|| -----Original Message-----
|| From: Carrol Cox
(...)
|| Probably the
|| greatest use of terror in modern times was the U.S. bombing campaigns in
|| the Vietnam War.
(...)
Yes it'll be hard to top 3 million dead in Afghanistan but the terror tactics are the same. The civilian deaths matter is becoming clearer now with OTOH Afghan warlords calling airstrikes down on each other (as in the convoy of Karzai supporters that got bombed) and OTOH this report: ---------------------------------------- http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,2001570024-2002003499,00.html FRIDAY JANUARY 04 2002 US raid killed 25 children, says UN BY STEPHEN FARRELL AND ROLAND WATSON UNARMED women and children were chased and killed by American helicopters during an attack on an Afghan village that left 52 dead, the United Nations suggested yesterday, citing an unconfirmed report.
Some of the victims, who included ten women and 25 children, were said to have been killed by the initial airstrike on Niazi Qala village in Paktia Province, others as they fled to shelter and a third group as they tried to rescue survivors, Stephanie Bunker, a UN spokeswoman in Kabul, said.
She said that about 15 villagers, including more women and children, fled north towards a water source. They were attacked and none survived. (...) ---------------------------------------- These civilian murders are clearly intentional and they are certainly not motivated by the pressure to deliver bodies as in VN. This is pure terrorism.
|| Paul Prescod wrote:
|| > Hakki Alacakaptan wrote:
|| > >...
|| > > Just whoa and back up here: "Terrorist act" is not a word
|| that means a great
|| > > deal. It just means an attack on civilians intended to
|| create terror.
||
|| Not necessarily. This may be the usual purpose of state terror, but in
|| the case of terror used against either one's own or some other state by
|| individuals or groups the goal is almost always to generate a reaction
|| that, the terrorist assumes, will rally larger numbers to "the cause."
How about anarchists? Where was "the cause" then? Where's "the cause" in Lockerbie, which was retribution by Iran (or Libya, if it makes the CIA and Chip happy)? There's no immediately discernible cause behind Oklahoma either. In fact, the general reaction among the public is usually bewilderment and shock: Sheer terror, IOW. The OK bomb actually served to rally the public to the curtailment of civil liberties, as did S11. Was that intended? Say yes and you'll have to deal with Chip :-) Conclusion: It's safest to define terrorism as attacks on civilians. That covers the Vendée, Vietnam, Guernica, IRA bombs, GIA cutthroats, you name it. That simple definition has the virtue of excluding liberation forces if they don't go massacring the civilians they're supposed to liberate. It makes no sense to call an attack on military "terrorism" bec there are plenty of names for that sort of conflict and military by definition are not supposed to succumb to fear or terror.
(...)
|| The dignity of the [...]
|| U.S. empire had to be maintained.Empires [...] cannot allow themselves
|| to be made to look
|| foolish. (...)
Empires cannot readily secure military bases in foreign territory without the pretext of war. There are now at least 6 new bases in use by US military in Central Asia and Pakistan. W now says the US mil is staying in Afghanistan. One of those new bases is Camp Rhino near Kandahar.
(...)
|| The U.S. remains
|| dominant in every way -- economically, technologically, culturally, etc.
|| But if it becomes mired in a Tar-Baby scenario in asia, and perhaps even
|| in Latin America and Africa, its world position will indeed become
|| seriously endangered, and renewed struggles between it and European or
|| Chinese/Japanese capital becomes a real possibilty. Sometime in the next
|| century the U.S. could face the sort of world-wide alliance that Germany
|| and Japan faced in the 1940s.
I'm sure US capitalists will drop W and pick a more trilateralist front man in the event that the Euro bloc & Japan should mount some sort of resistance, which I agree is likely. There are murmurs already that Russia and the GCC are looking at pricing their oil in Euros. Petroeuros could really hurt the US. But I doubt it'll ever become a "struggle". If capitalism has learned one thing from 1914-45, it's that the rich get richer fighting the poor, not each other.
Hakki