Late Night Thoughts on Khadr Trial

“You will forever be a murderer in my eyes.” Tabitha Speer tells Omar Khadr.

The statement was made by the widow of an American soldier to an enemy prisoner who supported the Taliban troops and allegedly threw a grenade that killed her husband. I am not so insensitive as not to be sorry for the widow. However, I do ask myself how many Americans are feeling sorry for widows, mothers and children in Iraq and Afghanistan who were killed by their soldiers in combat or in the indiscriminate bombing of the ‘enemy’ communities over last ten years. In spite of my admiration for many qualities which are almost exclusively American and my distaste for religious fundamentalism, I personally feel in a bind on who I should side with more – the people who were going about living their primitive lives in their primitive villages and towns or the people who invaded with their sophisticated weaponry the countries half way round the world to impose their own culture on them for reasons incomprehensible even to many American citizens. Surely the Iraqis and Afghans, poor and illiterate they may be, have the same emotions and deserve the same sympathy for their loss as the people who use elegant phrases to express their hatred for the enemy who only did what their husbands were trying to do to them.

Americans are entitled to defend themselves as much as anybody. However, this entitlement is only valid when they are being attacked and only against the enemies they have identified. Destroying a whole village by rockets fired by unmanned drones directed from Virginia because some Taliban leader may be hiding there is not defending America, it is attacking that village. If you are honest you have to accept that such attacks entitle residents of the village and their supporters, be they Taliban or foreign friends, to repel and if necessary kill the invaders by throwing grenades or whatever means are at their disposal.

Most Westerners believe that the 9/11 attacks have given America a cart blanche to destroy whatever they wish and wherever they wish to prevent the reoccurrence of the horrible event. That may be so but is it wise, not to mention ethical, to set no clear aims and limits? The original goal of the invasion of Afghanistan was the destruction of El Qaeda. Within a few months of the start of the fighting the followers of that group had scattered all over the world and the leaders left Afghanistan and are known to have been working from Pakistan. Rather than moving the soldiers to Pakistan, successive U.S. administrations have been sending arms and other aid to the tune of tens of billions of dollars every year to Pakistan government and the killings in Afghanistan continue unabated. The aim now is the destruction of Taliban who are accused of wishing to keep Afghans in dark ages. It is probably true but there are other tribal leaders there who pay lip service to the West in exchange for truck loads of dollars and are no better, in many ways worse, than Taliban and no one is destroying their villages. In many respects the mullahs of Iran follow the same creed and no one has invaded Iran. Only apparent reason for the West to fight Taliban is that they will not accept continued presence of invaders in their midst and they will fight rather than compromise their value system. As people who cherish our own value systems and are fighting to defend them we should be treating these fellow travelers (in this respect at least) with respect, not contempt.

In this context I should mention the Mau Mau movement in Kenya fifty years ago and its charismatic leader Jomo Kenyatta. For more than a decade British soldiers labeled the movement as terrorists, put a high price on the head of Kenyatta and fought them tooth and nail. When the loss of life became unacceptable and Kenya’s importance to the “Empire” diminished, British negotiated with Kenyatta and anointed him the President. There are several other cases of former terrorists leading their countries, often with distinction. It should not surprise any one if that happens before long in Afghanistan too.

El Qaeda has not succeeded in mounting another major terrorist attack in the U.S. since 9/11. But they have been a major factor in the near collapse of the economy. To combat El Qaeda the former President started unwinnable wars in two far off countries and built an immense security structure which not only costs more than the whole budget of many developed countries, it also inconveniences citizens at every step and adds significantly to the cost of doing business. These actions have been a huge drain on the economy and the debt administrations have accumulated over last eleven years is now counted in trillions. Moral authority goes with economic power and the debt of this magnitude has eroded the power of suasion the U.S. Presidents once had. It is a shame that the only super power at the beginning of the new millennium lost that distinction just as its nemesis did in the eighties, and the millennium is barely a decade old.

Incredible though it may seem, the decline and the probable fall of American economic empire is largely due to actions of one sick man – Osama Bin Laden – who was also behind the events that were the catalyst for the collapse of the Soviet Union.