Trebat is a first-year graduate student in mathematics.
By Nick Trebat
For the past few weeks there has been intense debate in The
Bruin on the merits of the U.S. war in Afghanistan. Of the Bruin
columnists taking part, no one has received more criticism than
Shirin Vossoughi. This writer’s “extreme” views
have come under attack for being “ignorant,”
“anti-American,” “deceitful,” and
childishly utopian. One writer informs us that he not only
disagrees with Vossoughi’s opinions but finds her
“reprehensible” as a person, due to her “manifest
contempt “¦ for this country and its people.”
But Vossoughi fits none of these characteristics. What she asks
is simply that America stop its indiscriminate attacks against the
civilian population of Afghanistan. Whether you approve or
disapprove of this request, you cannot reject its premise, which is
that American air raids are killing large numbers of innocent
people.
Consider a few examples from recent history. Testifying before a
House committee after the Gulf War, former Pentagon analyst Pierre
Sprey, as reported in the Los Angeles Times, stated that the
Pentagon’s reports during the war were
“shameless,” and added that for every bomb that hit a
target, “there were 70 or 75 misses.”
In NATO’s war on Yugoslavia, American F-16s repeatedly
struck civilian targets, including the Chinese Embassy, a Serb
radio station, and a refugee convoy filled with Kosovar Albanians.
The attack on the convoy killed 75 Albanians and wounded more than
100.
Should we continue to bomb anyway? Vossoughi’s critics say
the answer is yes. The death of innocents is a price worth paying
in the “fight against terrorism.”
Holding such a view implies one of two things: that you believe
Afghan lives are worth less than American ones, or you believe that
Afghan civilians are somehow culpable for the crime of Sept. 11 and
deserve to die.
Both are disgraceful ““ the first because it is racist, or
else tragically patriotic; the second because it mirrors the
position held by bin Laden, who believes American civilians are
responsible for the behavior of their government. This logic was
laid out quite clearly by the alleged bombers of the World Trade
Center in 1993, who in a letter sent to the New York Times four
days after the attack, wrote: “The American people are
responsible for the actions of their government and they must
question all of the crimes that their government is committing
against other people.” If they do not do so, they “will
be the targets of our operations.”
If Vossoughi’s critics reject this argument, as they
should, then they must do so in all cases.
To talk of peace is fine reply war supporters, but how can we
let the crimes of Sept. 11 go unpunished? The perpetrators of that
crime cannot go free. But is it not reasonable to ask: does
subjecting the impoverished Afghans to air raids constitute
“punishment” for the wealthy and well-connected elites
who orchestrated the attacks of Sept. 11? Surely there are more
practical ways of responding than this.
It just so happens that out of the rubble of World War II, there
arose a series of documents designed to deal with precisely this
kind of situation. These documents are the foundation of what is
now called international law.
True, international law has its limitations: unilateral
vigilante warfare is out of the question. The plaintiff, in this
case the U.S., must go to court, present evidence, and convince a
body of non-partisans that the party in question committed a
crime.
In some cases, the U.N. charter concedes force is necessary to
capture criminals. But such force must be approved by the member
nations and it must be applied in such a way as to minimize the
loss of innocent life. One way to do so is through the use of U.N.
ground troops, combined with diplomacy.
Many war supporters laugh at the notion of weak U.N. troops
entering Afghanistan, and scoff at the idea of negotiating with the
Taliban. But it is important to remember that U.N. military forces
are weak only because the U.S. refuses to strengthen them,
preferring to beef up NATO instead. There is no reason why the U.S.
cannot reverse this policy ““ immediately if it chooses.
As for the value of diplomacy, the Toronto Star reported that on
Oct. 5, the Taliban ambassador to Pakistan stated: “We are
willing to try (bin Laden) if America provides solid evidence of
his involvement in the attacks,” adding “We are willing
to talk about (trying bin Laden) in another country “¦ but we
must be given the evidence.” Given the massive international
support the U.S. would receive if it had pursued diplomacy, this
offer could have turned into something close to what the U.S.
wanted.
But we can only speculate what diplomacy could have achieved
because the Bush administration, and most of elite America,
rejected this option outright. The U.S. refused even to seek U.N.
Security Council approval for the bombing (a violation of the U.N.
Charter), despite U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan’s
requests.
According to our President, American bombs will continue to fall
on Afghanistan for months, even years. And when America decides to
stop, when the futility of its violence becomes too great for it to
handle, all of its problems will remain. The perpetrators of Sept.
11 will still be alive and ordinary Americans will still fear the
next attack.
The only way out of this horror is through the methods outlined
in the U.N. Charter. Proponents of the war call this idea
“utopian” and in this, they may be correct. But they
must also realize that the only alternative is unilateral violence
which, in this age of anthrax and atomic bombs, is no alternative
at all.