http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,788470,00.html
The Guardian (London) Monday September 9, 2002
by Noam Chomsky
DRAIN THE SWAMP AND THERE WILL BE NO MORE MOSQUITOES
By attacking Iraq, the US will invite a new wave of terrorist attacks
===========
September 11 shocked many Americans into an awareness that they had better
pay much closer attention to what the US government does in the world and
how it is perceived. Many issues have been opened for discussion that were
not on the agenda before. That's all to the good.
It is also the merest sanity, if we hope to reduce the likelihood of
future atrocities. It may be comforting to pretend that our enemies "hate
our freedoms," as President Bush stated, but it is hardly wise to ignore
the real world, which conveys different lessons.
The president is not the first to ask: "Why do they hate us?" In a staff
discussion 44 years ago, President Eisenhower described "the campaign of
hatred against us [in the Arab world], not by the governments but by the
people". His National Security Council outlined the basic reasons: the US
supports corrupt and oppressive governments and is "opposing political or
economic progress" because of its interest in controlling the oil
resources of the region.
Post-September 11 surveys in the Arab world reveal that the same reasons
hold today, compounded with resentment over specific policies. Strikingly,
that is even true of privileged, western-oriented sectors in the region.
To cite just one recent example: in the August 1 issue of Far Eastern
Economic Review, the internationally recognised regional specialist Ahmed
Rashid writes that in Pakistan "there is growing anger that US support is
allowing [Musharraf's] military regime to delay the promise of democracy".
Today we do ourselves few favours by choosing to believe that "they hate
us" and "hate our freedoms". On the contrary, these are attitudes of
people who like Americans and admire much about the US, including its
freedoms. What they hate is official policies that deny them the freedoms
to which they too aspire.
For such reasons, the post-September 11 rantings of Osama bin Laden - for
example, about US support for corrupt and brutal regimes, or about the US
"invasion" of Saudi Arabia - have a certain resonance, even among those
who despise and fear him. From resentment, anger and frustration,
terrorist bands hope to draw support and recruits.
We should also be aware that much of the world regards Washington as a
terrorist regime. In recent years, the US has taken or backed actions in
Colombia, Nicaragua, Panama, Sudan and Turkey, to name a few, that meet
official US definitions of "terrorism" - that is, when Americans apply the
term to enemies.
In the most sober establishment journal, Foreign Affairs, Samuel
Huntington wrote in 1999: "While the US regularly denounces various
countries as 'rogue states,' in the eyes of many countries it is becoming
the rogue superpower ... the single greatest external threat to their
societies."
Such perceptions are not changed by the fact that, on September 11, for
the first time, a western country was subjected on home soil to a
horrendous terrorist attack of a kind all too familiar to victims of
western power. The attack goes far beyond what's sometimes called the
"retail terror" of the IRA, FLN or Red Brigades.
The September 11 terrorism elicited harsh condemnation throughout the
world and an outpouring of sympathy for the innocent victims. But with
qualifications.
An international Gallup poll in late September found little support for "a
military attack" by the US in Afghanistan. In Latin America, the region
with the most experience of US intervention, support ranged from 2% in
Mexico to 16% in Panama.
The current "campaign of hatred" in the Arab world is, of course, also
fuelled by US policies toward Israel-Palestine and Iraq. The US has
provided the crucial support for Israel's harsh military occupation, now
in its 35th year.
One way for the US to lessen Israeli-Palestinian tensions would be to stop
refusing to join the long-standing international consensus that calls for
recognition of the right of all states in the region to live in peace and
security, including a Palestinian state in the currently occupied
territories (perhaps with minor and mutual border adjustments).
In Iraq, a decade of harsh sanctions under US pressure has strengthened
Saddam Hussein while leading to the death of hundreds of thousands of
Iraqis - perhaps more people "than have been slain by all so-called
weapons of mass destruction throughout history", military analysts John
and Karl Mueller wrote in Foreign Affairs in 1999.
Washington's present justifications to attack Iraq have far less
credibility than when President Bush Sr was welcoming Saddam as an ally
and a trading partner after he had committed his worst brutalities - as in
Halabja, where Iraq attacked Kurds with poison gas in 1988. At the time,
the murderer Saddam was more dangerous than he is today.
As for a US attack against Iraq, no one, including Donald Rumsfeld, can
realistically guess the possible costs and consequences. Radical Islamist
extremists surely hope that an attack on Iraq will kill many people and
destroy much of the country, providing recruits for terrorist actions.
They presumably also welcome the "Bush doctrine" that proclaims the right
of attack against potential threats, which are virtually limitless. The
president has announced: "There's no telling how many wars it will take to
secure freedom in the homeland." That's true.
Threats are everywhere, even at home. The prescription for endless war
poses a far greater danger to Americans than perceived enemies do, for
reasons the terrorist organisations understand very well.
Twenty years ago, the former head of Israeli military intelligence,
Yehoshaphat Harkabi, also a leading Arabist, made a point that still holds
true. "To offer an honourable solution to the Palestinians respecting
their right to self-determination: that is the solution of the problem of
terrorism," he said. "When the swamp disappears, there will be no more
mosquitoes."
At the time, Israel enjoyed the virtual immunity from retaliation within
the occupied territories that lasted until very recently. But Harkabi's
warning was apt, and the lesson applies more generally.
Well before September 11 it was understood that with modern technology,
the rich and powerful will lose their near monopoly of the means of
violence and can expect to suffer atrocities on home soil.
If we insist on creating more swamps, there will be more mosquitoes, with
awesome capacity for destruction.
If we devote our resources to draining the swamps, addressing the roots of
the "campaigns of hatred", we can not only reduce the threats we face but
also live up to ideals that we profess and that are not beyond reach if we
choose to take them seriously.
