Fortress America On September 11 morning, two hours before we were supposed to land at Washington's Dulles airport, our plane got diverted to Montreal, Canada. Making our way down by land over the next two days into upstate New York, Maryland and Washington, one was able to get an insight into the public mood not just from the international CNN-type broadcasting stations or the major dailies but from a host of local TV stations and local newspapers as well as from the average citizen met and spoken with. The popular reaction provided sources of both hope and despair. Hope, in that the shared moral outrage expressed across boundaries of race, religion and ethnicity testified to the existence of a universal humanitarian decency. Despair, that this potential for a moral sensitivity that is impartial and universal was stymied by the rapid surfacing of a predominantly nationalist insularity of response to the tragedy. The main question that preoccupied Americans was not why did this happen but how could it happen? Or rather, insofar as the why question was posed it was quickly disposed of to most peoples' satisfaction. The perpetrators are mindless terrorists or religious fanatics who hate America and what it stands for which is decency, democracy, freedom, etc. Rare were the voices (mostly religiously inspired pacifists or uncompromisingly liberal elements) who were prepared to say that the US must not seek revenge by waging war on Afghanistan or engage in activities that would itself amount to terrorism, i.e. killing the civilians of other countries. Rarer still were the voices of those who were prepared to point out even as they expressed their pain and outrage against the attacks on New York and Washington, that the US government's unjust actions abroad have helped create the breeding ground from which sub-state and combat group terrorists have emerged. Wholly admirable was the way in which people across the country united to support and offer help in the carrying out the necessary relief measures. Similarly, there was a perceptive and sensitive discourse in the media on what the efforts to avoid such attacks in the future might portend regarding restriction of civil liberties thereby weakening the freedoms and decencies of American society. Barring the fringe, most public political figures opposed attacks on Americans of Arab, South Asian origin or on ordinary Muslims in the country. That would be a betrayal of the values that the US is supposed to stand for. Even rightwing Republican leaders made it a point to say that this was not a war between the West and Islam but between the rest of the world and terrorism. Largely absent, however, was any recognition that the ugliest part of the American 'way of life' has been its foreign policy behaviour which has itself involved even more barbaric acts or campaigns of terror. The record here is simply awesome to contemplate, both in numbers and scale. It includes the nuclear bombing of civilians in Hiroshima/Nagasaki, the use of chemical weapons in Vietnam where the US killed over two million civilians, the use of sanctions since the Gulf War which have led to the deaths of 1.2 million Iraqis of whom 500,000 were children, a 'price' whose 'payment' Madeliene Albright justified. Instead of any media self-introspection on these grounds, there was an even stronger display of self-righteousness than usual. Civilization, best represented and led by the US, was under attack. Therefore, all those (whether countries, groups or individuals) who might refuse to support what the US government intended to do in retaliation were effectively enemies of not just the US but of all Given such a mood, it was hardly surprising that two premiers of Israel should try and seize the opportunity to harden the attitudes of the American government and public towards the plight of the Palestinians. The former Israeli premier, Netanyhu called for the destruction of the One thing is quite clear. Even if the evidence the US government is accumulating is not sufficient to establish a legally defensible case about an accused or suspect (Bin Laden in this case) it simply could not afford to admit as much. The public desire for revenge is so strong that it has to act. There are several historical precedents for this, the most recent being after the 1998 bombings of US Embassies in East Africa. The US on the Of course, the US government is not simply responding to domestic pressure. The speed with which 'long range thinking' was put into place was also remarkable. It is clear that it wishes to seize this opportunity to launch something like an 8-10 year campaign to attack (in all continents) all armed sub-state groups (and selected regimes) which are considered to be unacceptable to American interests. So the issue is not just Bin Laden and his network but the overthrow of the Taliban regime itself, followed by other targets to be highlighted as and when Washington chooses. This is not a war against terrorism but an effort to establish maximum freedom of military-political activity (of a kind and scale never before envisioned) for the US throughout the world. Indeed, in the guise of fighting one kind of terrorism it is sanctioning the freedom to carry out another kind. Returning to India after the Washington trip, one was again shaken by much of the public and media response. After initial expressions of horror, the main preoccupation seems to be how India can obtain enough foreign policy benefit, i.e. swing the US government over to 'our' side against Pakistan and its sponsorship of terrorism in Kashmir. The overall result is that only a small minority (though bigger than the even smaller minority in the US) of publicly articulated opinion declares that in the fight against international terrorism, it is not just sub-state actors/combat groups (whether or not supported/sponsored by states) that are the culprits but that states themselves are guilty of directing/executing terrorism. Indeed, that the sustainability, diversity of forms, and sheer scale of state terrorist acts and campaigns is qualitatively greater and more dangerous To any morally impartial view which seeks to fight international terrorism no matter who is responsible for it, the idea of establishing a concert of nations led by the US as the main international mechanism (regardless of its getting a manipulated sanction from the UN) through which one must fight terrorism, is utterly unacceptable. One cannot legitimize as the main correctors/policers of international terrorism those who are themselves guilty of terrorisms which then not only goes unpunished or unrecognized but is made unrecognizable. The double standards involved here are not just morally shameful but politically counter-productive because they will lead to more widespread bitterness and alienation reinforcing the appeal of those who claim that sub-state terrorism is the only form of retribution to the strong to whom the principles of justice do not apply. It is time to stand up and oppose the US-led coalition which will wage war on Afghanistan and to call on India not to join it. Copyright 2001 The Hindu |
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