following the U.S. defeat in Vietnam seemed to reflect the desperate need of the still-reigning superpower -- even after the fall of its powerful rival, the Soviet Union -- to establish its dominance everywhere. Hence the invasion of Grenada in 1982, the bombing assault on Panama in 1989, the first Gulf war of 1991. Was George Bush Sr. heartsick over Saddam Hussein's seizure of Kuwait, or was he using that event as an opportunity to move U.S. power firmly into the coveted oil region of the Middle East? Given the history of the United States, given its obsession with Middle Eastern oil dating from Franklin Roosevelt's 1945 deal with King Abdul Aziz of Saudi Arabia, and the CIA's overthrow of the democratic Mossadeq government in Iran in 1953, it is not hard to decide that question." Howard Zinn
i would ask zinn the same thing. and i bet he would at least attemot to answer it.
150,000 soldiers invade kuwait and threaten the same against saudi arabia. saddam is on the cusp of taking over the world majority of oil reserves and invade peaceful neighbors... what would you have done?
all i have seen people answer is with quotes from gandhi... sorry, that doesnt solve the problem, that realy happened.
Published in the December 2001 issue of The Progressive
A Just Cause, Not a Just War
by Howard Zinn
I believe two moral judgments can be made about the present "war": The September 11 attack constitutes a crime against humanity and cannot be justified, and the bombing of Afghanistan is also a crime, which cannot be justified.
And yet, voices across the political spectrum, including many on the left, have described this as a "just war." One longtime advocate of peace, Richard Falk, wrote in The Nation that this is "the first truly just war since World War II." Robert Kuttner, another consistent supporter of social justice, declared in The American Prospect that only people on the extreme left could believe this is not a just war.
I have puzzled over this. How can a war be truly just when it involves the daily killing of civilians, when it causes hundreds of thousands of men, women, and children to leave their homes to escape the bombs, when it may not find those who planned the September 11 attacks, and when it will multiply the ranks of people who are angry enough at this country to become terrorists themselves?
This war amounts to a gross violation of human rights, and it will produce the exact opposite of what is wanted: It will not end terrorism; it will proliferate terrorism.
I believe that the progressive supporters of the war have confused a "just cause" with a "just war." There are unjust causes, such as the attempt of the United States to establish its power in Vietnam, or to dominate Panama or Grenada, or to subvert the government of Nicaragua. And a cause may be just--getting North Korea to withdraw from South Korea, getting Saddam Hussein to withdraw from Kuwait, or ending terrorism--but it does not follow that going to war on behalf of that cause, with the inevitable mayhem that follows, is just.
The stories of the effects of our bombing are beginning to come through, in bits and pieces. Just eighteen days into the bombing, The New York Times reported: "American forces have mistakenly hit a residential area in Kabul." Twice, U.S. planes bombed Red Cross warehouses, and a Red Cross spokesman said: "Now we've got 55,000 people without that food or blankets, with nothing at all."
An Afghan elementary school-teacher told a Washington Post reporter at the Pakistan border: "When the bombs fell near my house and my babies started crying, I had no choice but to run away."
A New York Times report: "The Pentagon acknowledged that a Navy F/A-18 dropped a 1,000-pound bomb on Sunday near what officials called a center for the elderly. . . . The United Nations said the building was a military hospital. . . . Several hours later, a Navy F-14 dropped two 500-pound bombs on a residential area northwest of Kabul." A U.N. official told a New York Times reporter that an American bombing raid on the city of Herat had used cluster bombs, which spread deadly "bomblets" over an area of twenty football fields. This, the Times reporter wrote,"was the latest of a growing number of accounts of American bombs going astray and causing civilian casualties."
An A.P. reporter was brought to Karam, a small mountain village hit by American bombs, and saw houses reduced to rubble. "In the hospital in Jalalabad, twenty-five miles to the east, doctors treated what they said were twenty-three victims of bombing at Karam, one a child barely two months old, swathed in bloody bandages," according to the account. "Another child, neighbors said, was in the hospital because the bombing raid had killed her entire family. At least eighteen fresh graves were scattered around the village."
The city of Kandahar, attacked for seventeen straight days, was reported to be a ghost town, with more than half of its 500,000 people fleeing the bombs. The city's electrical grid had been knocked out. The city was deprived of water, since the electrical pumps could not operate. A sixty-year-old farmer told the A.P. reporter, "We left in fear of our lives. Every day and every night, we hear the roaring and roaring of planes, we see the smoke, the fire. . . . I curse them both--the Taliban and America."
A New York Times report from Pakistan two weeks into the bombing campaign told of wounded civilians coming across the border. "Every half-hour or so throughout the day, someone was brought across on a stretcher. . . . Most were bomb victims, missing limbs or punctured by shrapnel. . . . A young boy, his head and one leg wrapped in bloodied bandages, clung to his father's back as the old man trudged back to Afghanistan."
That was only a few weeks into the bombing, and the result had already been to frighten hundreds of thousands of Afghans into abandoning their homes and taking to the dangerous, mine-strewn roads. The "war against terrorism" has become a war against innocent men, women, and children, who are in no way responsible for the terrorist attack on New York.
And yet there are those who say this is a "just war."
Terrorism and war have something in common. They both involve the killing of innocent people to achieve what the killers believe is a good end. I can see an immediate objection to this equation: They (the terrorists) deliberately kill innocent people; we (the war makers) aim at "military targets," and civilians are killed by accident, as "collateral damage."
Is it really an accident when civilians die under our bombs? Even if you grant that the intention is not to kill civilians, if they nevertheless become victims, again and again and again, can that be called an accident? If the deaths of civilians are inevitable in bombing, it may not be deliberate, but it is not an accident, and the bombers cannot be considered innocent. They are committing murder as surely as are the terrorists.
The absurdity of claiming innocence in such cases becomes apparent when the death tolls from "collateral damage" reach figures far greater than the lists of the dead from even the most awful act of terrorism. Thus, the "collateral damage" in the Gulf War caused more people to die--hundreds of thousands, if you include the victims of our sanctions policy--than the very deliberate terrorist attack of September 11. The total of those who have died in Israel from Palestinian terrorist bombs is somewhere under 1,000. The number of dead from "collateral damage" in the bombing of Beirut during Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 1982 was roughly 6,000.
We must not match the death lists--it is an ugly exercise--as if one atrocity is worse than another. No killing of innocents, whether deliberate or "accidental," can be justified. My argument is that when children die at the hands of terrorists, or--whether intended or not--as a result of bombs dropped from airplanes, terrorism and war become equally unpardonable.
Let's talk about "military targets." The phrase is so loose that President Truman, after the nuclear bomb obliterated the population of Hiroshima, could say: "The world will note that the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, a military base. That was because we wished in this first attack to avoid, insofar as possible, the killing of civilians."
What we are hearing now from our political leaders is, "We are targeting military objectives. We are trying to avoid killing civilians. But that will happen, and we regret it." Shall the American people take moral comfort from the thought that we are bombing only "military targets"?
The reality is that the term "military" covers all sorts of targets that include civilian populations. When our bombers deliberately destroy, as they did in the war against Iraq, the electrical infrastructure, thus making water purification and sewage treatment plants inoperable and leading to epidemic waterborne diseases, the deaths of children and other civilians cannot be called accidental.
Recall that in the midst of the Gulf War, the U.S. military bombed an air raid shelter, killing 400 to 500 men, women, and children who were huddled to escape bombs. The claim was that it was a military target, housing a communications center, but reporters going through the ruins immediately afterward said there was no sign of anything like that.
I suggest that the history of bombing--and no one has bombed more than this nation--is a history of endless atrocities, all calmly explained by deceptive and deadly language like "accident," "military targets," and "collateral damage."
Indeed, in both World War II and in Vietnam, the historical record shows that there was a deliberate decision to target civilians in order to destroy the morale of the enemy--hence the firebombing of Dresden, Hamburg, Tokyo, the B-52s over Hanoi, the jet bombers over peaceful villages in the Vietnam countryside. When some argue that we can engage in "limited military action" without "an excessive use of force," they are ignoring the history of bombing. The momentum of war rides roughshod over limits.
The moral equation in Afghanistan is clear. Civilian casualties are certain. The outcome is uncertain. No one knows what this bombing will accomplish--whether it will lead to the capture of Osama Bin Laden (perhaps), or the end of the Taliban (possibly), or a democratic Afghanistan (very unlikely), or an end to terrorism (almost certainly not).
And meanwhile, we are terrorizing the population (not the terrorists, they are not easily terrorized). Hundreds of thousands are packing their belongings and their children onto carts and leaving their homes to make dangerous journeys to places they think might be more safe.
Not one human life should be expended in this reckless violence called a "war against terrorism."
We might examine the idea of pacifism in the light of what is going on right now. I have never used the word "pacifist" to describe myself, because it suggests something absolute, and I am suspicious of absolutes. I want to leave openings for unpredictable possibilities. There might be situations (and even such strong pacifists as Gandhi and Martin Luther King believed this) when a small, focused act of violence against a monstrous, immediate evil would be justified.
In war, however, the proportion of means to ends is very, very different. War, by its nature, is unfocused, indiscriminate, and especially in our time when the technology is so murderous, inevitably involves the deaths of large numbers of people and the suffering of even more. Even in the "small wars" (Iran vs. Iraq, the Nigerian war, the Afghan war), a million people die. Even in a "tiny" war like the one we waged in Panama, a thousand or more die.
Scott Simon of NPR wrote a commentary in The Wall Street Journal on October 11 entitled, "Even Pacifists Must Support This War." He tried to use the pacifist acceptance of self-defense, which approves a focused resistance to an immediate attacker, to justify this war, which he claims is "self-defense." But the term "self-defense" does not apply when you drop bombs all over a country and kill lots of people other than your attacker. And it doesn't apply when there is no likelihood that it will achieve its desired end.
Pacifism, which I define as a rejection of war, rests on a very powerful logic. In war, the means--indiscriminate killing--are immediate and certain; the ends, however desirable, are distant and uncertain.
Pacifism does not mean "appeasement." That word is often hurled at those who condemn the present war on Afghanistan, and it is accompanied by references to Churchill, Chamberlain, Munich. World War II analogies are conveniently summoned forth when there is a need to justify a war, however irrelevant to a particular situation. At the suggestion that we withdraw from Vietnam, or not make war on Iraq, the word "appeasement" was bandied about. The glow of the "good war" has repeatedly been used to obscure the nature of all the bad wars we have fought since 1945.
Let's examine that analogy. Czechoslovakia was handed to the voracious Hitler to "appease" him. Germany was an aggressive nation expanding its power, and to help it in its expansion was not wise. But today we do not face an expansionist power that demands to be appeased. We ourselves are the expansionist power--troops in Saudi Arabia, bombings of Iraq, military bases all over the world, naval vessels on every sea--and that, along with Israel's expansion into the West Bank and Gaza Strip, has aroused anger.
It was wrong to give up Czechoslovakia to appease Hitler. It is not wrong to withdraw our military from the Middle East, or for Israel to withdraw from the occupied territories, because there is no right to be there. That is not appeasement. That is justice.
Opposing the bombing of Afghanistan does not constitute "giving in to terrorism" or "appeasement." It asks that other means be found than war to solve the problems that confront us. King and Gandhi both believed in action--nonviolent direct action, which is more powerful and certainly more morally defensible than war.
To reject war is not to "turn the other cheek," as pacifism has been caricatured. It is, in the present instance, to act in ways that do not imitate the terrorists.
cont.
If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you.
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
-Oscar Wilde
The United States could have treated the September 11 attack as a horrific criminal act that calls for apprehending the culprits, using every device of intelligence and investigation possible. It could have gone to the United Nations to enlist the aid of other countries in the pursuit and apprehension of the terrorists.
There was also the avenue of negotiations. (And let's not hear: "What? Negotiate with those monsters?" The United States negotiated with--indeed, brought into power and kept in power--some of the most monstrous governments in the world.) Before Bush ordered in the bombers, the Taliban offered to put bin Laden on trial. This was ignored. After ten days of air attacks, when the Taliban called for a halt to the bombing and said they would be willing to talk about handing bin Laden to a third country for trial, the headline the next day in The New York Times read: "President Rejects Offer by Taliban for Negotiations," and Bush was quoted as saying: "When I said no negotiations, I meant no negotiations."
That is the behavior of someone hellbent on war. There were similar rejections of negotiating possibilities at the start of the Korean War, the war in Vietnam, the Gulf War, and the bombing of Yugoslavia. The result was an immense loss of life and incalculable human suffering.
International police work and negotiations were--still are--alternatives to war. But let's not deceive ourselves; even if we succeeded in apprehending bin Laden or, as is unlikely, destroying the entire Al Qaeda network, that would not end the threat of terrorism, which has potential recruits far beyond Al Qaeda.
To get at the roots of terrorism is complicated. Dropping bombs is simple. It is an old response to what everyone acknowledges is a very new situation. At the core of unspeakable and unjustifiable acts of terrorism are justified grievances felt by millions of people who would not themselves engage in terrorism but from whose ranks terrorists spring.
Those grievances are of two kinds: the existence of profound misery-- hunger, illness--in much of the world, contrasted to the wealth and luxury of the West, especially the United States; and the presence of American military power everywhere in the world, propping up oppressive regimes and repeatedly intervening with force to maintain U.S. hegemony.
This suggests actions that not only deal with the long-term problem of terrorism but are in themselves just.
Instead of using two planes a day to drop food on Afghanistan and 100 planes to drop bombs (which have been making it difficult for the trucks of the international agencies to bring in food), use 102 planes to bring food.
Take the money allocated for our huge military machine and use it to combat starvation and disease around the world. One-third of our military budget would annually provide clean water and sanitation facilities for the billion people in the world who have none.
Withdraw troops from Saudi Arabia, because their presence near the holy shrines of Mecca and Medina angers not just bin Laden (we need not care about angering him) but huge numbers of Arabs who are not terrorists.
Stop the cruel sanctions on Iraq, which are killing more than a thousand children every week without doing anything to weaken Saddam Hussein's tyrannical hold over the country.
Insist that Israel withdraw from the occupied territories, something that many Israelis also think is right, and which will make Israel more secure than it is now.
In short, let us pull back from being a military superpower, and become a humanitarian superpower.
Let us be a more modest nation. We will then be more secure. The modest nations of the world don't face the threat of terrorism.
cont...
Such a fundamental change in foreign policy is hardly to be expected. It would threaten too many interests: the power of political leaders, the ambitions of the military, the corporations that profit from the nation's enormous military commitments.
Change will come, as at other times in our history, only when American citizens-- becoming better informed, having second thoughts after the first instinctive support for official policy--demand it. That change in citizen opinion, especially if it coincides with a pragmatic decision by the government that its violence isn't working, could bring about a retreat from the military solution.
It might also be a first step in the rethinking of our nation's role in the world. Such a rethinking contains the promise, for Americans, of genuine security, and for people elsewhere, the beginning of hope
If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you.
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
-Oscar Wilde
i would ask zinn the same thing. and i bet he would at least attemot to answer it.
150,000 soldiers invade kuwait and threaten the same against saudi arabia. saddam is on the cusp of taking over the world majority of oil reserves and invade peaceful neighbors... what would you have done?
all i have seen people answer is with quotes from gandhi... sorry, that doesnt solve the problem, that realy happened.
every war is sold with similar lines as the one you keep repeating. Surely you're aware of that.
If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you.
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
-Oscar Wilde
you are right and 99% of the worlds historians are wrong...
yuo still have not answered my question, and apparently will not answer it
YOU WAKE UP, A 150,000 MAN ARMY HAS JUST CROSSED THE KUWAIT BORDER AND IS GOING TO TRY AND SEIZE HER BY FORCE AND FORM AN OCCUPATION. WHAT DO YOU DO ABOUT IT?
FROM WHAT I HAVE READ, YOU WOULD DO NOTHING. GOOD JOB.
yuo seem to be the type of guy that if an old lady was beign mugged you would walk the other way. the whole idea of saddam being "green lit" is horseshit that has been proven wrong time and time again in the last 17 years
see, the problem with our whole outlook on everything, is that every event to you is based on a concpiracy.
You act like everything is separate and not connected at all. I have no idea where you're getting this wake up and out of the blue nonsense. It's just broken...
So you really think like that? That would be kinda ridiculous to put it lightly...
I have no idea what question you're talking about now....you're all over the place...
Progress is not made by everyone joining some new fad,
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
the idea that the first gulf war was a conspiracy to weaken saddam and iraq and keep them that way for years until we decided to take him out is bullshit
we could have taken him out in 1991 when we had overwhelming national and world support to do so.
why would they wait? why take that chance? why wait for a future justification?
and if the CIA and the shadows of the US government are all controlling and dictate every world event, then how the hell did the former head of the CIA lose the election in 1992?
That is out of touch and you know it, and for reasons already explained earlier.
Progress is not made by everyone joining some new fad,
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
Progress is not made by everyone joining some new fad,
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
Comments
Well don't fight back when they come for you because then you are a warmonger only interested in your own self interests.
People choose and revel in conflict and war. Willfully. And they choose the consequences, too. And then they conveniently forget they chose them.
It is rare to see the truth beyond the self-delusions. A sure sign, however, is double-speak.
Awesome stuff, Roland.
http://www.myspace.com/illuminatta
Rhinocerous Surprise '08!!!
History tells a rather candid tale of regime manipulation and military instigation. The problem is it hasn't stopped, it's still going on right this very second.
Self defense is one thing, I'm not seeing that plight. I'm seeing a strong case for imperialism over what I think can be justified.
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
http://i36.tinypic.com/66j31x.jpg
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( o.O)
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thats like saying "rain=sunshine" is a stupid idea. the fact is after rain, there will be sunshine, so in that sense it is true. After sunshine is rain.
Eternal peace is the illusion. Peace is the time between conflict. conflict is the time between peace. That duality of conflict and peace is the only thing thats eternal.
That would be greedy murdering warmongers, not pacifists.
Same as the "support the troops" gets people to help promote the war through guilt.
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
http://i36.tinypic.com/66j31x.jpg
(\__/)
( o.O)
(")_(")
war is in fact SOMETIMES necessary to obtain a good peace. there is good and bad peace just like war. As i said, enslavement and complete capitulation is a form of peace. freedom and prosperity is another form of peace (and sadly, often shortterm). When someone decides to fight "for peace" most intelligent, sensible people will take that to mean "fight for a desirable and longlasting peace." Not end all war for all time or some such ridiculousness.
a pacifist plays 'words lawyer" and simply oversimplifies that to "war=peace? that dont make no sense!". most people arent that naive.
I think you explained nothing to me. It akin to support the troops. It's a methodology to get people onboard the conflict, and support it knowing peace will follow, but in reality that's not what happens, unless you practically genocide the opposition.
This prhase is meaningless in todays world, and those that use it are fooling people in to thinking it's a possibility.
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
http://i36.tinypic.com/66j31x.jpg
(\__/)
( o.O)
(")_(")
who is being fooled?!?! who do you know over the age of twelve that really thinks one particular war (assuming at least 2 people survive) will result in everlasting peace? Who would be so foolish as to take that so literally? name one person!
You mean who has a crystal ball and can read into the future? Not too many people.
Unless there's a miscommunication going on here, it's passed off by warmongers as a means to an end. The entire phrase is synonymous with the world "solution".
War is not a solution unless you kill man woman and child indiscriminately. That is not an option anymore these days as it was in the past.
The whole terminology has become defunct, and is a misnomer used to fool people into accepting war.
Kinda like dangling the proverbial carrot in front of the mule.
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
http://i36.tinypic.com/66j31x.jpg
(\__/)
( o.O)
(")_(")
seriously, what is with the hate for america? i am a liberal and i am so flabbergasted by the way lmany other iberals treat our nation.
Thing is the Iraqi army had given up. They were trying to retreat to Baghdad and were gunned down anyway. Us military pilots called it a "turkey shoot",
"like shooting fish in a barrel." The army was defeated, militarily, and were still subjected to the firepower of the US military, the deadliest force on the planet.
Yes war is shitty, people die. Yes the US military has awesome firepower. But gunning down a retreating army as they tried to escape down a highway in the middle of the desert is more than war-it is a slaughter. And that's the reality of the situation.
but they could've stopped the war before it ever started!
things to keep in mind to put it in a better context:
-kuwait had been stealin oil from iraq as well as violating opec quotas. iraq went to their friends, the US, who told them we "do not wish to get involved in arab-arab affairs."
-Amnesty International and other groups had issued reports on human rights abuses of Iraq but Bush didn't care.
-w/ the cold war being over the defense budget was slashed, upsetting a certain sector who they are all pretty much working in now
-iraq starts a troop buildup on the border and congress asks the state dept in to answer some questions about our allies, iraq...asked if we would be committed to action if anything happens the answer is 'of course not'
-nothing is done and the next day iraq invades
-the AI and other reports are suddenly treated like scripture to help prove the justifications for action
-defense budget blows up as does war spending
also bear in mind we had told the iraqis we would support them if they rose up against saddam...which they did and we did nothing while they were massacred
he had a voice that was strong and loud and
i swallowed his facade cos i'm so
eager to identify with
someone above the crowd
someone who seemed to feel the same
someone prepared to lead the way
1. Do you honestly think that Iraq would have invaded Saudia Arabia? Your military (biggest, best and brightest) is stretched thin trying to occupy Iraq, but Iraq (even in 1990) could have dominated that much territory, in the face of world pressure? Saddam had his own twisted reasons to invade Kuwait, he was not bent on some imperialistic crusade.
2. I rushed my post (from work) and didn't complete my thoughts, mixed up a fact...you could have made your point without being a dick about it.
What kind of things had the world up in arms tho? The false stories of dead babies in Kuwait, told by a US plant?
http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/0906/p01s02-wosc.html
Or maybe those classified US satellite photos showing the buildup of Iraqi troops on the Saudi border? (the ones that would conflict with Russian photos showing no buildup?)
http://www.iraqwar.org/bush.htm
....and again, you justify war for oil.
I want to take it as chicken or the egg. The violence in the region is deep seeded and would probably continue with or without US intervention. This part of your post is consistent with the rah-rah Team American rhetoric you and Mr.Smith are spewing. I'm sure gandhi would love some of your statements in this thread :rolleyes:
You ask what American gained from the first gulf war?
Well...for starters.... They solved a finacial issue (Saddam's claims over oil and land) for a family with $50 billion invested in the American economy. They destroyed a military that was getting big enough to influence policy in the region, and basically neutered it's leader/former asset.
Then there is the increased US military presence, and a reason to move troops into Saudi Arabia and establish bases....which were necessary to 'maintain peace' in the area until a bigger, shinier base was established in Iraq the next go-round ( http://www.monthlyreview.org/0302editr.htm#three )
...Then all the profits made by oil companies, and the MIC....
uhm...why is he even talking like this in the first place?
totally unreal.
crazy
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
http://i36.tinypic.com/66j31x.jpg
(\__/)
( o.O)
(")_(")
"There is no way to peace, peace is the way."
- Gandhi
he had a voice that was strong and loud and
i swallowed his facade cos i'm so
eager to identify with
someone above the crowd
someone who seemed to feel the same
someone prepared to lead the way
you have it all figured out my friend :rolleyes:
you are right and 99% of the worlds historians are wrong...
yuo still have not answered my question, and apparently will not answer it
YOU WAKE UP, A 150,000 MAN ARMY HAS JUST CROSSED THE KUWAIT BORDER AND IS GOING TO TRY AND SEIZE HER BY FORCE AND FORM AN OCCUPATION. WHAT DO YOU DO ABOUT IT?
FROM WHAT I HAVE READ, YOU WOULD DO NOTHING. GOOD JOB.
yuo seem to be the type of guy that if an old lady was beign mugged you would walk the other way. the whole idea of saddam being "green lit" is horseshit that has been proven wrong time and time again in the last 17 years
see, the problem with our whole outlook on everything, is that every event to you is based on a concpiracy.
i agree...
but that never stopped a fucking tank :rolleyes:
sometimes people MUST stand up and fight.
Sometimes it is the duty of the world to stand up and fight.
Take Burma for example. i would justify precise military action against the ruling junta to topple the regime. i guess you guys would just rather mail then some fucking flowers and ask them nicely to leave :rolleyes:
thats flat out horseshit
http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/174913
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
-Oscar Wilde
we could have taken him out in 1991 when we had overwhelming national and world support to do so.
why would they wait? why take that chance? why wait for a future justification?
and if the CIA and the shadows of the US government are all controlling and dictate every world event, then how the hell did the former head of the CIA lose the election in 1992?
i would ask zinn the same thing. and i bet he would at least attemot to answer it.
150,000 soldiers invade kuwait and threaten the same against saudi arabia. saddam is on the cusp of taking over the world majority of oil reserves and invade peaceful neighbors... what would you have done?
all i have seen people answer is with quotes from gandhi... sorry, that doesnt solve the problem, that realy happened.
Published in the December 2001 issue of The Progressive
A Just Cause, Not a Just War
by Howard Zinn
I believe two moral judgments can be made about the present "war": The September 11 attack constitutes a crime against humanity and cannot be justified, and the bombing of Afghanistan is also a crime, which cannot be justified.
And yet, voices across the political spectrum, including many on the left, have described this as a "just war." One longtime advocate of peace, Richard Falk, wrote in The Nation that this is "the first truly just war since World War II." Robert Kuttner, another consistent supporter of social justice, declared in The American Prospect that only people on the extreme left could believe this is not a just war.
I have puzzled over this. How can a war be truly just when it involves the daily killing of civilians, when it causes hundreds of thousands of men, women, and children to leave their homes to escape the bombs, when it may not find those who planned the September 11 attacks, and when it will multiply the ranks of people who are angry enough at this country to become terrorists themselves?
This war amounts to a gross violation of human rights, and it will produce the exact opposite of what is wanted: It will not end terrorism; it will proliferate terrorism.
I believe that the progressive supporters of the war have confused a "just cause" with a "just war." There are unjust causes, such as the attempt of the United States to establish its power in Vietnam, or to dominate Panama or Grenada, or to subvert the government of Nicaragua. And a cause may be just--getting North Korea to withdraw from South Korea, getting Saddam Hussein to withdraw from Kuwait, or ending terrorism--but it does not follow that going to war on behalf of that cause, with the inevitable mayhem that follows, is just.
The stories of the effects of our bombing are beginning to come through, in bits and pieces. Just eighteen days into the bombing, The New York Times reported: "American forces have mistakenly hit a residential area in Kabul." Twice, U.S. planes bombed Red Cross warehouses, and a Red Cross spokesman said: "Now we've got 55,000 people without that food or blankets, with nothing at all."
An Afghan elementary school-teacher told a Washington Post reporter at the Pakistan border: "When the bombs fell near my house and my babies started crying, I had no choice but to run away."
A New York Times report: "The Pentagon acknowledged that a Navy F/A-18 dropped a 1,000-pound bomb on Sunday near what officials called a center for the elderly. . . . The United Nations said the building was a military hospital. . . . Several hours later, a Navy F-14 dropped two 500-pound bombs on a residential area northwest of Kabul." A U.N. official told a New York Times reporter that an American bombing raid on the city of Herat had used cluster bombs, which spread deadly "bomblets" over an area of twenty football fields. This, the Times reporter wrote,"was the latest of a growing number of accounts of American bombs going astray and causing civilian casualties."
An A.P. reporter was brought to Karam, a small mountain village hit by American bombs, and saw houses reduced to rubble. "In the hospital in Jalalabad, twenty-five miles to the east, doctors treated what they said were twenty-three victims of bombing at Karam, one a child barely two months old, swathed in bloody bandages," according to the account. "Another child, neighbors said, was in the hospital because the bombing raid had killed her entire family. At least eighteen fresh graves were scattered around the village."
The city of Kandahar, attacked for seventeen straight days, was reported to be a ghost town, with more than half of its 500,000 people fleeing the bombs. The city's electrical grid had been knocked out. The city was deprived of water, since the electrical pumps could not operate. A sixty-year-old farmer told the A.P. reporter, "We left in fear of our lives. Every day and every night, we hear the roaring and roaring of planes, we see the smoke, the fire. . . . I curse them both--the Taliban and America."
A New York Times report from Pakistan two weeks into the bombing campaign told of wounded civilians coming across the border. "Every half-hour or so throughout the day, someone was brought across on a stretcher. . . . Most were bomb victims, missing limbs or punctured by shrapnel. . . . A young boy, his head and one leg wrapped in bloodied bandages, clung to his father's back as the old man trudged back to Afghanistan."
That was only a few weeks into the bombing, and the result had already been to frighten hundreds of thousands of Afghans into abandoning their homes and taking to the dangerous, mine-strewn roads. The "war against terrorism" has become a war against innocent men, women, and children, who are in no way responsible for the terrorist attack on New York.
And yet there are those who say this is a "just war."
Terrorism and war have something in common. They both involve the killing of innocent people to achieve what the killers believe is a good end. I can see an immediate objection to this equation: They (the terrorists) deliberately kill innocent people; we (the war makers) aim at "military targets," and civilians are killed by accident, as "collateral damage."
Is it really an accident when civilians die under our bombs? Even if you grant that the intention is not to kill civilians, if they nevertheless become victims, again and again and again, can that be called an accident? If the deaths of civilians are inevitable in bombing, it may not be deliberate, but it is not an accident, and the bombers cannot be considered innocent. They are committing murder as surely as are the terrorists.
The absurdity of claiming innocence in such cases becomes apparent when the death tolls from "collateral damage" reach figures far greater than the lists of the dead from even the most awful act of terrorism. Thus, the "collateral damage" in the Gulf War caused more people to die--hundreds of thousands, if you include the victims of our sanctions policy--than the very deliberate terrorist attack of September 11. The total of those who have died in Israel from Palestinian terrorist bombs is somewhere under 1,000. The number of dead from "collateral damage" in the bombing of Beirut during Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 1982 was roughly 6,000.
We must not match the death lists--it is an ugly exercise--as if one atrocity is worse than another. No killing of innocents, whether deliberate or "accidental," can be justified. My argument is that when children die at the hands of terrorists, or--whether intended or not--as a result of bombs dropped from airplanes, terrorism and war become equally unpardonable.
Let's talk about "military targets." The phrase is so loose that President Truman, after the nuclear bomb obliterated the population of Hiroshima, could say: "The world will note that the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, a military base. That was because we wished in this first attack to avoid, insofar as possible, the killing of civilians."
What we are hearing now from our political leaders is, "We are targeting military objectives. We are trying to avoid killing civilians. But that will happen, and we regret it." Shall the American people take moral comfort from the thought that we are bombing only "military targets"?
The reality is that the term "military" covers all sorts of targets that include civilian populations. When our bombers deliberately destroy, as they did in the war against Iraq, the electrical infrastructure, thus making water purification and sewage treatment plants inoperable and leading to epidemic waterborne diseases, the deaths of children and other civilians cannot be called accidental.
Recall that in the midst of the Gulf War, the U.S. military bombed an air raid shelter, killing 400 to 500 men, women, and children who were huddled to escape bombs. The claim was that it was a military target, housing a communications center, but reporters going through the ruins immediately afterward said there was no sign of anything like that.
I suggest that the history of bombing--and no one has bombed more than this nation--is a history of endless atrocities, all calmly explained by deceptive and deadly language like "accident," "military targets," and "collateral damage."
Indeed, in both World War II and in Vietnam, the historical record shows that there was a deliberate decision to target civilians in order to destroy the morale of the enemy--hence the firebombing of Dresden, Hamburg, Tokyo, the B-52s over Hanoi, the jet bombers over peaceful villages in the Vietnam countryside. When some argue that we can engage in "limited military action" without "an excessive use of force," they are ignoring the history of bombing. The momentum of war rides roughshod over limits.
The moral equation in Afghanistan is clear. Civilian casualties are certain. The outcome is uncertain. No one knows what this bombing will accomplish--whether it will lead to the capture of Osama Bin Laden (perhaps), or the end of the Taliban (possibly), or a democratic Afghanistan (very unlikely), or an end to terrorism (almost certainly not).
And meanwhile, we are terrorizing the population (not the terrorists, they are not easily terrorized). Hundreds of thousands are packing their belongings and their children onto carts and leaving their homes to make dangerous journeys to places they think might be more safe.
Not one human life should be expended in this reckless violence called a "war against terrorism."
We might examine the idea of pacifism in the light of what is going on right now. I have never used the word "pacifist" to describe myself, because it suggests something absolute, and I am suspicious of absolutes. I want to leave openings for unpredictable possibilities. There might be situations (and even such strong pacifists as Gandhi and Martin Luther King believed this) when a small, focused act of violence against a monstrous, immediate evil would be justified.
In war, however, the proportion of means to ends is very, very different. War, by its nature, is unfocused, indiscriminate, and especially in our time when the technology is so murderous, inevitably involves the deaths of large numbers of people and the suffering of even more. Even in the "small wars" (Iran vs. Iraq, the Nigerian war, the Afghan war), a million people die. Even in a "tiny" war like the one we waged in Panama, a thousand or more die.
Scott Simon of NPR wrote a commentary in The Wall Street Journal on October 11 entitled, "Even Pacifists Must Support This War." He tried to use the pacifist acceptance of self-defense, which approves a focused resistance to an immediate attacker, to justify this war, which he claims is "self-defense." But the term "self-defense" does not apply when you drop bombs all over a country and kill lots of people other than your attacker. And it doesn't apply when there is no likelihood that it will achieve its desired end.
Pacifism, which I define as a rejection of war, rests on a very powerful logic. In war, the means--indiscriminate killing--are immediate and certain; the ends, however desirable, are distant and uncertain.
Pacifism does not mean "appeasement." That word is often hurled at those who condemn the present war on Afghanistan, and it is accompanied by references to Churchill, Chamberlain, Munich. World War II analogies are conveniently summoned forth when there is a need to justify a war, however irrelevant to a particular situation. At the suggestion that we withdraw from Vietnam, or not make war on Iraq, the word "appeasement" was bandied about. The glow of the "good war" has repeatedly been used to obscure the nature of all the bad wars we have fought since 1945.
Let's examine that analogy. Czechoslovakia was handed to the voracious Hitler to "appease" him. Germany was an aggressive nation expanding its power, and to help it in its expansion was not wise. But today we do not face an expansionist power that demands to be appeased. We ourselves are the expansionist power--troops in Saudi Arabia, bombings of Iraq, military bases all over the world, naval vessels on every sea--and that, along with Israel's expansion into the West Bank and Gaza Strip, has aroused anger.
It was wrong to give up Czechoslovakia to appease Hitler. It is not wrong to withdraw our military from the Middle East, or for Israel to withdraw from the occupied territories, because there is no right to be there. That is not appeasement. That is justice.
Opposing the bombing of Afghanistan does not constitute "giving in to terrorism" or "appeasement." It asks that other means be found than war to solve the problems that confront us. King and Gandhi both believed in action--nonviolent direct action, which is more powerful and certainly more morally defensible than war.
To reject war is not to "turn the other cheek," as pacifism has been caricatured. It is, in the present instance, to act in ways that do not imitate the terrorists.
cont.
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
-Oscar Wilde
There was also the avenue of negotiations. (And let's not hear: "What? Negotiate with those monsters?" The United States negotiated with--indeed, brought into power and kept in power--some of the most monstrous governments in the world.) Before Bush ordered in the bombers, the Taliban offered to put bin Laden on trial. This was ignored. After ten days of air attacks, when the Taliban called for a halt to the bombing and said they would be willing to talk about handing bin Laden to a third country for trial, the headline the next day in The New York Times read: "President Rejects Offer by Taliban for Negotiations," and Bush was quoted as saying: "When I said no negotiations, I meant no negotiations."
That is the behavior of someone hellbent on war. There were similar rejections of negotiating possibilities at the start of the Korean War, the war in Vietnam, the Gulf War, and the bombing of Yugoslavia. The result was an immense loss of life and incalculable human suffering.
International police work and negotiations were--still are--alternatives to war. But let's not deceive ourselves; even if we succeeded in apprehending bin Laden or, as is unlikely, destroying the entire Al Qaeda network, that would not end the threat of terrorism, which has potential recruits far beyond Al Qaeda.
To get at the roots of terrorism is complicated. Dropping bombs is simple. It is an old response to what everyone acknowledges is a very new situation. At the core of unspeakable and unjustifiable acts of terrorism are justified grievances felt by millions of people who would not themselves engage in terrorism but from whose ranks terrorists spring.
Those grievances are of two kinds: the existence of profound misery-- hunger, illness--in much of the world, contrasted to the wealth and luxury of the West, especially the United States; and the presence of American military power everywhere in the world, propping up oppressive regimes and repeatedly intervening with force to maintain U.S. hegemony.
This suggests actions that not only deal with the long-term problem of terrorism but are in themselves just.
Instead of using two planes a day to drop food on Afghanistan and 100 planes to drop bombs (which have been making it difficult for the trucks of the international agencies to bring in food), use 102 planes to bring food.
Take the money allocated for our huge military machine and use it to combat starvation and disease around the world. One-third of our military budget would annually provide clean water and sanitation facilities for the billion people in the world who have none.
Withdraw troops from Saudi Arabia, because their presence near the holy shrines of Mecca and Medina angers not just bin Laden (we need not care about angering him) but huge numbers of Arabs who are not terrorists.
Stop the cruel sanctions on Iraq, which are killing more than a thousand children every week without doing anything to weaken Saddam Hussein's tyrannical hold over the country.
Insist that Israel withdraw from the occupied territories, something that many Israelis also think is right, and which will make Israel more secure than it is now.
In short, let us pull back from being a military superpower, and become a humanitarian superpower.
Let us be a more modest nation. We will then be more secure. The modest nations of the world don't face the threat of terrorism.
cont...
Such a fundamental change in foreign policy is hardly to be expected. It would threaten too many interests: the power of political leaders, the ambitions of the military, the corporations that profit from the nation's enormous military commitments.
Change will come, as at other times in our history, only when American citizens-- becoming better informed, having second thoughts after the first instinctive support for official policy--demand it. That change in citizen opinion, especially if it coincides with a pragmatic decision by the government that its violence isn't working, could bring about a retreat from the military solution.
It might also be a first step in the rethinking of our nation's role in the world. Such a rethinking contains the promise, for Americans, of genuine security, and for people elsewhere, the beginning of hope
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
-Oscar Wilde
every war is sold with similar lines as the one you keep repeating. Surely you're aware of that.
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
-Oscar Wilde
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
-Oscar Wilde
You act like everything is separate and not connected at all. I have no idea where you're getting this wake up and out of the blue nonsense. It's just broken...
So you really think like that? That would be kinda ridiculous to put it lightly...
I have no idea what question you're talking about now....you're all over the place...
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
http://i36.tinypic.com/66j31x.jpg
(\__/)
( o.O)
(")_(")
That is out of touch and you know it, and for reasons already explained earlier.
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
http://i36.tinypic.com/66j31x.jpg
(\__/)
( o.O)
(")_(")
and reveling in it's loyalty. It's made by forming coalitions
over specific principles, goals, and policies.
http://i36.tinypic.com/66j31x.jpg
(\__/)
( o.O)
(")_(")