Very perceptive article from a Czech author. Nadine posted it at FADG.
praguepost.com
Why I won't march
A splintered and unfocused left fails to offer alternatives in face of threats to peace
By Jeremy Hurewitz
The Prague Post
(February 12, 2003)
I've been asked by many of my friends to march for peace and I've repeatedly turned them down. Am I against peace? Certainly not. But what is the peace movement and what does it want to accomplish other than stopping a U.S. invasion of Iraq?
My problem with the peace movement is that it fails to articulate a counterpolicy in the wake of serious threats to the global order. It is a collection of disparate and incoherent voices that seems to mostly serve as a pretext for criticizing America. The bankruptcy of left-wing foreign policy has to do with its ambivalence toward the threats of Muslim extremism and toward the unsavory options in dealing with those threats.
On the one hand the left espouses equal rights for women, minorities and homosexuals; it lauds free speech and a vibrant independent press as essentials of civil society. The left is a guardian of the separation of church and state and a watchdog of the judicial process. So it finds itself in diametrical opposition to the nature of most Arab societies. But in the wake of this opposition, the left simply sticks its head in the sand rather than confront the reality that as globalization integrates the world order ever closer, we are hurtling toward a clash of civilizations unless the world comes to some sort of agreement on universal values. The left has failed to say that it will not stand for the oppression of women, the vicious repression of human rights and suppression of democratic principles. The only thing it can articulate is a naive and dangerous blame-America-first rhetoric as the root of all problems in the world today.
This hypocrisy is at its zenith in the case of Iraq. For years the left criticized the UN sanctions against Iraq. These sanctions left the Iraqi population debased and demoralized, with dismal health care and a falling standard of living. Though this decay of Iraqi society was due explicitly to Saddam Hussein's exploitation of the sanctions to enrich himself on the lucrative oil black market while he ignored the suffering of his own people, the left called the UN's attempts to contain Hussein genocide. Now, as America moves toward confronting Iraq over its failure to disarm, those same voices from the left praise those sanctions, speaking about them with a degree of reverence as the most intrusive and effective sanctions in history.
What the left does not want to confront in Iraq is that despite its international obligations, Iraq has failed to disarm peacefully. The model for Iraq is the previously successful disarmaments of the nuclear programs in Ukraine, South Africa and Kazakhstan. These countries invited inspectors and voluntarily rid themselves of weapons of mass destruction in a transparent fashion. Despite war, sanctions and UN agreements, Iraq -- which has proven time and time again that it is an expansionist regime bent on regional domination -- has not lived up to its obligations.
It's not simply that I'm against the peaceniks and for invading Iraq. My ambivalence is based on a strong distrust of President George W. Bush's administration, a distrust so profound that I find it hard to support any policy coming out of the White House. I find its cynical exploitation of the Iraqi use of unconventional weapons against the Iranians and the Kurds self-serving in light of the U.S. government's having been far from critical when those war crimes took place. The hubris of the Bush administration and its unilateral tendencies are counterproductive and ugly. Its case that the Iraqi regime is linked to al-Qaida is dubious, and having the Bush administration filled with former oil executives makes people justifiably suspicious about its intentions in the oil-rich Middle East.
But those who claim that the question of invading is solely one of oil interest are mistaken. If the only thing America is interested in is oil in the Middle East, it would have sold out Israel many years ago. Instead, America's policy on Israel is one of principle in supporting the only democratic nation in the Middle East, particularly as it suffers from a wave of homicidal fanatics blowing themselves up and taking with them as many innocent civilians as possible.
Rather than seeking to turn Iraq into its own personal gas station, America's goal is to take the first steps that will help pull the Arab world out of the quagmire that it finds itself in. The UN Arab Development report says that 60 percent of the Arab population is illiterate and that the combined gross domestic products of all Arab nations equals that of Spain. These shocking facts have clearly contributed to the reason the Arab world has proven to be fertile ground for extremists who wish to target Western society. The rhetoric of Islamic extremism is intoxicating for a broad mass of disaffected young men in Arab countries because those governments have failed to provide them with a future and have viciously repressed dissent. What has resulted from repression is a tidal wave of human missiles who have given up on the possibilities of this life and are banking on the promises of an afterlife of martyrdom. Problems are seldom solved with bombs, and war is not an attractive option. But I believe in universal values and I think those in the Arab world also deserve them, even if it means a risky cultural intervention.
I stand solidly with the left on social issues such as abortion, legalization of drugs and prostitution and the struggle to defend civil liberties. But I will not march with the peace movement because it is not a constructive vehicle to bring about change and is dangerously contributing to a polarized world. Whether it is the fashionable objectification of the Palestinian cause or the delusional view of America as an evil menace bent on controlling the world, the left has lost touch with reality and succumbed to perilous delusions. |
