MEDECINS AVEC FRONTIERES
The medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres' (MSF) decision to withdraw from Afghanistan symbolised the growing clash between the aid organisations (or Non-Governmental Organisations, NGOs) and national governments, particularly the US government. MSF, which has prided itself in giving humanitarian aid regardless of political constraints, accuses the US government of compromising their independence. 'MSF denounces attempts to use humanitarian aid to win hearts and minds', said operations director Kerry Gluck (Independent, 29 July 2004). This action, said Gluck 'endangers the lives of humanitarian aid workers'. Further 'the US-backed coalition has consistently sought to co-opt humanitarian assistance to build support for its own military and political ambitions'. Gluck's accusations are all the more telling since MSF managed to work under the Soviet Occupation, the rein of the warlords and then of the Taliban. Only under the US occupation have MSF volunteers suffered the kind of setbacks that saw five killed this June.
But MSF's complaints are not so straightforward. Though the organisation, like all the NGOs eschews party and national politics, they are still political organisations. It was the aid organisations in Afghanistan that did most to de-legitimise the Taliban - tacitly supported by the US until NGO lobbying on women's rights helped to demonise Mullah Omar's regime enough to prepare western opinion for an invasion. In Rwanda, MSF lobbied hard for western intervention against Juvenal Habyarimana's government.
But the NGOs are only capable of criticising existing regimes. They have no brief for making new states. Once the Taliban was overthrown, the US military assumed that aid organisations would help them restore authority. But that puts the aid organisations in the firing line - the focus of a hostility they do not believe they deserve. The truth is, however, though NGOs purport to independence from government authority, they have been used over and over again to advance Western interests against indigenous governments, with aid preceding the flag from Somalia to Afghanistan. Not surprisingly aid workers are increasingly targets of indigenous hostility as the distinction between them and the invasion forces is more apparent to the NGOs than it is to the locals.
JOHN KERRY 'REPORTING FOR DUTY'
Senator John Kerry accepted the Democratic Party nomination as candidate for the presidential elections in terms that left you wondering which was the warmongers' party in the United States. He would 'never hesitate to use force', meet attack with 'a swift and certain response', 'build a stronger American military' with an additional '40,000 active duty troops' and 'fight a smarter, more effective war on terror', because 'strength is more than tough words'. Anyone who thought that the 'war on terror' was itself misconceived should understand that Kerry is not their candidate. George Bush has already sacrificed thousands of Iraqi and American lives to prove that he is not a wimp - how many more must be sacrificed to be demonstrated that the Democrats are not a party of wimps?
And anyone hoping that a Democrat in the White House would lighten the patriotic tub-thumping will have been disappointed by Kerry's sub-text that America is tired of being pushed around: 'I will never give any nation or international institution a veto over our national security' - though who ever threatened such a thing is left un-said. But the under-dog pose was not restricted to military questions. On the economy Kerry appealed to Old Glory, too. 'If you give the American worker a fair playing field, there's nobody in the world the American worker can't compete against', Kerry declaimed - as if the world trading system was biased against the US. Trying to tie anti-Arabic and anti-Bush sentiment together, Kerry insisted 'we value an America that controls its own destiny because it's finally and forever independent of Mideast oil' adding 'I want an America that relies on
its own ingenuity and innovation - not the Saudi royal family'.
'The future doesn't belong to fear; it belongs to freedom,' said the candidate. But Kerry pressed the 'fear' button more than he did the 'freedom ' one. Not just by adding to the hysteria of the 'war on terror', but by playing on people's health fears over the uninsured as well. 'The story of people struggling for health care is the story of so many Americans,' according to Kerry. But the US has some of the best vital statistics in the world. With a bloated health industry predatory upon fears of disease, the Democrats long-running pursuit of health-care reform only puts a radical twist on the industry's scare mongering. Kerry's opening line, 'John Kerry, reporting for duty' sums up the Democrats' subservience to the US elite, though ironically, it is the culture of fear that he helps to promote that is undermining any positive support for US society.