Australia, East Timor, & Conscription

Yoshie Furuhashi furuhashi.1 at osu.edu
Fri Sep 24 05:34:32 PDT 1999


Gary MacLennan wrote on Lou's marxism list: ***** Date: Fri, 24 Sep 1999 12:00:20 +1000 From: Gary MacLennan <g.maclennan at qut.edu.au> Subject: The fruits of our great victory in East Timor To: marxism at lists.panix.com

This morning, the Prime Minister of Australia announced that he was considering the reintroduction of conscription. This is terrible news for us and it shows the extent to which the government has played the East Timor issue to strengthen its imperialistic ambitions.

I have no idea whether DSP will oppose conscription or not. Who can say with Social Democrats? It should of course put an end to their stupid claim to have forced the government to send troops to East Timor. But I doubt it will do that. They will retreat even further into the laager and throw shit over the walls at their left critics. *****

One of the reasons these military interventions are fought in the name of "humanitarianism" is to overcome one of the remaining effects of the Vietnam War: many people's opposition (in America, Australia, and elsewhere) to see their own countrymen dying in a protracted war. (Alas, people now don't mind seeing Iraquis, Yugoslavs, etc. dead.) In this regard, it isn't conservatives but liberals and social democrats who are helping this process of fully getting rid of the "Vietnam syndrome."

Yoshie



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