TERROR THROUGH A MORAL LENS
- From: Raymond <Bluerhymer@xxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 28 Feb 2008 19:18:45 -0800 (PST)
TERROR THROUGH A MORAL LENS, Part 2
The star-spangled delusion
ASIA TIMES
By David Young
Countries that - whether by lack of desire or capacity - enable
militant groups to attack soft and hard targets of the US and its
allies abroad. We negotiate and are explicitly allied with Pakistan's
dictator President Pervez Musharraf, who consistently strikes deals
with Pashtun militants (some Taliban, some not) promising them free
reign to smuggle copious amounts of opium out of Afghanistan and
attack North Atlantic Treaty Organization forces there.
In exchange, Musharraf solicits empty assurances that his own regime
will not be the target of their aggression. These assurances have
proven useless to a crippled Musharraf, but
regardless, these assurances were and are, in fact, negotiated. More
importantly, in the weeks after 9/11, because we zeroed in on Osama
bin Laden and his sponsoring Taliban regime in Afghanistan, we had no
choice but to buy Musharraf's cooperation - as limited as it certainly
has been.
Likewise, we negotiate oil prices with Near East tyrants because we
are "addicted to oil", as Bush has said, even though the greatest
beneficiaries to these deals often dedicate their wealth to
terrorizing Americans and our allies in the region. Now, after nearly
five years of stubborn self-delusion, we have decided to initiate the
early stages of a very quiet and important negotiation with the
Islamic regime in Iran over the stability of Iraq and Iran's nuclear
weapons program.
In fact, even if our government did not negotiate with terrorists and
their respective sponsors on a regular basis, the American government
negotiates under countless other types of severe duress, which we
strangely regard as benign "diplomacy". We negotiate with China about
import-export tariffs that cost Americans hundreds of thousands of
jobs because we believe that this benefits our nation in the long run.
We negotiate with Mexico over illegal immigrants because we are
worried about Latino contributions to America's melting pot.
When the Soviet Union inserted nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles into
Cuba, we negotiated with them (though in secret) because, in order for
us to pose an effective nuclear deterrence, we had to have more
warning than the few seconds it would take for those missiles to reach
Miami some 140 kilometers away. Under unfathomable duress, we eagerly
negotiated during these 13 incomparable days.
Countless nations would add terrorism and kidnapping to the above list
of obviously worrisome but normal forms of "leverage" - exceptionally
persuasive leverage, but leverage nonetheless. In contrast, we see
kidnapping and terrorism as extortion, and (ironically) our elected
leaders actually feed into this delusion for the same reason that they
negotiate with our enemies: they have to. Grounded in reality, they
are compelled by a landscape that offers no other way to keep
themselves and America at the head of the table.
Compromise is not a moral imperative, but rather a distinctly
political one. So if we are repulsed by foreign insistence that we
negotiate under duress, then this repulsion has nothing to do with
morality, but is instead the standard and understandable reaction of
any party facing a tactical disadvantage in negotiations. Employing
moral rhetoric enables us to cope with feelings of utter impotence.
Yet even if our resolve was, in fact, based on moral considerations,
then we would be fooling ourselves to think we are able to measure up
to these standards in a world that is already brimming with compromise
at every turn.
Cont'd
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/JB16Ak04.html
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