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By
C. J. Clarke
Game Over
By
C.J. Clarke
Published The Modern Tribune
March 22, 2003
"Our inability to
engage in productive multilateral processes is a
serious statement about our relationship with the rest
of the world right now, and in future days."
War is Not a Hollywood
Production
By
C. J. Clarke
Published The Modern Tribune
March 19, 2003
"We
go home to our well-appointed houses in the wealthiest
nations in the world and we read and write and
speculate nonchalantly about shedding the blood of
hundreds of thousands of innocent people along with
our morning tea."
Game Over
By
C. J. Clarke
Published The Modern Tribune
March 22, 2003
I can recall an
epiphany that I had when I was playing Monopoly with
my younger brother once. The game was coming to an
end. He owned virtually all of the properties on the
board, and had a bank full of cash. I was down to two
fully mortgaged slum properties and a couple of
bucks. It became clear to me at that point: it was
literally "game over", unless we redistributed the
properties, exchanged loan agreements, or made some
other kind of concessions.
Game over. This is
what the world faces now. If we take a serious look
at the current escalation of violence in this world,
one single glaring core reason emerges: the absolute
unadulterated corporate greed involved in the
worldwide arms trade.
War means cash for
companies - period. A mere knowledge of second grade
math yields a simple equation.
Arming
world powers
+ Arming
developing and rogue nations
=
Sustained world violence and the need for more arms
Pure cash inflow for
military companies - that's what it comes down to. I
decided to write this piece after reading two articles
coming out of the New York Times in the recent days.
The first referred to of 123 charges against Hughes
Electronic Corp unit of General Motors and Boeing
Satellite Systems for unlawfully transferring rocket
and satellite data to China in the 1990's (New York
Times, March 6, 2003); and the second was Iraq's
announcement that a Virginia-based biological supply
house and a French scientific institute were the
sources of all the foreign germ samples that it used
to create the biological weapons. (New York Times,
March 15, 2003)
Such stories require us
to ask ourselves whether it wouldn't be prudent to try
putting our thumb on our military corporations for
once, rather than pounding our fist on the virtually
defenseless population of Iraq to guard against
violence in this world.
The numbers are of
course, highest in the United States. The above are
recent examples of illegal arms trading. The truly
shocking addition to the equation, is that it is the
blinded U.S. taxpayers who are currently:
-Footing the bill for
much of the world's military
arms trade;
-Footing the bill for
the U.S. government's re-militarization;
-Footing the bill for
the current war underway in Iraq (depleting old
stockpiles of weapons so the U.S. companies can sell
the government more);
-Footing the bill for
cleaning up the mess. (...through financial aid to
U.S. corporations who have recently been offered
rebuilding projects in post-invasion Iraq.)
It is the powerful
U.S. military corporations who are taking in exorbitant profits off the
backs of the working people in this country.
Check out some facts
from the Arms Trade Resource Center in New
York:
*Spending on national
defense is nearing $400 billion... Spending for
homeland security has increased dramatically as well,
and will be $37.7 billion in 2003.
*U.S. arms, training,
and military personnel have been dispatched not only
to Afghanistan but also to Pakistan, India,
Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Georgia, the Philippines, and
Yemen. Forward bases for U.S. forces have been
established or expanded at thirteen sites in nine
countries, and administration policymakers are now
taking aim at a new adversary, Iraq. Left
unchallenged, this expansion of U.S. global military
presence and military commitments will generate tens
of billions of dollars in additional costs for decades
to come.
*Foreign Military
Financing (FMF) grants and loans must be used by the
recipient nation to purchase U.S. defense-related
items--a nice boost for U.S. defense contractors.
International Military Education and Training grants
are given to foreign governments to pay for
professional education in military management and
technical training on U.S. weapons systems.
*The 2003 ESF budget
request is $2.29 billion. Top recipients include:
$600 million for
Israel,
$615 million for Egypt,
$200 million for
Pakistan,
$60 million for
Indonesia,
and $25 million for
India.
*The 2003 FMF budget
request of $4.107 billion includes
$2.1 billion for
Israel,
$1.3 billion for Egypt,
$20 million for the
Philippines,
$50 million for
Pakistan,
$50 million for India,
and $98 million for
Colombia.
*This year’s $80
million IMET budget request represents a 27.5%
increase over 2001. Top recipients include major
allies in the war on terrorism: India, Pakistan,
Uzbekistan, Georgia, Philippines, Jordan, Oman, and
Yemen.
*The following funds
were doled out as part of the emergency supplemental
bills:
$600 million in ESF for
Pakistan;
$40.5 million in
economic and law enforcement assistance for
Uzbekistan;
$45 million in FMF for
Turkey and Uzbekistan;
$45.5 in
Non-proliferation Anti-terrorism Demining and Related
programs;
$42.2 million for
training and equipment for border security forces in
Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Turkey,
Kyrgyzstan, Azerbaijan, and Kazakhstan; $108 million
for a variety of counter-terrorism training programs
and demining in Afghanistan.
The FY 2002
Supplemental (Pl-107-206) included
$665 million for ESF,
$387 million for FMF,
$110 million for
Assistance for Independent States of the former Soviet
Union,
and $88 million for
Non-Proliferation, Anti-terrorism, De-mining, and
Related programs ($12 million of which will go to
Indonesia).
(http://www.worldpolicy.org/projects/arms/news/SpendingDOD911.html)
Looking at some of the
data above, one might ask what business do we have in
funding the militarization of some of these nations,
whose past track records range from horrendous, to
unstable at best?! Looking at the history of
conflicts in the 20th century, it is an historically
provable FACT that it will be precisely these
armaments that will be used to provoke the United
States at some point in the future. Of course the
United States corporations will be licking their chops
at the prospect that the U.S. government will then
need to fight back.
Let's not forget the
generous (and probably tax-free) gift by the defense
industry that equaled almost $14 million dollars in
the last election alone (64% to Republicans).
(http://www.opensecrets.org/industries/indus.asp?Ind=D)
Okay so let's do the
math here: if you add up all of the spending we've
done in the current budget year, plus military
political pocket lining, the total is somewhere around
$465 billion US dollars. Compare: the United Nations
Food and Agriculture Organization states that 815
million people have insufficient access to food:
The World
Food Summit estimated that approximately 840 million
people in developing countries subsist on diets that
are deficient in calories. The latest estimates
indicate that roughly 826 million people are
undernourished -- 792 million people in the developing
world and 34 million in the developed world.
Projections for 2015 and 2030 suggest that the number
of undernourished in the developing world should fall
to around 580 million. This still lies far short of
the World Food Summit goal of reducing the number to
400 million. That goal will not be reached until 2030
according to current projections.
http://www.fivims.org/index.jsp?LANG_CODE=EN
What would it cost to
feed these hungry people? I was reading an article
recently that indicated that approximately $35 U.S.
dollars could feed a family in Afghanistan for a
month.
Of all countries in the
world, in the United States military spending is the
highest. U.S. military spending is approximately FIVE
TIMES that of the France and Japan, which are the
second highest military consumers in the world.
The sad part is, as
illustrated above in unstable regions throughout the
world, violence is continuous, and people are dying as
a result of the wide availability of illegal
armaments. I take specific offense to our attempts to
"expand NATO" to include the new European states such
as Romania, Poland and Bulgaria. First of all, it is
a widely written about FACT that certain Lockheed
executives have been actively promoting this "NATO"
initiative, and have been soliciting the cash of these
nations. There is no doubt that the U.S. is funding
the militarization of these nations, at least in the
short term. There is no doubt that at some time in
the future, these relatively poor countries are going
to be weaned off of U.S. military aid while tied to
long-term contracts to purchase armaments that they
just cannot afford. This availability of armaments in
such newly democratized states, could easily lead to
increasing instability.
How is this cycle
weighing on the taxpayer? Rather than investing in
the lives and health of the working taxpayer, the
gov't diverts billions to the arms trade. Currently
there are 7.2 million children in the United States
without health insurance coverage. Overall, 38.9
million people under age 65 were without health
insurance from January to July, or 15.9 percent of the
population, about the same as in 2002.
'Experts fear the
uninsured numbers could rise again as states face
severe budget crunches. In Kansas, for instance, the
CHIP program, called HealthWave, is increasing
premiums. People who now pay $10 per month will have
to pay $30, and $15 premiums will jump to $45. The
increases are expected to affect about 5,800 families,
and state officials predict about 2,950 children could
drop out of the program, said Caleb Asher, spokesman
for the Kansas Department of Social and Rehabilitation
Services. “We are in such an economic hardship in the
state,” he said. “It’s becoming more real to folks.”
(Associated Press,
December 31, 2003 -
http://www.msnbc.com/news/853418.asp)
More statistics
indicate that the U.S. taxpayer pays as much taxes for
military expenditure as they pay for health care,
social services and education COMBINED. A meagre
portion of taxes are spent on preserving the
environment, which everyone relies on - and public
transportation - which would cost people much less to
use than cars:
Average California
household Federal Income Taxes
paid in 1997: $3,626
Use Expenditure
Military $1,610
Health Care $642
Debt Interest $511
Social Services $207
Nutrition $105
Education $91
Affordable Housing $91
Foreign Aid $40
Environment & Energy
$33
Job Training $18
Mass Transit $0.36
Other $279
Source: Budget of the
United States Government, Fiscal Year 1999.
http://www.penpress.org/docs/PEN68.pdf
A New York Times
article from March 16, 2003 indicates that in its
efforts to avoid further budgetary short falls, "the
Republican leaders of Congress have unveiled proposals
for slashing the most basic government programs for
years to come. With rationalizations running from
tragic to ludicrous, House budgeters envision cuts of
$470 billion in "waste, fraud and abuse" in Medicare,
Medicaid, education, child care and other vital
programs, from transportation to health care, the
environment to science research..."
In order to pay for its
tax cuts for the rich, these “Congressmen
have proposed a
startling $12 billion cut in food stamps and cuts to
Medicare by $214 billion this decade." (New York Times
Editorial, March 16, 2003.) This is all occurring in
the face of the fact that in 1999, which was a time of
relative economic stability, 31 million Americans were
food insecure, meaning they were either hungry or
unsure of where their next meal would come from. Of
these Americans, 12 million were children.
(http://www.thehungersite.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/CTDSites)
When the working people
of this country are toiling long hours to subsist, and
are then further crunched by the lack of good public
education and health care - the population becomes
stressed to its limits. With no return on their
investment of tax dollars, the result is social unrest
and high crime rates. The sad flip-side of this is
that as a result of their hardship, some of these
working people will end up in the military themselves.
In order to keep their teens out of trouble, and to
help fund their post-secondary education,
working-class kids are also the ones most likely to be
entering the military. Democratic Party Congressional
Black Caucus Representative Charles Rangel (D-NY) in
his New York Times Opinion article (dated Tuesday,
December 31, 2002), states: "A disproportionate number
of poor and members of minority groups make up the
enlisted ranks of the military, while the most
privileged Americans are underrepresented or absent."
The bottom line is that
taxpayers in the United States are being hood-winked
out of their tax dollars and their children, as a
result of the 20th century political-economic
environment which places the military-industrial
complex above the basic needs and human dignity of
U.S. citizens.
Military and oil
corporations should absolutely not be wielding the
kind of power that they exert on "democratic"
governments and foreign policy. The result is a huge
downward spiral into a black hole of world war.
Our inability to engage
in productive multilateral processes is a serious
statement about our relationship with the rest of the
world right now, and in future days. Saddam Hussein
is the example we should be learning from. If you
gain and maintain power through violence, the only way
to keep playing the game is to deny reality, to
continue escalating violence and brutality. The
populations and their nations will just not put up
with this kind of sustained aggressive intervention.
In our case, if we gain and maintain power through
violence and military aid, the only way to continue
that power, is to shell out more cash, or engage in
aggressive "defense". Ultimately, the whole tenuous
system creates bitter dependencies rather than true
democratic international relations. The situation
will blow up in our face.
We seem to need a
constant reminder in this country: the purpose of an
economic system is to benefit the population - not to
benefit ten men from Texas.
For more information
visit:
The World Policy
Institute Arms Trade Resource Center.
http://www.worldpolicy.org/projects/arms/news/SpendingDOD911.html
The United Nations
Development Programme
http://www.undp.org/mdg/goalsandindicators.html
I recently attended a university
"War" debate. On that night, one professor noted that
in the Gulf War approximately 100,000 Iraqi soldiers
died (at least some of whom, he speculated, were
probably not in the army voluntarily). He also
mentioned that 100,000 civilians also died in the
conflict itself and in its aftermath. He then asked
how we would feel about a war with Iraq if we knew
that 100,000 U.S. soldiers would die. His question
was meant to touch our hearts, not as academics, but
as human beings.
War is not a Hollywood
production. It is first and foremost about the loss
of life, about human carnage and death and suffering
inflicted upon innocent people.
The response given was the blink
of an eye, a shrugging of shoulders and a statement:
"We won't lose that many soldiers anyhow - so the
point is irrelevant." (or something to that effect).
As a spectator in the overflow room, my mouth hit the
table: So this is what we've become.
The first thought to come to my
mind was: of course we won't lose that many
American soldiers - that's what the Kurds are
for! We've been training and arming a handful of them
for the past 6 weeks so that they can do all of our
dirty work on the ground for us! Now of course
don't say that too loud - the Kurdish issue is a
delicate one that requires a strong ability to talk
out of both sides of one's mouth at the same time:
"The Kurds!" we exclaim
emphatically to CNN, "The poor Kurds! They've been
gassed you know. Its time someone did something to
help those poor Kurds!"
"The Kurds." we cough, and
quietly push the military base assistance agreement
across the desk to the Turkish officials, "are all
yours, just sign on the dotted line."
"The Kurds!" we smile broadly
with our arm around Kurdish liberation leaders, "We
feel your pain. Here, take some guns!"
Mark my words, in three years
from now the newly U.S.-armed and trained Kurdish
liberation leaders, when they become a thorn in the
side of Turkey or the U.S. military regime in Iraq,
will soon become "terrorists" that "need to be dealt
with." Ridiculous, all of it. You don't arm and train
fringe groups! How many times do we need to shoot
ourselves in the foot before we figure this out?!?!
We sit at our fancy tables and
talk. We go home to our well-appointed houses in the
wealthiest nations in the world and we read and write
and speculate nonchalantly about shedding the blood of
hundreds of thousands of innocent people along with
our morning tea. I recently went to see the movie
"The Pianist" which as you know, is about the German
occupation and massacre of the Jewish population in
Poland. My 28 year old Iranian friend was with me.
Her family was relatively untouched by the war in Iran
- but she abhors violence -the generational residue
left over from what her people went through almost
twenty years ago. For fully the final third of this
film (perhaps 45 minutes or so) this young Iranian
woman cried, and sobbed and wept uncontrollably. Her
response to the human suffering inflicted upon the
Jewish people did not come from her Iranian background
of course. Then from where did it originate? It came
from being a member of the human family we call
earth. Her response is called human empathy. At
first I was uncomfortable sitting beside her through
all of her sobbing, but then I got over myself as I
sat there: She was the only one in a nearly full
audience who did cry. So this is what we've
become?
I watched the Jewish people being
moved from their fine homes into a segregated portion
of the city, where their comings and goings were
strictly controlled; where they were forced to openly
identify themselves as Jews; and where they were
subject to intermittent violence at the will of the
occupying force. As I sat there a picture came into
my mind: Robert Fisk was in town two weeks ago
showing footage of a documentary he had made in the
1990s which included footage about the Jewish
settlements and occupation of Palestine. I'm a
Canadian. I have no preconceived notions or
inclinations about these issues from which to draw
on. However, the similarity between the two examples
of human suffering was remarkable to me! I just shook
my head and said to myself "Millions of Jewish people
experienced first hand the loss of life, human
carnage, death and suffering inflicted upon innocent
people - but what exactly did we learn from that
lesson?" What have we become indeed!
Well "so what" you might say.
"You can lead a human to humanity but you can't make
him drink. Get over it." I don't want to stop
there. My heart is with the Iraqi people, but my mind
is also reeling to comprehend what is going to happen
to the shambled remnants of what was once a system of
international law that was just in full bloom. During
the spring and summer of 2002 the Bush administration
began what I believe to be the historic anomaly of
disentangling itself from its obligations under
international instruments such as the Statute of Rome
and the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. I apologize if
this was discussed during the first portion of
Thursday's debate - but I would really appreciate
knowing what this community of scholars think about
this topic. To the best of my knowledge there was
never any mention of "withdrawing" from treaties in my
old international law textbooks. My gut reaction was
queasiness. I thought to myself: "If the wealthiest,
most well educated and powerful nation in the world
can go around "unsigning treaties" - what are the
barely-contained "rogue" nations of the world going to
take from this example?" Sure enough within a matter
of months, North Korea announced it was withdrawing
from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Agreement.
While we're on the topic I'd like
to mention another thing that has been nagging at me
of late. All of the sudden North Korea have thrust
themselves into the international limelight. Has
anyone noticed that every single time the government
of North Korea makes another announcement about its
military programs and initiatives, it prefaces or
concludes its statement by saying "We are doing this
because the United States has provoked us. We are
doing this in self-defence." Or should I say
"Anticipatory self-defense" - the vogue term these
days?
So what does North Korea want
anyhow? From their statements it would appear that
the underlying sentiment is that their world is an
unstable place as long as the new War Hawks in the
Bush Administration are re-arming themselves and
shooting at anything that moves. On a political level
the North Koreans have asked for what they want point
blank. Money and a non-aggression treaty. What I
can't figure out is "what is so wrong with this
request?" A non-aggression treaty? Great! You would
think the Bush administration would be beating down
their doors to sign one! Money? No problem! The
Bush administration has flagrantly demonstrated in
recent days that money is no object when it comes to
getting what they want from international law.
Systematic efforts to strong-wallet the free world
into signing bi-lateral ICC shield agreements comes to
mind as a fine example.
While we're on the topic of the
International Criminal Court I would like to take
issue with one professor's assertion that the
international community stands by and does nothing
until the United States steps up to the plate to hit
the grand slam homer at the bottom of the ninth. I
imagine if the Europeans could speak to this point
they would highlight their significant losses in World
War II as a fine example of the international
community stepping up, and the United States sitting
the game out while a serious, well-known, highly armed
and well-organized aggressor wreaked havoc on the
populations of half the free world.
This statement is also a slap in
the face to members of civil society who work
tirelessly day in and day out to protect human rights.
I am on the news listservs for the Coalition for an
International Criminal Court and Human Rights Watch
and every day these organizations are coming out with
statements to try their best to ensure that human
rights and humanitarian assistance gets through to the
Iraqi people (and people around the world in similar
situations of poverty and violence). The International
Criminal Court orgs are actively working on a daily
basis calling for states in Europe to indict Iraqi
ministers for war crimes every time they step foot off
Iraqi soil. Academics world wide and a handful of
governments are jumping on the "universal
jurisdiction" band wagon. Good for them. As lawyers,
law professors, and law students, I think that we
should be embracing and creatively thinking of any way
the law can be used to address these issues.
The law. What an interesting
concept. In these days of increasing unilateralism
and escalating militarization, the single most
significant action that the Bush administration could
take to stop this train from derailing would be to
stand up and proudly, vigorously, and actively pursue
every possible avenue of international law to
ensure peace in this world. Embrace and commit to the
ICC. Restore much needed funding to the United
Nations. Sign and ratify important treaties. Aid in
international policing and evidence gathering to help
bring criminals to justice. Use our well-honed
ability to strong-arm the developing world to make
them follow suit.
Actually, these days it is some
members of the developing world who are coming to the
table with a fresh and educated perspective on these
issues. They've lived through the hell of
dictatorships and military governments and poverty.
They bring a fresh appreciation of what liberty and
democracy truly mean. Liberty is a notion that we
have seriously begun to take for granted in the
Western world. How truly disheartening it must be for
the African and Latin American countries to be finally
proudly seated at this incredible international
democratic institution, the United Nations, and come
to realize at times like these, that democracy and
justice are merely commodities that can be bought and
sold to the highest bidder!!
Recent news out of Chile is that
“The government has ... been criticized for seeking
membership on the Security Council in the first place,
putting Chile in a position that could hurt its
interests.” Similarly, "Pakistan's top leader,
President Pervez Musharraf, ...has openly said that he
wishes Pakistan had not received the honor of a
rotating seat on the United Nations Security Council
this year." How pathetic - countries such as these,
who are just learning the ways of democracy, are
considering disengaging from international processes
to avoid being blindsided by the United States and its
threats of withdrawing as their "big brother". Not
only are we setting a bad example for the world, we
are literally forcing them to choose between cash and
democracy. At this point, the only reason why a
handful of the Eastern block and African countries
have sided with the U.S. about the war and the ICC is
because they are nations that the U.S. has managed to
entangle in its unending snare of "military
assistance".
I know you raised an eyebrow when
I said that we've begun to take liberty for granted
here. Here are a few recent New York Times and other
headlines to help jog your memory: March 6, 2003 U.S.
Should Release Some Guantanamo Prisoners; March 4,
2003 U.S. Military Investigating Death of Afghan in
Custody; August 23, 2002 Secret Court Says F.B.I.
Aides Misled Judges in 75 Cases. Let's not forget the
proposals for a "National ID card" and the "Total
Information Awareness System". Finally, you know to
keep your eyes open when Administration officials such
as Donald Rumsfeld refer to the German and French
responsiveness to their public opinion as "government
pandering". It's called democracy, sir - perhaps we
could give it a try on this side of the Atlantic? Our
traditional notions of liberty could be tossed out the
window in the blink of an eye if we do not keep
informed of issues such as these. I think the
"chilling effect" on free speech that is discussed in
academic journals is already here to stay. I talk to
people on a daily basis, especially immigrants, who
have no doubt that the CIA or the FBI is listening in
on phone calls, filtering emails and monitoring web
visits. I've even noticed Americans who lower their
voices when discussing controversial political
issues.
On a similar thread one
commentator in the New York Times recently produced a
scathing report about the United States' plans to
"rebuild" Iraq in the face of its inability to provide
basic public schooling for its own children at home.
The author cites information from towns and states
across America that are slashing everything but the
kitchen sink to try to keep their heads above water.
So let's get back to it then:
what would we think if we knew that 100,000
American lives would be lost in a war in Iraq? Well,
if the loss of the lives of 4000 innocent people in
New York are any indication, there would be a great
wailing and tearing of hair and gnashing of teeth. We
do care. The world poured out its heart on the days
that followed 9/11. At that time, we were finally
able to tap into that essential source of human
empathy that envelopes us all. The hard question is:
why do we seem to only be able to do it when the face
of those who suffer only resembles our own?
There will be civilian
deaths in Iraq. The Bush administration is quick to
tell CNN that they are merely seeking to assist the
poor oppressed Iraqi people and the Kurds. However,
the truth is that the means chosen by the Bush
administration: a few thousand troops, and a few
hundred missiles and aircraft, are infinitely
inappropriate to the task of eliminating one man.
It is akin to mowing down the haystack to try to find
the needle. How many civilians will need to die
before Saddam is removed? Have we even given it a
thought? I have a picture in my mind of the entire of
Baghdad awash in flames and smoke and carnage, and out
from under all of it crawling - Saddam with a big grin
on his face! Quite honestly, he will probably be the
only one who walks out of this unscathed! The entire
escapade is quite simply an inappropriate amount of
force to use considering the reasons given. If,
however, the Bush adminstration were to lay their
cards on the table and vocally embrace this "so what
if 100,000 people die" attitude, at least the U.S.
population could clear their heads from all of the
smoke and mirrors out there in the news right now and
see this choice clearly.
What a number of Americans do
recognize is that going to war with Iraq without
provocation and without international legitimacy is
equivalent to reckless endangerment: of American
citizens who will have more to fear from terrorists,
of Iraqi civilians who will suffer and die, of
international peace and cooperation, of American
democracy and society that suffer when outrageous sums
of public tax moneys are used for militarization
instead of for education and health care.
I was on the telephone with an
Iranian friend living in Toronto and he said to me
"Can you imagine being a pregnant woman going into
labor in Baghdad when the Americans hit? What will
they hit first - the country's infrastructure [what
ever is left of it] like electrical plants that power
weapon-making facilities. [hey I thought the
inspectors haven't found any real weapons facilities
there?] The lights go out, you have no heat, no clean
water, no emergency health care facilities, and no
transportation." I hadn't thought of it like that
before...
What scares me the most about
losing another 100,000 Iraqi lives in 2003, and the
nonchalant attitude toward such a tremendous loss of
life, is that ultimately in Iraq, there will be
another 100,000 children affected by this decision.
These children and their families have witnessed war
and human suffering for the past twenty years. These
children will watch what decision the Western world
makes about their future, and they will remember. In
the discussion, one professor suggested that there is another
option besides going to war now or allowing Saddam to
stay in power. Give the money to the people. Let me
add to that: Feed them and give them a good
education. Let them think and choose what religious
affiliation they wish to have. Give them medical aid
and keep their families and communities intact.
Provide the resources for free elections. Only
education can save the Iraqi people. There is an
international network of Iranian academics right now
who speculate that there will be a significant change
in Iranian society and governance soon. If you allow
the people to become educated and informed and give
them the necesssities of life that will allow them to
have time to think and formulate opinions on these
matters, the change will come from within.
Rome wasn't built in a day, and
most of the Western world took decades, if not
centuries to settle down - why should we expect Iraq
to come to the playing field over the course of a few
decades?
Ultimately, it doesn't matter if
Saddam is gone tomorrow or in 25 years from now.
Someday one of these children is going to become the
new leader of Iraq. What kind of leader will this
child grow up to become if he or she were to witness
today a systematic effort of the international
community to embrace international law, uphold
democratic institutions, bring criminals to justice
through the rule of law and provide a much-needed
influx of resources to alleviate suffering in Iraq?
Perhaps he or she will then become a leader that is
actively engaged in multilateral decision making
processes; a leader that works to foster and build
democratic institutions, who respects the rule of law
and who will respond with empathy to the fundamental
needs of fellow citizens.
What kind of leader will this
child grow up to become if he or she were to witness
today a systematic effort of the international
community to solve Iraq's problems by buying friends,
trampling on human rights, denigrating multilateralism
and international cooperation and creating a
humanitarian catastrophe? If he or she were to grow
up maimed, orphaned, living on the streets caring for
younger siblings and picking through radioactive waste
to survive? Perhaps he or she will then become a
leader that is cold, bitter, calculating, and an
isolationist who gains and maintains power through
violence, who regards the rule of law with arrogance,
and who has learned to live alongside suffering and
death without flinching. A leader without empathy.
At the end of his recent
discussions at a local university, Robert Fisk said an
interesting thing. His father had fought in World War
I and had a medal from the French Army. The back of
the medal said something to the effect of: The War
that Was Fought for Civilization. Fisk went on to
remind us that at the end of World War I, the
victors, heady and arrogant from the win, in their
well-appointed rooms in the wealthiest nations of the
world, sat down with a map and redrew some lines:
Northern Ireland, Yugoslavia and the Middle East. He
asked us to think of the century that followed and how
many hundreds of thousands of lives have been lost as
a result of the Western world drawing its arbitrary
lines in the sand of other people's nations.
We stand at the cross roads now.
Let's make a decision that the Iraqi children will
remember - with a sense of hope, cooperation and
brotherhood.
"Whatever we do to the web of life, we do to
ourselves." Chief Seattle
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Peace Through Ideas - Ideas Through
Debate
