The war on terrorism is a lie

The murderous and terrible events of September 11th. have plunged the world into a moral swampland, a place in which it seems that any kind of brutality and recklessness on the part of the governments of the West can be justified. At the heart of this is the stupid and meaningless declaration, by the President of the United States of America, of a War On Terrorism – and the way in which this crass abuse of language has been accepted and parroted by the rest of what are called world leaders. And by the media.

There is no such thing as a War On Terrorism. It is not possible to wage war on an idea or an activity. War is waged against military forces or against people or even against States. But calling for a War On Terrorism is like calling for a war on stupidity, on greed, or on poverty. It is a nonsense, and the truth is that those people who are at the heart of the military campaign that is currently being waged in Afghanistan, primarily by the United States and Britain, know it.

To call the military response to the terrorist attack on New York a War On Terrorism was a smart piece of spin-doctoring. It is such a loaded concept that it undercuts the position of dissenters. Are you for terrorism or against it? Well, if you’re against it, why do you have a problem with a campaign, the purpose of which is to free the world of the evil of terrorism? Why have you got a problem with a War On Terrorism?

It is also sufficiently woolly to allow even countries who are themselves engaged in acts of barbarism and terror to climb on board. Are you against terrorism? Sure, we are. Everybody is against terrorism. BANG! Oh, don’t worry about that explosion in the background. That was just some excavating we’re doing. Now is there anyone you think we should arrest and torture, to see if we can assist you in your great struggle?

On Friday, on the occasion of the meeting of European Union leaders in Ghent, Belgium, the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, was interviewed by RTE. In the course of the interview, he rejected the call that had been made by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Mary Robinson, for a halt to the bombing in Afghanistan, in order to allow humanitarian aid to be brought to people, whose lives and whose country have been devastated by the military campaign so far.

It was particularly depressing that, in his reply, the Taoiseach trotted out the War On Terrorism cliché. And it was depressing, too, that there was no attempt whatsoever by the interviewer to question the use of the phrase. Do we really have to sink into the moral swamp that was created by others? Is it not possible for us to establish an independent line that is based on a complete rejection of terrorist action, of any kind, and no matter by whom it is perpetrated – but which also effectively challenges the gloss that is being put on ruthless acts of war by George Bush and Tony Blair?

In general, the media has been complicit to the point of collusion in the great deceit that is behind this war effort. In taking this rhetoric at face value, newspapers, T.V. stations and other branches of the media have given it a credibility that it does not deserve. Indeed in the U.S., the media – and the television media in particular – has failed dismally in its duty to question the policies and the tactics being adopted by President George Bush and his advisors. Instead they have bought lock stock and two smoking cruise missiles into the military response.

The same is true of Sky News, where the events in Afghanistan are described against a backdrop that proclaims the War On Terrorism. Is this just sloppiness, a tabloid-like desire to go with the catchy headline? Or is it more sinister – a calculated and deliberate participation in the propaganda effort?

On television, there is very little evidence of a serious attempt to cover the war actions in an impartial and objective way. Thus the sickeningly cynical food-drops which have been carried out by the U.S. military are blithely and unquestioningly described as an humanitarian response. These efforts are not just grossly inadequate and ill-targeted – they are ill-conceived to begin with.

Reports on the ground suggest that they are suffering the obvious fate likely to befall anything that is merely dropped from the sky, without any of the careful thought and planning which genuine humanitarian aid requires: they are being collected by the local wide-boys who are trading in them as a commodity – meaning that the starving and weak and the poor are unlikely to gain any benefit at all from the exercise.

Even more fundamentally, it is widely understood among humanitarian agencies and workers that to combine military action with what is being depicted as humanitarian aid, in the way that the United States and their British allies have done to date, will inevitably inflict damage on the whole concept of humanitarian aid – which must be seen to be independent and impartial.

It is not as if there is any difficulty, finding appropriate agencies through which the provision of food for the people of Afghanistan might be channelled. In the context, the only conclusion you can come to is that what is involved is a crass and cynical act, a PR stunt which is designed to put a misleading gloss on what is really going on. Look, look at the orange bags falling from the sky! Thousands of them. See how many there are, just lying there on the ground waiting to be picked up by the lucky locals! Aren’t we really wonderful, giving so much of our precious peanut butter to the poor staving people of Afghanistan? Boo-hoo-hoo.

Like fuck.

The Taliban regime is an appalling travesty. In particular, its treatment of women is utterly indefensible, vile and unjust. It would be a good thing if it were indeed to be overturned. But the impetus to do this should come from within Afghanistan itself. And certainly, the methods which are now being used, in the attempt to engineer the fall of the Taliban leadership, are morally repugnant.

That they may backfire badly on those responsible in the long run is just another terrible truth that we may all have to deal with some day.