UNITED NATIONS' HUMAN SACRIFICE
Interviewed by the BBC's Michael Cockerell British Prime Minister Tony Blair was asked whether, in the words of a former US Secretary of State for Defence (Robert McNamara), he was prepared to 'pay the blood price' to keep the special relationship with the United States of America. Blair 'vigorously assented', indicating a willingness to shed British blood to maintain ties with the White House. But on past precedent, it will be ordinary people in Iraq who will be slaughtered on the altar of maintaining the alliance. In his speech to the General Assembly US President George Bush made it clear that American support for the United Nations was to be tested by a willingness to support military action against Iraq.
HOW THE WEST IS AND IS NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR SEPTEMBER 11
Critics of the proposed military action in Iraq, as of that in Afghanistan, warn darkly that it will provoke further reactions along the lines of the World Trade Center attack. But it is a misunderstanding of September 11 to see it as a popular reaction on the part of the peoples of the Middle East to military actions against them, such as the original operation Desert Storm against Iraq twelve years ago. There is indeed a relationship between the US's attack on Iraq and the Al Qaeda attack on the Twin Towers on September 11, 2001, but not that of action and reaction.
The conspiratorial groups that coalesced as Al Qaeda arose precisely because of the collapse of Arab nationalist movements that were destabilised in the first Gulf War. Saddam's regime in Iraq might not deserve the label 'popular', but it did grow out of the popular nationalist ba'ath movement, active in Syria, Iraq and Egypt in the post war years. In the 1980s regimes established under a wave of nationalist sentiment were already finding difficulties meeting popular aspirations, so much did the West restrict their room to manoeuvre. But the demand that Middle Eastern nations endorse a military strike against one of their own showed that Arab nationalism had reached a dead end, and all the regimes in the region suffered a loss of public support.
It was in that context that the actions of small groups of conspirators could become decisive. Not surprisingly, it was amongst America's strongest allies, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Pakistan that Al Qaeda recruited. Attempts by the Bush and Blair governments to blame Iraq for training the perpetrators of September 11 are all the more fanciful, since most supporters of that movement received their training from US instructors during the proxy wars in Afghanistan and Bosnia.
-- James Heartfield The 'Death of the Subject' Explained is available at GBP11.00, plus GBP1.00 p&p from Publications, audacity.org, 8 College Close, Hackney, London, E9 6ER. Make cheques payable to 'Audacity Ltd'