Friday, November 19, 2004
Whose War is it Anyway?
Naming the enemy
We are all unwitting participants in a campaign of thought control. No, nothing so dramatic as the reality described in "The Search for the Manchurian Candidate, The CIA and Mind Control", where LSD, sensory deprivation and unethical psychological manipulation were techniques applied to create the perfect killer for the powers that be. It is much simpler and more subtle than that, and it's there every time you listen to the news, read the paper or go down to the corner pub for a drink. It's in the mis-appropriation of terms in order to give them a definition that is suitable to the agenda of the power élite.
Every war or aggression against another force has it own personal manipulation of idiom. Shock and Awe, Days of Penitence, Antique Babylon, etc. A war can be "The Great War", as WWI is referred to in Europe, or even "The Good War", as WWII is referred to in the United States. In the days of globalisation, what will this war, WWIII, be referred to as?
If one takes into account the use of terminology, it's already quite clear that it is a war that has an enemy, and what proper war wouldn't? There are other means to establish law, order and reconstruction that don't see the firing of a single bullet, much less a rain of cluster bombs and Hellfire Missiles. Who is the good guy, and who is the enemy?
Is this enemy actually the people that are supposedly being liberated? Or are they merely a population that has to be dominated in order to appropriate the land and resources? The enemy was personified in Saddam, but Saddam is no more, so why is the massacre of the Iraqi people continuing to take place? Why are those who resist to a forgeign force that has invaded, occupied and now engages in technological warfare as well as the more visible garden variety of armed combat, called "insurgents", "rebels" and often in street talk, "terrorists"? Whose home is it anyway? Why are the Marines called "The Allied Soldiers" or "The Coalition"? International law dictates that they are an "Occupying Force", and that is just a nice name for what they really have been since day one, the "Invading Force". But, in the technical jargon of jus bellus, they are held to maintain certain rules of war pertaining to combat and its side effects, such as protection of the civilian population, avoiding any combat which could cause damage to civilian structures. Are the atrocities committed just "collateral damages"? Is human life and human suffering that cheap? Those who have given the soldiers the mandate to attack, (the government of the US and the other "coaltion States", and certainly not the Iraqis nor international institutions who had actually begged that this intervention be avoided at all costs), are even called upon to supply basic life sustainance needs to the persons in the area of occupation.
What have the Marines done on behalf of those who had sent them? They have forced the more fortunate members of the civilian population of Fallujah to flee in some instances, including even the hospital and its patients, without providing for their safety. Those who remained of course were denied water, electricity or food, and were under fire 24 hours a day. Most of Fallujah is now rubble, but it won't be the Marines who are cleaning up.
So, someone remind me, who is supposed to be the bad guy?
We are all unwitting participants in a campaign of thought control. No, nothing so dramatic as the reality described in "The Search for the Manchurian Candidate, The CIA and Mind Control", where LSD, sensory deprivation and unethical psychological manipulation were techniques applied to create the perfect killer for the powers that be. It is much simpler and more subtle than that, and it's there every time you listen to the news, read the paper or go down to the corner pub for a drink. It's in the mis-appropriation of terms in order to give them a definition that is suitable to the agenda of the power élite.
Every war or aggression against another force has it own personal manipulation of idiom. Shock and Awe, Days of Penitence, Antique Babylon, etc. A war can be "The Great War", as WWI is referred to in Europe, or even "The Good War", as WWII is referred to in the United States. In the days of globalisation, what will this war, WWIII, be referred to as?
If one takes into account the use of terminology, it's already quite clear that it is a war that has an enemy, and what proper war wouldn't? There are other means to establish law, order and reconstruction that don't see the firing of a single bullet, much less a rain of cluster bombs and Hellfire Missiles. Who is the good guy, and who is the enemy?
Is this enemy actually the people that are supposedly being liberated? Or are they merely a population that has to be dominated in order to appropriate the land and resources? The enemy was personified in Saddam, but Saddam is no more, so why is the massacre of the Iraqi people continuing to take place? Why are those who resist to a forgeign force that has invaded, occupied and now engages in technological warfare as well as the more visible garden variety of armed combat, called "insurgents", "rebels" and often in street talk, "terrorists"? Whose home is it anyway? Why are the Marines called "The Allied Soldiers" or "The Coalition"? International law dictates that they are an "Occupying Force", and that is just a nice name for what they really have been since day one, the "Invading Force". But, in the technical jargon of jus bellus, they are held to maintain certain rules of war pertaining to combat and its side effects, such as protection of the civilian population, avoiding any combat which could cause damage to civilian structures. Are the atrocities committed just "collateral damages"? Is human life and human suffering that cheap? Those who have given the soldiers the mandate to attack, (the government of the US and the other "coaltion States", and certainly not the Iraqis nor international institutions who had actually begged that this intervention be avoided at all costs), are even called upon to supply basic life sustainance needs to the persons in the area of occupation.
What have the Marines done on behalf of those who had sent them? They have forced the more fortunate members of the civilian population of Fallujah to flee in some instances, including even the hospital and its patients, without providing for their safety. Those who remained of course were denied water, electricity or food, and were under fire 24 hours a day. Most of Fallujah is now rubble, but it won't be the Marines who are cleaning up.
So, someone remind me, who is supposed to be the bad guy?
