Letter to US Ambassador on Guantanamo

by Justin Morahan - Peace People Wed Oct 12, 2005 18:30

BP: I oppose all war, all torture, all oppression, all barbarity whatever the source or stated reason given for same. I thought you knew that. May I take it from the language you use to describe the blowing to bits of British soldiers and a British politician that you yourself are not a pacifist. Positions stated?

If someone publicly praises my "great work" in publishing facts about torture, and in the same breath (as my mother used to say) tells me that the torture which I condemn "will ignite the the feelings of 20 million Muslims" who support Al Qaeda, it's hardly imprudent of me to make clear that that is not my intention

I don't know exactly where you yourself stand with regard to Al Qaeda, suicide bombing or beheading. My reading of your comment suggests that you are saying the "just cause people" in any conflict can do anything they like. Is this reading wrong? (Mr Bush, who believes his cause is just, works on the same principle).

Although we agree on the wrongness of the torture of the Guantanamo prisoners, we appear to hold different viewpoints and work from a different ethic. .

However, just because you state your viewpoint which is very different to mine, I won't accuse you of "simplistic, hysterical moral lecturing" and I won't patronise you by saying that you are "sensitive" or that you are "springing at the slightest hint of a stain upon your motives to extremely defensive mode"

(B)PS: Salaam, Shalom

by BP Wed Oct 12, 2005 04:12

... but you have to remember and accept that knowledge is power, and the collective response of the Muslim/Arab section of the world to this barbarity and similar now openly practised against them with utter contempt will be a function of their very great and understandable anger - true, it is indeed a fearful prospect to consider what the consequences will be for the aggressor nations, and as collateral damage certainly a great many of their innocent civilians - but that is their (and by extension our perhaps unwilling) look-out. This truth does not render invalid anything Michael has just said, it simply reinforces the imperative to stop provoking the inevitable retaliation and mutual escalation cycle now building.

Any student of history and Irish/British inter-relations can tell you that the Irish wars of Independance and subsequently for/in the North were relatively tame affairs, in which rather gentlemanly 'game rules' were by-and-large (ahem, *take pinch of salt here*) adhered to (on behalf of the IRA, they were always sub-consciously thankful for this small mercy; on behalf of the Brits, because it suited them down to the ground)

Maggie and suchlike ideological radicals threatened to upset the whole apple (or shit) cart and were neutralised or disposed of on both sides. However, do you seriously really think that if Maggie had entered into a no-holds-barred by-jingo military 'final solution' to the 'NI problem', as she most assuredly wanted to do after the humiliating smokings inflicted on Airey Neave at Westminster, her own arse skimmed of whiskers at Brighton Hotel, the dearly beloved Royal Marines at Warrenpoint, etc. etc., that there would not have been a, by military logic completely consequent, and for the ordinary population of Britain, very terrible, response by the thus challenged, boosted and unleashed IRA and its allied organisations?

We all know the answer to that one, and that is precisely why the Brit Army always held back in recent decades from the gung-ho solely militaristic approach in Ireland - they were/are not stupid, have long experience in colonial control and always harboured a healthy private respect for the tenactiy and capabilities of Irish fighters to inflict crippling levels of counter-damage to their system.

There is not the slightest doubt in my mind that had the Brits during this time treated northern Catholics/Nationalists in the same way the US now does Muslim/Arabs, and had better tactics/weapons not been readily available for retaliation, then the ubiquitous suicide-bomber might well have been invented and literally 'tested to destruction' (also a pun) by irish nationalist resistance forces in NI and Britain.

This is not heinous heresy, Justin, it's simply an obvious, cold conclusion drawn from any cursory understanding of human history.

Michael did not suggest by any stretch of the imagination that you 'condone suicide bombing' or wished to 'influence ...[whoever]... to ... acts of terror', any more than he suggests you support force-feeding hunger-strikers or indeed anybody. You are obviously sensitive about these issues, but springing at the slightest hint of a stain upon your obviously pacifist motives to extremely defensive mode is of no help either.

Because then the simplistic, hysterical moral lecturing sets in - to wit: 'Suicide bombings are totally repugnant to me', etc., etc. Why this special, selective, moral condemnation of war tactics employed by one side only? What about more technological solutions by the other side which produce the same results?

Has anyone, except torture-meister Uncle Sam and his apologists suggested that the detainees in Guantanamo are guilty of anything at all, never mind the "blood on the hands of AQ"?

In short, Justin - yes, you seriously misread and over-react to Michael's post, but not because of any inaccuracy or illogical thought-process expressed in it, indeed, I venture to guess it was these very qualities which provoked you.

Now, let us look back at the scale of the current problem originally referred to by Michael, and the relative strengths of the major protagonists involved in the, quite literally, no-holds-barred war now in progress and looking a safe bet to very considerably heat up before it begins to cool down - high-tech weaponry, economic advancement and gigantic political influence are currently stacked to the advantage of the US and its NATO asswipes in their drive for US global domination, but sheer numbers and back-against-the-wall desperation are with their Muslim/Arab foe. And this is a fluid situation, nothing lasts forever.

In fact, you'd have to be pretty arrogant, foolhardy and historically ignorant to take on 2 billion Muslims/Arabs in asymmetric (guerilla/terrorist, as you will) warfare on their own home soil, plus also a good slice of the rest of the world (the poor, workers) who will tend (eventually) to sympathise with their (more) just cause, unless you are able and prepared to literally wipe them all out before they can marshall a commensurate and potentially crushing response. Tragically, the Bush-Man fulfills the first three says requisites admirably, and there is vanishingly little reason to doubt him, with regard to the last, when he or the system he fronts for says that literally *all options* are on the table. Which is grim, no doubt.

But all this is somehow reminiscent of the German III Reich v UdSSR crunch of 1941-45. In that case the cocksure Uebermenschen mentality suffered a pasting it should never have forgotten - Germans at least will never forget it. Talk about asymmetric warfare! The Russians were literally clogging the German cannons with their mounds of fallen - bait in a honeytrap - and the Nazi's laughed all the way to Stalingrad as they mowed down everything in their path. But there was no laughing on the way back, for the very few who made it.

Yes, no historical comparison can be fully compelling, but the Iraqi Resistance is certainly finding the feet-of-clay of the supposedly unstoppable US military behemoth, while on another fronts intense challenges to US economic, political and ideological hegemony are gathering real heads of steam, sapping the power of the beast. With the best will in the world, it is difficult to see the much-vaunted nascent US-empire holding together for another 20 years, never mind a whole 'New American Century' as proposed by PNAC-certified lunatics, whose brains have sadly been deprived of air since the days of Smokin' Joe McCarthy.

How to effectively hasten the day of that glorious supernova-like system implosion and fresh start for mankind, now that would be an interesting topic for exploration - anyone?

by Justin Morahan - Peace People Tue Oct 11, 2005 22:25

Michael's praise, although apparently sincere, gives me the shudders. I do not condone suicide bombing, and influencing Al Qaeda at however a remote distance to promote these or other acts of terror is not part of my agenda. Suicide bombings are totally repugnant to me. Sending out children whose bodies have been strapped in with bombs in order to kill themselves and others is heinous. Beheading hostages likewise.
The hunger strikers in Guantanamo have been charged with no crime and cannot be tainted with the blood on the hands of Al Qaeda.
Maybe I have misread your comment Michael but if so you can put me right.
Thanks Mary for your own generous words.

by Michael Tue Oct 11, 2005 11:53

Brilliant work Justin and thanks for the information.

Besides the horrendous treatment these human beings are receiving, this treatment will slowly become more and more exposed to the world and will further ignite the feelings of the 10 or 20 million estimated Muslims who support the ideals of those espoused by such groups as Al Quaida. The harsh line taken by the British Government under Margaret Thatcher and the brutality of Internment serves as just one warning of what this kind of horrendous treatment will ultimately lead to.

by Mary Kelly Mon Oct 10, 2005 22:47

Guantanamo is laid at door of US Embassy in Dublin.
Thanks Justin for putting it up to them, and opening up this horrifying situation to us.