Madam, - Amid the blizzard of piety and recrimination surrounding the fifth anniversary of 9/11, a few basic truths need to be reiterated, unpalatable as they may be.
First, it should not need to be said, but bears repeating, that the United States, and much of the civilised world, is at war with the forces of reaction. Detonations in Madrid and London, averted attacks in Berlin and Paris, the slaughter of innocents in Bali, Istanbul and Amman - not to mention Kabul, Baghdad and Jerusalem - all feed back to the attacks of September 11th, 2001. Fanatics, with no love for life, seek to disrupt and destroy our way of life.
To minimise this as an inverted-commas "war", a cloak to shield imperial intentions, is to make a most grave error. This is indeed war, and our own cities are its front lines.
Second, it is not quite right to say, as President Bush does, that Islamic fundamentalists "hate freedom". Rather, they hate our freedoms: freedom of speech and thought and political assembly, freedom of indulgence, of conscience, of religion and association, freedom of sexual orientation, and women's freedoms. As such, the forces arrayed against us are, effectively, anti-Enlightenment. Fascism may be the most proximate political interpretation, but a more fitting one would be clerical medievalism. Needless to say, capitulation to such a foe is simply not an option.
Third, it is clear now that much of the left has abdicated its historical responsibility to stand as the defender of the Enlightenment. The shameful performance of Pilger, Galloway, Moore and Chomsky, and their numerous supporters in the "anti-war" movement, would give Paine and Jefferson - not to speak of Orwell and Camus - cause for disgust. The sight of left-wingers eagerly hoping for the victory of the murderous "resistance" in Iraq and the insurgent Taliban in Afghanistan is a permanent blot on an often honourable record.
Fourth, focus on our humanitarian obligations is not a distraction from the war on terror. In Darfur, terror of the most horrific kind has been loosed on a defenceless populace, and Osama bin Laden has promised to make it a graveyard for any Western troops that intervene to stop the killing. It is only with intervention to halt genocide in Africa that the UN and Nato can acquire the credibility to combat terror in the Middle East.
Lastly, it also needs to be repeated that the most important battlefield in this war is that of ideas. It is here that the ordinary citizen makes his most valuable contribution. If this is to be made a war for the preservation and encouragement of the democratic ideal, it is active citizens - from New York to Baghdad - who will sustain it and carry it out, with their effort, their voices, and their votes. Solidarity with them, and with the ideas they represent, should be the most urgent task of the left today. - Yours, etc,
SEAN COLEMAN,
Brian Avenue,
Marino,
Dublin 3.
****
Madam, - The only surprising thing about 9/11 is that it happened in 2001 and not years earlier. For decades US foreign policy put the US in the role of the worlds number one bully, pursuing a policy of unbridled self-interest while proclaiming itself as the leading proponent of democracy and freedom. Consider the following random examples:
1. The US has consistently supported Israeli settlement of occupied Palestinian land and has wilfully ignored the endless abuses perpetrated by the Israeli state on the Palestinian people.
2. The US promotes the values of freedom and democracy - as long as those who get elected are pro-American. Otherwise, democratically elected governments find aid cut off (as in the case of several Central and South American countries) or have even their elected leaders assassinated with US backing (Allende in Chile, for example).
3. US support for past brutal and undemocratic regimes (Mobutu, Marcos, Pinochet, the Argentine junta in the 1970s) continues in its alliances with repressive regimes such as Saudi Arabia. Anything goes as long as a state is on Uncle Sam's side.
4. In the early 1970s hundreds of thousands of innocent Cambodians died as a result of the secret bombing of their country by the US air force. War criminals such as Henry Kissinger told the most blatant lies in defence of this genocide.
5. During the Clinton presidency the US was Colombia's biggest aid contributor despite the most blatant evidence of large-scale atrocities committed against innocent peasants, trade unionists, teachers, etc.
6. During the thirty years of the Troubles in Northern Ireland the Provisional IRA received considerable funding from Irish-Americans, a group particularly noted for ignorance of Irish history and geography.
It is sadly in the above context that the events of 9/11 must be viewed. Ghosts of the innumerable people killed by the US military or as a direct result of US foreign policy were bound to come back to haunt the US at some stage in its ongoing imperial mission. Meanwhile the vast majority of the US public depends on a very uncritical media and is daily exposed to one-sided and ill-informed dross from major channels such as CNN (where, typically, the personality of the newscaster seems to have as much significance as the news they are supposed to relate).
Finally, it must be categorically stated that 9/11 was a cowardly act of terrorism. As with all terrorism, innocent people were killed for political reasons and such an act must be condemned in the strongest terms. Perhaps when people in the West view the killing of Cambodian peasants or Palestinian children with the same seriousness as those killed on 9/11 will there be some progress, even in the world of realpolitik. - Yours, etc,
ANTHONY HARTNETT,
Chestnut Grove,
Bishopstown,
Cork.
****
Madam, - President Bush maintains that America is opposed to the use of torture for extracting information from alleged terrorist prisoners. But he defends what is incomprehensibly called "extraordinary rendition" of alleged terrorists.
This opaque phrase translates as the delivery of such persons by the American authorities into the clutches of various unsavoury regimes in eastern Europe and the Middle East which have no qualms about using torture in order to extract whatever "information" America may require, and for which they will receive aid and finance from America. This, according to President Bush, is a necessary part of his "war on terror", and is therefore justifiable as well as profitable.
Guantánamo and unnamed eastern European and Middle Eastern locations are outside the reach of the American legal system, and so can continue with these operations unscathed. This makes it all acceptable to Mr Bush and his administration. It is morality stood on its head, and the ethics of the damned.
We here in Ireland continue to countenance and aid the air transport of such people as Bush and his administration see fit to farm out to the savage mercies of these squalid employees of the United States administration. We are complicit in this continuing atrocity, and must share in the blame for such international criminality.
We should hang our heads in shame. - Yours, etc,
DAVID GRANT,
Mount Pleasant,
Waterford.