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For the arrogance of power
America now pays a terrible price
By JONATHAN POWER
September 12, 2001
LONDON - The American nation appears not only
immensely distressed and
angry about the bombings but surprised too. It
cannot understand why anyone
should be moved by such hatred against it and,
inured from the rest of us by
the isolationism of most of its political
representatives and its media, it has
little idea of the currents swirling against it.
An event of this magnitude was not only
unimagined, it was unimaginable. Yet
long before George Bush became president with his
forceful in-your-face,
take-it-or-leave-it attitude to the world outside
on issues as diverse as global
warming and anti-missile defences, America has
been turning in on itself, to
the point of self-destructiveness.
William Pfaff, the astute American commentator,
wrote recently that "America
is a dangerous nation while remaining a righteous
one" and America's
pre-eminent foreign policy observer, George
Kennan, ambassador to the
Soviet Union during Stalin's time, wrote quite a
few years ago, "I do not think
that the United States civilization of these last
40-50 years is a successful
civilization. I think this country is destined to
succumb to failures which cannot
be other than tragic and enormous in their
scope." And later added that for
Americans "to see ourselves as the centre of
political enlightenment and
teachers to a great part of the rest of the world
[is] unthought-through,
vainglorious and undesirable."
It would be misunderstanding human nature to
believe that most Americans
want to hear such thoughts played back to them on
their day of grief, victims of
an evil deed that compares with the worst of the
blood-stained twentieth
century. Yet they have to know that action
produces reaction and not for
nothing is anti-American resentment on the
increase all over the world, not
least in Europe where there is some astonishment
at the way the new
American administration has ploughed ahead with
its self-interested agenda
as if no one else has a legitimate opinion or
could perhaps view the same
situation in a different light.
Foreign observers do not miss the reports that
come out of Pentagon think
tanks of America's need to use this special
moment after the defeat of
European communism and the break up of the Soviet
Union to make sure that
America is militarily superior the world over,
and that no one, not even its
closest allies, should be in a position to tell
it what to do.
The U.S. began the new millennium as the most
heavily militarised nation on
earth. It is the U.S., which poses the military
threat to others. At the outbreak of
the Second World War the U.S. army was only
174,000 men. Today it has 1.4
million in its "standing army" and a ready
reserve and National Guard
numbering 2.5 million. Despite the end of the
Cold War, under President Bill
Clinton the U.S. made only a paltry effort to
wind down the nuclear arsenals of
the superpowers, and instead provocatively
insisted on expanding Nato close
to Russia's borders. The Bush administration with
its declared ambition to
abandon the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty,
solemnly signed by Richard Nixon
and Leonid Brezhnev, seems unconcerned that this
will set in motion events
that will unwind hard won international norms on
ending nuclear testing and on
the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, even
hinting that it will understand if
China has to increase its nuclear forces or test
new nuclear weapons.
I have talked to a range of ordinary Europeans in
the last 24 hours and they all
say, in the face of the earnest
shoulder-to-shoulder rhetoric of their leaders,
that America has got itself into this hole by its
own disregard for what others
think.
The first law of holes, of course, is to stop
digging - which, of course, is what
Washington should firmly have told Israel six
presidents ago when it started its
foolish and counterproductive policy of building
settlements on what everyone
knew was Palestinian land. Amazingly, the policy
continues with apparent
understanding from the Bush administration. While
Arab governments ring
their hands, and young Palestinians fight one of
the best trained armies in the
world with stones, there are the inevitable few
attached to the Palestinian
cause who are moved towards serious violence -
the suicide bombers and,
we don't know yet, although it is the most likely
explanation, the destroyers of
the World Trade Centre.
In every political movement - whether it be the
Palestinians or the globalisation
protestors in Genoa there are fringe elements
that advocate violence. This
does not mean the mainstream of that movement is
wrong. It might or might
not be. But, right or wrong, there will always be
powerful elements of truth
contained within it, or the passions and purpose
would never be ignited.
To meet it eye for eye and tooth for tooth, as
Gandhi once said, is to make
everybody blind.
America right now is a repository of exhausted
ideas, like dead stars. The
arrogance of power has produced its inevitable
reaction. America is
threatened not by nuclear tipped missiles from
unknown rogue nations, but by
small groups of angry men who, although prisoners
of their zealotry, know well
enough that much of the world whilst not agreeing
with them understands their
frustration. To deal with this effectively
requires a new way of looking at the
world.
George Kennan, the late Senator William
Fulbright, Willam Pfaff and others
have been arguing what this might be for a long
time. On this sad and tragic
day one wishes their pens could become mightier
than America's sword.
I can be reached by phone +44 7785 351172 and
e-mail:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Copyright C 2001 By JONATHAN POWER
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