Noam Chomsky on War & Peace Political Activist

Sub-sections under War & Peace:
• Mideast
• Other issues under War & Peace

Opposed Vietnam War, but TV only covered sound bites

1966: protests against Vietnam met with extreme hostility

A: Things began to heat up again in the early 1960s. By the time the beginnings of the Vietnam War were coming along, it was just impossible not to become involved.

Q: And during those early years, what was the response to the work that you were doing?

A: Mostly it was total incomprehension. Through the early 1960s, you couldn't get anybody to sign a petition. By 1965 or 1966, Vietnam was becoming a big issue. But protests were met with extreme hostility. Take Boston, right here. This is a pretty liberal city, but we couldn't have public protests against the war. They would be violently broken up. The speakers would be saved from being murdered only by hundreds of state police. And the attack on the protesters would be praised in the liberal media. It was considered right. It wasn't until late 1966 that there was enough of a change for you to see substantial public opposition.

Humanitarian intervention in Kosovo is euphemism for war

A: The bombing of Serbia was called a "humanitarian intervention", by no means a novel usage. That was a standard description of European imperialist ventures in the 19th century. To cite some more recent examples, the major recent scholarly work on "humanitarian intervention" in the immediate pre-WWII period: Japan's invasion of Manchuria, Mussolini's invasion of Ethiopia, and Hitler's takeover of the Sudetenland. The author is not suggesting that the term is apt; rather, that the crimes were masked as "humanitarian."

Whether the Kosovo intervention indeed was "humanitarian," possibly the first such case in history, is a matter of fact: passionate declaration does not suffice, if only because virtually every use of force is justified in these terms. It is quite extraordinary how weak the arguments are to justify the claim of humanitarian intent in the Kosovo case; more accurately, they scarcely exist.

CIA trained Islamist fundamentalists in Afghanistan

A: This attack was surely an enormous shock and surprise to the intelligence services of the West, including those of the US. The CIA did have a role, a major one in fact, but that was in the 1980s, when it joined Pakistani intelligence and others (Saudi Arabia, Britain, etc.) in recruiting, training, and arming the most extreme Islamic fundamentalists it could find to fight a "Holy War" against the Russian invaders of Afghanistan.

There is now, predictably, an effort under way to clean up the record and pretend that the US was an innocent bystander. After that war was over, the "Afghans" (many, like bin Laden, not Afghans), turned their attention elsewhere: for example, to Chechnya and Bosnia, where they may have received at least tacit US support. Not surprisingly, they were welcomed by the governments; in Bosnia, many Islamic volunteers were granted citizenship in gratitude for their military services.

Use international court system & UN for grievances, not war

That is the course one follows if the intention is to reduce the probability of further atrocities. There is another course: react with extreme violence, and expect to escalate the cycle of violence, leading to still further atrocities such as the one that is inciting the call for revenge. The dynamic is very familiar

US's low-level conflict is indistinguishable from terrorism

Terrorism, according to the official definitions, is simply part of state action, official doctrine, and not just that of the US, of course. It is not, as is often claimed, "the weapon of the weak."

Furthermore, all of these things should be well known. It's shameful that they're not. These are things people need to know if they want to understand anything about themselves. They are known by the victims, of course, but the perpetrators prefer to look elsewhere.

US pressured allies to join in war against Nicaragua

Stop the escalating cycle of violence

A: Bin Laden and others like him are praying for “a great assault on Muslim states,” which will cause “fanatics to flock to his cause.” The escalating cycle of violence is typically welcomed by the harshest and most brutal elements on both sides.

The initial response was to call for intensifying the policies that led to the terrorist attack: increased militarization, domestic regimentation, attack on social programs. Terror attacks, and the escalating cycle of violence they often engender, tend to reinforce the authority and prestige of the most harsh and repressive elements of a society.

If the rich and powerful choose to keep to their traditions of hundreds of years and resort to extreme violence, they will contribute to the escalation of a cycle of violence. Of course, that is by no means inevitable. An aroused public within the more free & democratic societies can direct policies towards a much more humane and honorable course.

Nicaragua: US destroyed Sandanistas & real hope for reform

The hatred that was elicited by the Sandanistas for trying to direct resources to the poor (and even succeeding at it) [was the basis for] the US launching a three-fold attack against Nicaragua.
1. We exerted extreme pressure to compel the World Bank to terminate all projects and assistance.
2. We launched the contra war along with an illegal economic war to terminate what Oxfam rightly called “the threat of a good example.”
3. We used diplomatic fakery to crush Nicaragua. The US virutally tripled CIA supply flights to the contras, and within a few months the peace plan and [a fair] election campaign were totally dead.

Vietnam War about destroying “virus” of independence from US

Right into the late 1960s, the US blocked all attempts at political settlement of the conflict, even those advanced by Saigon generals. If there were a political settlement, there might be progress toward successful development outside our influence-an unacceptable outcome.

The US did achieve its major objective in Indochina. Our basic goal was to destroy the virus.

Panama: Noriega’s crime was independence, not drugs

It’s all predictable. A tyrant crosses the line from friend to villain when he commits the crime of independence. One mistake is to go beyond robbing the poor and to start interfering with the privileged. By the mid-1980s, Noriega was guilty of these crimes. He seems to have been dragging his feet about helping the US in the contra war. His independence also threatened our interests in the Panama Canal. Since we could no longer trust Noriega to do our bidding, he had to go.

Peace process ignores non-US-approved efforts

The peace process is restricted to US initiatives, which call for a unilateral US-determined settlement with no recognition of Palestinian rights. That’s the way it works.

No-nuke zone in Middle East would end military aid to Israel

Iraq War was first war where massive protest preceded war

Hamas won the 2006 Palestinian elections

It is important not to overlook the fact that the US-Israel operate is tandem. Israel relies crucially on US military, economic, diplomatic, and ideological support. It will proceed as far as the US allows. Its criminal actions are US crimes.

In response to the unfortunate free elections of Jan. 2006, US-Israeli punishment of the people of Gaza is sharply increased, peaking with many killing in early June.

Iranian nukes are recognized as their right by most of world

Disallow Israeli settlements by discontinuing US funding

If Obama were at all serious about opposing settlement expansions, he could easily proceed with concrete measures, for example, by reducing US aid by the amount devoted to this purpose That would hardly be a radical or courageous move. The Bush I administration did so (reducing loan guarantees), but after the Oslo accord in 1993, Pres. Clinton left calculations to the government of Israel. Unsurprisingly, there was no change in the expenditures flowing to the settlements.

An Obama administration official informed the press that the Bush I measures are "not under discussion," and the pressures will be "largely symbolic." In short, Obama understands, just as Clinton and Bush II did

We want an obedient Iraq, but democracy might do otherwise

In Iraq, the dilemma of combining a measure of independence with firm control arose in a stark form not long after the invasion, as mass nonviolent resistance compelled the invaders to accept far more Iraqi initiative than they had anticipated. The outcome evoked the nightmarish prospect of a more or less democratic and sovereign Iraq taking its place in a loose Shiite alliance comprising Iran, Shiite Iraq, and possibly the nearby Shiite-dominated regions of Saudi Arabia, controlling most of the world's oil and independent of Washington.

Iraq was necessary first example of preventive war doctrine

Accordingly, as the new strategy was announced, the war drums began to beat to rouse public enthusiasm for an attack on Iraq. The target of preventive war must have several characteristics:

1. It must be virtually defenseless.
2. It must be important enough to be worth the trouble.
3. There must be a way to portray it as the ultimate evil and an imminent threat to our survival.

Anyone threatened by Iraq can approach UN Security Council

UN authorizing US force in Iraq allows Iran to use force

Iran is a neighbor and victim of U.S.-backed Iraqi aggression and chemical warfare, and could claim, not implausibly, that its invasion would have some local support; the United States and Britain can make no such claim.

Such Iranian actions, if imaginable, would never be tolerated, but would be far less outrageous than the plans of the self appointed enforcers. It is hard to imagine such elementary observations entering public discussion in the United States and Britain.

Iraq: Sanctions kill children

In a bitter condemnation of the sanctions (January 20, 1998), 54 Catholic Bishops quoted the Archbishop of the southern region of Iraq, who reports that “epidemics rage, taking away infants and the sick by the thousands.”

The United States and Britain have taken the lead in blocking aid programs--for example, delaying approval for ambulances on the grounds that they could be used to transport troops, barring insecticides to prevent spread of disease and spare parts for sanitation systems.

US declared independent Iran as evil in 1953 & in 1979

Then for the next 26 years it was good. The Shah compiled one of the worst human rights records in the world. President Carter particularly admired the Shah. Just a couple of months before he was overthrown, he said how impressed he was by the Shah's "progressive administration," and so on.

In 1979, Iran became evil again. They pulled out of the imperial system. And since then they have been evil. They haven't been following orders.

US opposes Iraqi democracy because they get closer to Iran

There is a reason for that. If there is any element of democracy in the new regime, the population will have some voice in what is happening. That is what the democracy is. But the problem is that the majority of the population is Shiite, which means that to the extent that the majority of the population has any voice, it is going to move toward relations with Iran, which is the last thing the US government wants. Furthermore, the Kurds in the northern part of Iraq, who are another big part of the population, are on a quest for some kind of autonomy, and Turkey will go berserk if that happens, as will the US.

Fight terrorism by arresting criminals, not bombing Mideast

A: When a federal building was blown up in Oklahoma City, there were calls for bombing the Middle East, and it probably would have happened if the source turned out to be there. When it was found to be domestic, with links to the ultra-right militias, there was no call to obliterate Montana and Idaho. Rather, there was a search for the perpetrator, who was found, brought to court, and sentenced, and there were efforts to understand the grievances that lie behind such crimes and to address the problems. Just about every crime--whether a robbery in the streets or colossal atrocities--has reasons, and commonly we find that some of them are serious and should be addressed.

Bin Laden's goal: Drive westerners out of Muslim lands

"Blowback" from the radical Islamic forces organized, armed, and trained by the US, Egypt, France, Pakistan, and others began almost at once, with the 1981 assassination of President Sadat of Egypt.

9-11 is indirect consequence of US building Islamist army

A: The attacks are not "consequences" of US policies in any direct sense. But indirectly, of course there are consequences. There seems little doubt that the perpetrator come from the terrorist network that has its roots in the mercenary armies that were organized, trained, and armed by the CIA, Egypt, Pakistan, French intelligence, Saudi Arabian funding, and others. The backgrounds of all of this remain somewhat murky.

The US, along with its allies, assembled a huge mercenary army, maybe 100,000 or more, and they drew from the most militant sectors they could find, which happened to be radical Islamists, what are called here Islamic fundamentalists, from all over, most of them not from Afghanistan. They're called "Afghanis," but like bin Laden, many come from elsewhere.

Bin Laden joined sometime in the 1980s. He was involved in the funding networks. They fought a holy war against the Russian occupiers.

CIA created Osama bin Laden & fostered fanaticism

A: To answer your question a sensible person would try to ascertain Bin Laden’s views, and the sentiments of the large reservoir of supporters he has throughout the region. Bin Laden became a militant Islamic leader in the war to drive the Russians out of Afghanistan. He was one of the many religious fundamentalist extremists recruited, armed, and financed by the CIA and their allies in Pakistani intelligence to cause maximal harm to the Russians-quite possibly delaying their withdrawal-though whether he personally happened to have direct contact with the CIA is unclear, and not particularly important. Not surprisingly, the CIA preferred the most fanatic and cruel fighters they could mobilize. The end result was to “destroy a moderate regime and create a fanatical one, from groups recklessly financed by the Americans” (according to London Times correspondent Simon Jenkins).

Islamic hatred based on US support for repressive regimes

A: Bin Laden is bitterly opposed to the corrupt and repressive regimes of the region, which he regards as “un-Islamic,” including the Saudi Arabian regime, a close US ally since its origins. Bin Laden despises the US for its support of these regimes. Like others in the region, he is also outraged by long-standing US support for Israel’s brutal military occupation, now in its 35th year: And like others, he contrasts Washington’s dedicated support for these crimes with the decade-long US-British assault against the civilian population of Iraq, which has devastated the society and caused hundreds of thousands of deaths while strengthening Saddam Hussein. These sentiments are very widely shared, [even among] wealthy and privileged Muslims in the Gulf region. Among the great majority of people suffering deep poverty and oppression, similar sentiments are far more bitter, and are the source of the fury and despair that has led to suicide bombings.

US chartered UN & must follow UN decisions on Iraq

There are legitimate ways to react to the many threats to world peace. If Iraq’s neighbors feel threatened, they can approach the Security Council to authorize appropriate measures to respond to the threat. If the US and Britain feel threatened, they can do the same. But no state has the authority to make its own determinations on these matters and to act as it chooses.

Israeli nukes should preclude foreign aid

Gulf War: US refused diplomacy & forced violence in Iraq

The US also reinforced its dominant position, and taught the lesson that the world is to be ruled by force. Washington proceeded to maintain “stability,” barring any threat of democratic change in the Gulf tyrannies and lending tacit support to Saddam Hussein as he crushed the popular uprising of the Shi’ites in the South.

Gulf War had nothing to do with principles

Second, these same authorities proclaimed in a litany that the UN was now at last functioning as it was designed to. They claimed this was impossible before the end of the Cold War.

The US wasn’t upholding any high principle in the Gulf. The reason for the response to Saddam Hussein was because he stepped on the wrong toes. Hussein is a murderous gangster- exactly as he was before the war, when he was our friend and trading partner. His invasion of Kuwait was an atrocity, but well within the range of many similar crimes conducted by the US and allies and nowhere near as terrible as some.