I also agree with Chomsky's anarchism, and he -- writing at the same time as Cockburn -- proposed, as others did, a different approach and an agency other than a principal instrument of US oppression:
"Alternatives were prominently suggested. By the Vatican, for example, which called for reliance on the measures appropriate to crimes, whatever their scale: if someone robs my house and I think I know who did it, I am not entitled to go after him with an assault rifle, meanwhile killing people randomly in his neighborhood. Or by the eminent military historian Michael Howard, who delivered a 'scathing attack' on the bombardment of Afghanistan on October 30, not on grounds of success or failure, but its design: what is needed is 'patient operations of police and intelligence forces,' 'a police operation conducted under the auspices of the UN on behalf of the international community as a whole, against a criminal conspiracy, whose members should be hunted down and brought before an international court.' There certainly are precedents, including acts of international terrorism even more extreme than those of Sept. 11: the US terrorist war against Nicaragua, to take an uncontroversial example -- uncontroversial, because of the judgment of the highest international authorities, the International Court of Justice and the Security Council. Nicaragua's efforts to pursue lawful means failed, in a world ruled by force; but no one would impede the US if it chose to follow a similar course.
"Could the legitimate goals of apprehending and punishing the perpetrators have been attained without violence? Perhaps. We have no way of knowing whether the Taliban offers to discuss extradition were serious, since they were dismissed..." --CGE
On Sun, 16 May 2004, Doug Henwood agonized once again:
> So what's your approach? Should a government - and I assume you're not
> an anarchist, so a government is ok by you - have an intelligence
> agency?
>
> Our mutual pal Cockburn wrote in The Nation's Nov 12, 2001, issue:
>
> <http://www.counterpunch.org/cockburnleft.html>
>
> I'm guessing, given your professions in the past, that you more or
> less agree with this (I do). So what agency would identify, pursue,
> and capture the perps? The NYPD? The Red Cross? Or something like the
> CIA?
>