🚀 go-pugleaf

Folgenden Beitrag fand ich in den Newsgroups:
 alt.politics.clinton
 us.politics
 alt.politics.liberalism
 soc.culture.usa
 alt.current-events.usa

Wer will dort in Englisch mitdiskutieren,
bezw. f�r unsere Leute ins Deutsche �bersetzen ?
Wenn ich Zeit habe, (�ber Weihnachten) werde ich es versuchen,
ansonsten steht es nat�rlich jedem frei der Zeit und Lust dazu hat.
F�r mich ist dieser Beitrag wichtig, denn er zeigt das "andere" Amerika,
das Amerika das nicht Bomben wirft sondern vern�nftige Fragen stellt.

Taken from the World Socialist Web Site of the International Committee
of the Fourth International (ICFI):  http://www.wsws.org

The bombing of Iraq

A shameful chapter in American history

By Martin McLaughlin and David North
19 December 1998

Those who are responsible for the bombing of Iraq are writing a
shameful chapter in American history. Hundreds of Iraqi men,
women and children have already been killed or maimed by
American bombs and cruise missiles. The death toll from the air
war will mount far higher. Even the Pentagon had predicted more
than 10,000 would be killed in an onslaught of only medium
intensity, let alone in the full-scale attack which was unleashed on
December 16.

Putting aside for a moment the reactionary aims being pursued
by the Clinton Administration, the massive disparity between the
resources of the United States and those of Iraq endows a
nightmarish and criminal character to the actions taken by the
Pentagon. What is unfolding today in the Middle East resembles
not so much a war as a state-sanctioned execution. But in this
case, the victim is not an individual, strapped helplessly to a
gurney, but rather the unarmed population of a defenseless
country.

The White House, the Pentagon, the Congress, and, of course,
the media sing hymns of praise to "our heroic men and women in
the Persian Gulf." In reality, every American should feel deeply
ashamed of what these "heroes" are being ordered to do in the
name of the United States. "Heroism," at a minimum, involves a
serious element of risk and danger. "Heroes" are not those who
are willing to kill, but who are prepared to die. On the basis of this
definition, the people of Baghdad are far more deserving of
respect and admiration than those who are tormenting them from
the relative safety of their high-tech murder machines.

There is nothing particularly courageous about placing one�s
finger on a button to launch a cruise missile, while floating on a
naval vessel in the Persian Gulf or flying a B-52 bomber 1,000
miles from Baghdad.

In 1991 American soldiers in the Persian Gulf War had a lower
death rate than their counterparts who stayed home. More died of
traffic accidents than from Iraqi weapons. During the last seven
years, the risks facing American military personnel have been
even further reduced. US weaponry has been upgraded and
Iraq�s defenses have been virtually destroyed. Moreover,
American pilots are guided to their targets by intelligence
provided by UN weapons inspectors and spy satellites which
have scoured the Iraqi landscape continuously for the past eight
years.

As for the commanders who are in charge of this sordid
operation, history will judge them in much the same way as it
does the scoundrels who supervised the genocidal slaughter of
the Indians in the 1870s and 1880s. This much is certain: 50
years from now no one will be making films like Patton, The
Longest Day or Saving Pvt. Ryan about their exploits.

One need not agree with the politics of such World War II-era
commanders as Eisenhower, Bradley, Patton, and Nimitz to
acknowledge that they, at least, led their armies against an
enemy fully capable of firing back. Today's generals are nothing
more than bureaucrats of mass slaughter, working their way up
the Pentagon hierarchy, spending a term at the top issuing orders
to destroy helpless populations, then retiring to well-paid
positions on corporate boards or as "consultants" to the TV
networks covering the next American blitzkrieg.

The horrors of World War II evoked searing images that
profoundly influenced the political consciences of several
generations. Next to those produced by the opening of the Nazi
death camps, the most unforgettable images were those of the
German Luftwaffe raining bombs on defenseless populations �
above Warsaw, Rotterdam, and, most infamous of all, the
Basque village of Guernica. It was this last atrocity that was
transformed on the canvas of Picasso into a
universally-recognized expression of outrage against the
inhumanity of fascism.

Even though the United States was, for the most part, spared
much of the on-the-ground horrors of World War II, the event which
brought America into the war � the bombing of Pearl Harbor �
deeply aroused public opinion. There is, from the standpoint of
historical analysis, little doubt that the Roosevelt Administration
skillfully maneuvered the Japanese government into a situation in
which it had little choice but to go to war against the United
States. But the manner in which Japan initiated hostilities �
bombing Pearl Harbor without warning � outraged millions. For
decades to come, the phrase "sneak attack" was synonymous
with the basest form of treachery. Nearly 20 years after the end of
World War II, in 1962, during the missile crisis, among the
reasons given by Robert Kennedy for opposing an invasion of
Cuba was that such an action would require a "sneak attack" that
would blacken America�s historic reputation.

And yet, in 1998, the US government � without any fear of public
objection � declares openly that the bombing of Iraq began
without warning, let alone a formal declaration of war!

In no other supposedly democratic country is there such a
restricted range of political expression. A resolution endorsing
the military onslaught was passed by the House of
Representatives with only five dissenting votes.

The mass media � television, newspapers, radio � are thoroughly
integrated into the US war machine. There is no serious attempt
to evaluate the impact of the air raids or to communicate to the
American people the terrifying reality of modern war. The media
parrots the crudest Pentagon propaganda, presenting the
prospect of an antiseptic, risk-free war, in which thousands of
bombs and missiles can strike Iraq but kill only a few dozen
people.

The real death toll in that battered and starved country can be
better estimated by considering the blast which leveled the US
embassy in Kenya. If one primitive bomb, weighing about as
much as a single US cruise missile, could kill nearly 300 people,
what is to be expected from the impact of thousands of such
weapons striking Baghdad, a metropolis the size of Chicago?

The Clinton administration�s onslaught against Iraq takes
advantage of the political confusion which prevails in the working
class, exploiting naive patriotic sentiments and concern for sons
and daughters who joined the military, in large measure, because
of a lack of economic opportunity.

But the White House and the Pentagon are well aware of the
great reservoir of potential hostility to a new Gulf war. They
learned this in February, during the dress rehearsal for the current
attack, when administration spokesmen were denounced at a
public forum on the Iraq crisis at Ohio State University. The
subsequent decision to launch air strikes without prior warnings
or a lengthy media buildup was made, not so much to gain
tactical surprise in Iraq, but to present the American people with a
fait accompli.

No lie is too brazen, no explanation too absurd for the American
media. The contradictions in the official cover story mount from
day to day. When Clinton announced the attacks, he said their
target was Iraq�s mythical "weapons of mass destruction" �
nuclear, chemical and biological. But US spokesmen now
concede that not a single such facility has been hit by US
warplanes and cruise missiles. The reason given by the
Pentagon � a barefaced lie � is concern that Iraqi civilians could
be killed by the release of chemical or biological agents. The real
reason is that there are no weapons production facilities or
stockpiles, and the US military will not waste bombs or missiles
on facilities that do not exist.

The real targets of the bombing are Iraq�s conventional military
assets � troops, tanks, antiaircraft weapons � and its industrial
infrastructure. What the Pentagon calls the "capability" to produce
chemical or biological weapons are breweries, dairies, pesticide
factories and other facilities engaged in food-processing and
chemical manufacturing, commonplace in any industrialized
society

Once the truth emerges about the real nature of the US war
against Iraq, a wave of revulsion will be felt in the United States.

Readers: The WSWS invites your comments. Please send e-mail to :
editor@wsws.org