A Necessary War?

[DP]

Last week President Obama told a notoriously right-wing group, the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW), that “Afghanistan is a war of necessity.” We in the peace movement beg to differ. On what basis is Afghanistan a war of necessity? On the basis that the people of Afghanistan attacked the United States? How silly. It’s true that Afghanistan’s former Taliban government—a group of theocratic hardliners who never represented a majority of Afghans—gave aid and assistance to Al-Qaeda. But that government was easily removed after the U.S.-led invasion in 2001. The Taliban government is no more. So why are ordinary Afghan people still being killed by the dozens in U.S. airstrikes? And why is United States Army still chasing its tail all over the mountains and caves of the Hindu Kush, in spite of surge after surge? Could it be that, like the Vietnam War, the occupation of Afghanistan is not a war of necessity, at all, but really just another March of Folly?

Let’s consider this philosophy of group responsibility and group punishment a little further. Why does group punishment apply in some cases but not others? Why doesn’t it apply to Americans for example? When Timothy McVeigh attacked the Federal building in Oklahoma City, why didn’t the government send troops to occupy Michigan, McVeigh’s base of operations? Why haven’t we sent to troops occupy Idaho, Texas, or any number of other places where vocal minorities have made threatening gestures towards our national government? Of course we know that such idiocy is morally wrong, and would only spawn hundreds of new McVeighs anyway. So why do we think we’ll have better luck in Afghanistan? Are Afghans any less insulted by their country being occupied than Americans would be if the shoe were on the other foot?

According to security experts in the new Internet video series “Rethink Afghanistan” (http://rethinkafghanistan.com/), occupying a country is simply not a good way to fight terrorism. This is because occupation does not and cannot address the root causes of terrorism. Poverty is one of those causes, hatred for the West (especially the United States) is another. Poverty can only be addressed through thoughtful and well-administered aid programs and fair trade. It cannot be addressed by search-and-destroy missions, good ole’ boy contractors (Halliburton, Blackwater), and predator drones. Hatred can only be overcome by mutual respect and honest dealing between nations. It cannot be overcome by CIA-sponsored coups, cynical weapons deals, and sanctions. The reason people in the Middle East hate America might seem mystifying to some people, but to anyone who knows their history, or even just follows the news, it’s as plain as the desert sun. From the American-backed coup in Iran in 1954 to the war crimes committed at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamó Bay, from the genocidal Iraq sanctions, to the unqualified support of apartheid Israel, we have demonstrated that, when it comes to Muslims, we are just not square dealers.

More info: http://www.ifamericansknew.org/images/4maps.jpg

Can anyone seriously dispute that the endless wars in Afghanistan and Iraq—while they have made us considerably poorer—have not made us any safer? If anything, our activities in the Middle East have only increased the long-term threat of terrorism and instability in the Muslim world. There’s a bumper sticker out there that we think says it all; “We are making enemies faster than we can kill them.”

There were great hopes that the election of Barack Obama would change all this. We’re still holding out hope too, but doubts are beginning to creep in. Michael Moore, writing in a recent issue of “Rolling Stone,” thinks Obama says things like that once in a while to throw off the Republicans while he is actually doing something else: a kind of “rope-a-dope” political strategy designed to wear out the opposition. Only time will tell if that is really what he’s doing and, more importantly, whether it will work.

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/29551986/barack_obama_so_far

We in the peace movement don’t mean to be to be overly harsh on President Obama. But we do expect him to lead an open and honest dialog with America on the nature and causes of terrorism and the best way to protect our nation against it. (If we can do this for racism, why can’t we do it for terrorism?) In any case, we do not want our president to keep limping along with utterly failed policies of his predecessor, and we do not want to get sucked any deeper into the sand of endless, unwinnable wars.

We said it after 9-11, and we say it again now, two useless wars and thousands of American lives later . . . This is NOT the time to heap more violence upon violence. It’s a time for reflection, introspection, and CHANGE.

—David Preston and John Repp

Members, West Seattle Neighbors for Peace and Justice

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