Not in Our Name!
Citizens Against War Form a Major Moral Force Which Nobody can Ignore
Praful Bidwai
The Hindustan Times, 25 February 2003
Imagine the equivalent of the combined population of Mumbai, Delhi and
Kolkata pouring out into the streets to voice the urgent concerns of
India's civil society. And you get an idea of the relative magnitude of
last Saturday's spectacular peace marches in London, Paris, Rome, Madrid,
and to a lesser extent, New York and 750 other cities throughout the
world.
Try to visualise a sea of humanity inspired by noble ideals and worthy
goals, not calculations of self-interest. And you can sense the marchers'
awesome moral power. I joined the 1.5-to-2 million-strong march in London,
the capital of a country with 59 million people, which had as many
"apolitical" middle class people who had never before held a placard, as
seasoned activists. I can barely describe the mood, the spirit, the
atmosphere-and the electricity.
The staggering scale of today's mobilisation is wholly unprecedented. It
exceeds not only the 1970s' global anti-Vietnam War demonstrations, but
even the mid-1980s' great European peace movement. Then, two million
Germans formed a human chain on a single day and the membership of peace
groups often exceeded that of political parties. This peace movement led
to the abolition of a whole class of nuclear missiles
(intermediate-range), and was termed the greatest popular mobilisation
since World War II.
Now, global civil society has asserted itself against war and injustice as
never before. Citizens have intruded into the Olympian heights of
statecraft: security, international affairs, disarmament and peace, which
states have jealously guarded for centuries. In the true spirit of
democracy, the people are re-appropriating these spaces.
This is a historic moment for the world. As The New York Times put it, the
US has a rival, a Second Superpower-global civil society. Except that this
is a moral force, in citizens' hands, not subordinated to the forces of
greed, destruction and war.
Nobody can ignore the anti-war movement. Not Kofi Annan, who paid it
handsome tributes. Not Jack Straw, who admitted "it is very difficult
indeed" to go to war if a majority of people disapprove. Nor the Security
Council ambassadors, many of whom cheered France's de Villepin-a rarity in
that sedate, stuffy environment. Nor, beyond a point, even Bush or Blair,
despite their unctuous sermonising-without losing credibility.
Why, even our Atal Behari Vajpayee spoke out against war on Iraq twice
this week alone-(although India's official stated only insists on UN
authorisation for war and is turning soft under US pressure.)
The significance of the World-Says-No-To-War movement does not lie solely
in its numbers or composition-including poets and politicians, artistes
and anti-racists, feminists and fishmongers. Nor does it lie in the
remarkable fact that it is the world's first peace movement since the
Second War taking place before, rather than during, the war itself. (Even
the anti-Vietnam war campaign started three years later, when the
body-bags started coming).
It lies in the bigger, broad-horizon, universal, concerns it increasingly
articulates. These aren't mainly about Iraq. Rather, they are about the US
and taming its overwhelming power; about oil and control over resources,
about Israel's brutal occupation and freedom for Palestine, about
countering the Military-Industrial Complex and corporate power-structures
which have a stake in war. The concerns are against hegemonism, hierarchy
and empire.
Why is the peace mobilisation moving so quickly into these broader,
inter-connected, issues? Many participants feel the motives for war have
little to do with disarming Iraq of weapons of mass destruction (WMD).
After Hans Blix's second report, it is disingenuous to contend that Iraq
has significant quantities of WMD, and is obstructing UNMOVIC. It has even
agreed to U-2 spy-plane surveillance and private interviews with
scientists-something few states will accept, certainly not India, leave
alone the US!
Admittedly, gaps remain in Iraq's accounting of chemical and biological
precursors and nutrients-though not of nuclear materials. These must be
filled-hopefully with help from some of their Western suppliers. But to
argue that Iraq poses a serious threat to the US or its own neighbours
defies credibility.
Iraq's airpower was pulverised long ago. All it has is some outdated Scuds
and crude Al-Samoud-2 missiles lacking guidance systems. Nor is Iraq
recklessly expansionist-despite its despotic and repressive regime.
US and British charges against Iraq would have sounded less preposterous
had the UK document been based on British intelligence, not plagiarism and
doctoring of key words, and had the CIA and other intelligence sources
(including France's) not confirmed that Powell's February 5 presentation
was based on exaggeration, illegitimate extrapolation and over-reading of
evidence (e.g. of a "de-contamination truck"). Nor did it help that
UNMOVIC censored Iraq's 12,000-page statement and concealed
Western-corporate identities, rather than release it to the public, minus
WMD formulas.
Most sensible people don't accept that a war on Iraq is just or necessary
(in relation to containment, including continued inspections). The
(partial) exceptions are Americans, 60 percent of whom wrongly believe in
an Iraq-Al-Qaeda nexus (although bin Laden attacks Iraq for being a
secular, ungodly state).
Hypocrisy is writ large in the Great Powers' treatment of Iraq. They have
given Saddam Hussein an ultimatum after history's severest inspections,
launched to confirm suspicions about his WMD programmes. But none of them
has any intention of giving up its self-confessed nuclear-weapons status.
Indeed, to its eternal shame, the US has drawn up plans to actually use
nuclear weapons in Iraq, according to the formidably credible William
Arkin, and sanctioned $21 million to design new and modified nukes. While
attacking Iraqi cities, it intends to use calmative chemical gases-banned
under the Chemical Weapons Convention.
Bush rants that "that guy" hasn't implemented a UN resolution for 12
years, and casts doubts on the Security Council's "capacity to be
effective" and "enforce its own resolutions". But Bush is complicit in
Israel's blatant violation of Resolutions 242 and 338, which go back to
the 1960s and 1970s!
Bush (rightly) accuses Saddam of practising torture, illegal detention,
denial of free passage, punishment of families, economic pauperisation,
demolition of houses of adversaries, etc. Yet, Ariel Sharon does all that
and more-including extra-judicial assassinations-with the full approval of
the US.
Citizens are also appalled that the US is threatening to undermine
multilateral institutions and norms, rules, and restraints. These
structures, including the UN, were built painstakingly over two centuries
in the face of Westphalian nation-states' opposition to dilution of
absolute sovereignty. It has taken countless wars, and Hiroshima and
Nagasaki, to evolve international humanitarian law, covenants on rights,
the Geneva Conventions, and disarmament treaties.
US unilateralism and bullying will undermine the purpose of the UN. Its
Charter's very first objective is "to save succeeding generation from the
scourge of war".
The Indian debate on these issues is marked by a great deal of insularity,
narrow parochialism and total amorality. Many see India's options in
restricted "national-interest" terms. Our strategic "experts" advocate a
cynical, self-serving approach: tail America, side with the winner, get
some post-war crumbs.
Citizens must not fall into this trap. We are not passive observers who
can be morally indifferent to the state of play. We are active agents who
can shape outcomes and abolish historic evils like slavery, colonialism,
apartheid-and genocidal wars.
There hasn't been enough anti-war activism in India to pressure the
government, barring the 7,000-strong February 10 rally in Delhi and
smaller demonstrations and vigils in other cities. It is high time we shed
our apathy and participated as conscientious actors and doers in the
historic processes reshaping the world today.
Copyright 2003 The Hindustan Times
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