4/10/05:US OCCUPATION OF IRAQ-ROOTCAUSE FOR VIOLENCE(R.FISK, ABC/TV)

fwd-8-Oct-2005

[AddedNOte: This ABC interview with Robert Fisk, a respected Mid-East
Journalist, certainly explore into the depth of problems in Iraq.
Salient points that I saw here are:

1. Americans and the West still need to recoginse the root causes
of increasing terrorism (in Iraq and elsewhere) are the illegal
occupation of Iraq;

2. The existence of American troops in Iraq are fueling insurgency.
To end this insurgency and violence in Iraq, American troops MUST
leave;

3. The Americans may not 'cut-and-run' for legitimate reasons. The
US Administration must fine an exist strategy.

The conversation about Iraq was somewhat distracted by Tony Jones
(ABC reporter) wanting to discuss bombing incidents in Indonesia.
Nevertheless, this interview is a very enlightening one for the
situation in Iraq. ABC should be congratulated for this.

Those who are not in Australia, you can listen to the interview
at the ABC/lateline website. ABC has done their audios nicely.

-- Regards, U Ne Oo]
---------------------------


Australian Broadcasting Corporation

TV PROGRAM TRANSCRIPT

LOCATION: http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2005/s1474704.htm

Broadcast: 04/10/2005

TERRORISM REACTION, NOT ADDRESSING THE CAUSE, FISK.

Reporter: Tony Jones

TONY JONES: Well, returning to our top story. And on Saturday night,
as the bombs were going off in Bali, Robert Fisk was delivering the
Edward Said Memorial Lecture at Adelaide University. As Middle East
correspondent for The Independent, Robert Fisk has been based in
Beirut for more than 25 years and has seen firsthand the growth of
terrorism in that region and across the world. And in his new book The
Great War for Civilisation - The Conquest of the Middle East he
compares the history of the British in Iraq in the 1920s with events
unfolding in that country today. He joins me now from our Canberra
studio. Robert Fisk, thanks very much for being there.

ROBERT FISK, WRITER AND JOURNALIST: Thank you.

TONY JONES: Jihadist extremism has spawned countless suicide
terrorists from New York to London, from Baghdad to Bali. How do you
stop them without generating a general conflict between Islam and the
West?

ROBERT FISK: Well, I don't think this is a question of intelligence
agencies or draconian legislation. At the end of the day, we've got to
say, "Look, these people come from or think they come from a part of
the world which clearly has many problems." I'm talking about the
Middle East. I mean, after the crimes against humanity of September
11th, 2001, we were discouraged from saying, "Why? Why did this
happen?" We knew who did it - in this case, 19 Arabs flying
aeroplanes. How did they do it? Planes, box-cutters, tall
buildings. But the moment you asked why - in other words, the motive
for the crime, which is something any ordinary policeman asks of any
crime - you were told merely to ask the question why it was to be
pro-terrorist to support the enemies of democracy, etc. But I think we
do have to ask the question why, and we have to say, "What has
happened in the Middle East to produce an environment from which these
people can come?" We are not condoning what they do, the wickedness of
bombing innocent people, but we do need to ask, "What's wrong in the
Middle East?" and that means dealing with injustices that exist there
- injustices which the Australian Government, the British Government,
the American Government could deal with or try to deal with if they
wish.

But I think we're spending far too much time on, you know,
mainframe computers, listening to telephones, legislation, than we
should be in dealing with actual human problems that exist on the
ground. You've just brought up the British. Let's look at the British
in Iraq in 1917. We invaded. We announced in a document, which I have
hanging on my library wall, "We come here," we said to the Iraqi
people in 1917, "not as conquerors, but as liberators to free you from
generations of tyranny." Sound familiar? We then had an insurrection
in 1920, we bombarded Fallujah, similar to the Americans. We
surrounded Najaf, we demanded the surrender of Shi'ite clerics, we
said there would be civil war if the British Army left and, indeed,
British intelligence in 1920 said that terrorists were crossing the
border from Syria. Now, we can go on repeating history endlessly, just
as we are now. This is fingerprint parallel history. But at the end of
the day, we've got to say, "Hang on a second. There are problems
here. How do we deal with them?" And unless we deal with them, we are
not going to be safe. By "we", I mean the West, us.

TONY JONES: Alright. Just for a moment I'm putting aside Iraq and
indeed the Middle East, because these issues get exported to Muslim
countries even like Indonesia. Now, it's much harder to point the
finger and say there's a general level of injustice in Indonesia, the
largest Muslim country in the world, and yet we've seen now three
major bombing efforts directed against the West plus many others
against other Indonesians inside Indonesia. How do these things get
exported, these grievances, and transplanted into countries where they
ought not be?

ROBERT FISK: Well, you say they ought not be. If they are Muslim
countries there will be people there with very strong feelings about
what is happening in the Middle East, just as, for example, the Pope
in the 11th century was very worried about what was happening to
Christians in the Middle East and that started the Crusades. Again,
we're not condoning the wickedness of killing innocent people and we
have to say, "What was Bali? What were the two sets of bombings in
Bali? Were they not really an attack on the Australians?" Wasn't July
7th an attack on the British? Of course it was, on the tube train
system.

TONY JONES: Let me pull you up there and we'll take the first Bali
bombing, for example.

ROBERT FISK: Yes.

TONY JONES: They were in 2002. More than 200 Western tourists and
Balinese were killed in those, but they were long before the invasion
of Iraq.

ROBERT FISK: Yeah, but they were after Afghanistan, weren't they?

TONY JONES: So there's a problem with the invasion of Afghanistan? The
problem is, the problem is that 88 Australians died in the Bali
bombings. In one of his rambling justifications for these kind of
terrorist acts, Osama bin Laden pointed the finger and said
Australians were targeted in Bali because they intervened in East
Timor.

ROBERT FISK: Yes. I think the East Timor thing is a lie by Osama bin
Laden - I don't think that's what it is about. But, you see, we can go
on trying to distance the wickedness done to us from the events on the
ground by saying like Tony Blair does, "Oh, it's nothing to do with
Iraq. It is evil ideology. They are against our society. They are
against our democracy. They are against our freedoms."

TONY JONES: It clearly was - my point about what happened in Bali, it
was clearly -

ROBERT FISK: No, let me just finish. A lot of Muslims, I think, would
like these freedoms we have. They would like freedom from us to some
extent. But you see, over and over again our problem is we have major
problems in the Middle East, and somehow we've got to deal with them
and bring some justice to the Middle East, and as long as we don't, as
long as we in various military operations in the Muslim world, as the
British have done, as the Australians have done, as the Spanish did,
but no longer, we are going to have problems and we have got to
somehow deal with that. Now, just saying as we do now, "OK, well the
wickedness of Bali..." Of course it was wicked. Innocent people - it's
an atrocity against humanity.

But we have to make a connection at some
point between what we as independent free Western nations do in other
people's countries and at the moment we have a large number of Western
- between what we as independent free Western nations do in other
people's countries and at the moment we have a large number of Western
- I suppose we would once have said "Christian", but there aren't a
lot of Christians left - countries involved in the Muslim world, and
this is creating enormous friction. And when we have these atrocities,
we can't say, "Oh, it's nothing to do with what we do in the Muslim
world. No, no, it's nothing to do with us". It is. It must have a
connection. It clearly does. It does with the July 7 bombings in
London. Even Blair is remaining silent now about his "evil ideology"
line.

TONY JONES: Alright, but you seem to be ignoring the people that
actually generate the terrorism. I'm thinking in this case, for
example, in Indonesia the spiritual leader of Jemaah Islamiah, Abu
Bakar Bashir, the cleric. He gave an extensive interview just recently
in which he openly justifies suicide bombing and goes on to say that
the West, especially America, are the natural and constant enemies of
Islam. Now, his idea is that there will be a never ending war. If
people like that are teaching young Muslims how to think about the
West, we're in trouble, aren't we?

ROBERT FISK: Well, it was President Bush - if I may do a little bit of
adding on here - who announced to us not long ago that the war against
terror would never end. It seems to me both our leaders and their
however terrorist or mad or whatever you want to call them leaders
were all promising each other everlasting war. This is insanity. What
we are talking about is how to protect in the most basic thing. Or in
my case, I'd like to protect British people. I'd like Americans
protected. But just to say, "Intelligence, intelligence, terrorist,
terrorist, terrorist, and then, draconian legislation will not protect
Australians, or British, or Americans. We've got to deal with serious
issues here.

TONY JONES: But Robert, how do you protect Australians against someone
like Abu Bakar Bashir -

ROBERT FISK: You keep quoting this guy like he's some kind of
philosopher king. He's not.

TONY JONES: But he is to the people who are blowing themselves up,
that's the point.

ROBERT FISK: No, he's not. That's the whole point. He's not.

TONY JONES: He says, "The prophet Mohammed has decreed that Islam must
win and the Westerners will be destroyed. If they want to have peace,
they will have to accept to be governed by Islam." Now, this man has
been teaching large numbers of Indonesian students to think like this.

ROBERT FISK: Yes, but look, if you're going to take and quote so
seriously people who have no serious backing or philosophical
understanding of Islam themselves, and then put them, as you do, quote
them now to me and I can quote them back to you. I've met bin Laden
three times, I've listened to the real thing. And believe me, it's
even more boring than what you're reading now. The fact of the matter
is - get rid of these people out of your mind for the moment. They're
the guys who are bad, they're the guys who are calling for suicide
bombings, yes. But we have to deal with real facts on the ground, and
most of them are in the Middle East and we will not do so.

I notice every time I raise the issue of the Middle East with you, we
come back to Indonesia again. But there are connections between
Indonesia and the Middle East - with Indonesia and Libya, actually as
well. There are direct connections between al-Qaeda and
Indonesia. You've said that on your program. We need the talk about
the Middle East and we will not do so, and even you on this program -
and with much respect, we're talking as journalists together - you
don't want to make that connection, and that connection exists and
unless we make it, we are in danger.

TONY JONES: You are making that connection, but I'm asking you also to
reflect upon the people who are driving the terrorists to blow
themselves up.

ROBERT FISK: I meet them. I don't have to reflect upon them. I meet
these wretched people! I have to listen to them directly.

TONY JONES: How do you stop Osama bin Laden?

ROBERT FISK: You have to take -

TONY JONES: You say it is incredibly hard to talk to them. How do you
deal with it?

ROBERT FISK: You have to take away from them the ability to use
injustice for their own aims and we will not do that and we must ,
because unless we do that we - and I mean you and me together - are
not safe.

TONY JONES: Alright. Let's go to the burning issue of the day, which
is Iraq. How do you see that ending? I know that one of your - in one
of your recent interviews, you've essentially said the only way it can
end is for a new government to be dually constituted in Iraq and for
them to basically force the Western troops out.

ROBERT FISK: Well, look, the equation in Iraq is this: The Americans
must leave. The Americans will leave. But the Americans can't
leave. That's the equation that turns sand into blood. How do you get
a situation where you have an Iraqi state which runs itself, but which
doesn't feel it is living under occupation, which it is. There are
135,000 American troops there. We both know that if the national
export of Iraq was asparagus or carrots, they wouldn't be there. It's
because it's an oil state. We wouldn't have again there if asparaguses
were the national export. The reality is that we have vast numbers of
Western troops in a Muslim country with total anarchy, except in the
far north in the Kurdish areas, and we can't stop the anarchy or
produce security. We are having Wal-Mart suicide bombers. I mean, it
is worse than you are making it out to be.

I remember when the Hezbollah were fighting Israelis in southern
Lebanon, it was one a month, then with the Palestinians and the
Israelis, it was one a week, and now it is seven a day. I mean, I
don't know where they come from - Saudi Arabia, if you want to say
literally - but how do you deal with this? The Americans can't control
Iraq. The British can't control Iraq. Look at the pictures we saw the
other day from Basra. Certainly the Australians are having to protect
Japanese in Iraq. We have here a hell of a disaster and it needs to be
brought under control. Instead of that, what are we doing? We say
things are getting better. The path to freedom is opening. More
democracy is coming. I remember Bush saying, "Very soon the Arab
states will all want to imitate Iraq". No they won't.

TONY JONES: You tell us your view on how to make things better, how
time prove the situation which is clearly deteriorating day by day?

ROBERT FISK: Well, that's an admission. Look, the first thing that
must happen is - the first thing that will happen is that the
Americans will talk to the insurgents. In small scale ways, they
already are. In places like Mosul, you are finding a marine sergeant
talking to a local guy saying "We won't do our patrols tonight if you
don't mortar us". That's how it begins. The real problem for the
Americans is how you make the connection. You know in the Algerian war
when the French were trying to get away from Algeria, they constantly
looked for mediators. (Speaks French) Turns out the French murdered
most of them so they couldn't find a way out.


But with the Americans, they need to find a way of negotiating with
the resistance, insurgents, call them what you will, so they could
find an avenue out. It is actually my belief, after a lot of work on
the subject, there is a faction of the insurgents within the present
Iraqi government. The Americans can do it within the structure of
democracy that was set up by the elections that took place on January
30th this year, which I was present for in Baghdad. If that can
happen, if we can have a narrative dialogue between the Americans and
some of those who are involved in resisting violently the presence of
foreign troops, then we can see the beginning of some kind of
structure by which the Americans can get out and the government of
Iraq can say, "We would like all foreign troops to leave by January
23rd", you name the day. At which point the Americans can say, "We
have victory - democratic government. We can leave." They go.

It will not produce the government we want. It will not produce human
rights. It will not produce protection for women, I'm sorry to
say. But it will end up with a government that has a kind of
insurgency, fragile partly democratically elected government,
authority. It certainly is not what I would like to see in Iraq. It's
not what you would like, but it's probably the only way out at the
moment.

TONY JONES: Robert Fisk, there's much, much more to talk about. We
will have to leave it for another occasion, though. We thank you very
much for being here tonight in Canberra.

ROBERT FISK: You're welcome. You're welcome. Thank you. (Laughs)
--
http://netipr.org/~uneoo/ (Burma HR Activity)
http://netipr.org/saorg/ (Refugee Rights Activity)
emails: uneoo@xxxxxxxxxx druneoo@xxxxxxxxxxx
POST: Dr U Ne Oo, 18 Shannon Place,Adelaide SA5000,AUSTRALIA
.

Relevant Pages