INNATE 96, February 2002: Editorial

Headytorial:
Afghan Aftermath
It is too early to say how things will turn out in Afghanistan - we said this in our last editorial in December. This is not in the sense of denying that the Taliban and al-Qaeda elements in the country have been roundly defeated, despite pockets of resistance, but that how the future looks is still uncertain. Maybe the intervention of the USA and its allies will usher in a golden era of cooperation and peaceful development. Maybe. And maybe not. What cannot be said is that al-Qaeda and its leadership have been destroyed. Maybe the lesson of violence they will learn from the war is to be even more ruthless next time.

The USA is a predominantly 'Christian' country with a higher attendance at Christian churches than most. US Christians turned to their faith, and undoubtedly people of other faiths to their own, following the 11th September. What is strange in all this is how what can be called 'the hidden gospel of nonviolence' in Christianity - which echoes the 'Golden Rule' in all world religions of doing to others as you would like done to you - became not only hidden but invisible.

Christians are taught by their founder that 'an eye for an eye' is an outdated concept and that a difficult path of forgiveness is necessary. Yet we have seen the USA killing more civilians in Afghanistan than were killed in the al-Qaeda attacks on the USA on 11th September. 'An eye for an eye' was a limiting rule; it meant you should not take retribution beyond the evil done to you. What we have seen in the case of the USA's war in Afghanistan is that more 'eyes' of innocent Afghan people have been taken than the 'eyes' destroyed on 11th September. So it would be difficult to justify this taking of life even by the old Hebrew precept of 'an eye for an eye' - which implied taking the perpetrator's eye, not that of an innocent third party.

The plight of prisoners from Afghanistan held in the USA's enclave in Cuba (what on earth beyond US military interests justifies the US presence there?) is a human rights issue. Denying they are 'prisoners of war' may rebound on the USA in years to come when its soldiers are captured. But this issue is nothing compared to the issues of life and death in Afghanistan itself.

The bulk of Afghani people were undoubtedly glad to be freed of the Taliban yoke. But how the USA intervened, and how fixated the USA has been on 11th September when tragedies of a similar scale happen around the world with regularity - admittedly some not as a result of direct human actions - does not augur well for the future. Some in the USA have been asking the right questions about the nature of the USA as a world power and its presence on the world stage. But, we have said it before and we will unfortunately say it again, it seems to be the lot of world superpowers of whatever era to see themselves in a far more benevolent light than the bulk of the world sees them. 'Might is right' gets cloaked in humanitarian phrases which, when analysed, are the same old story of self interest and self delusion.