A fortnight after witnessing the repugnant, gruesome execution of Iraq's former dictator, the Wrangler cow-boy munching pretzels in his Texas ranch declared that the entire exercise was indeed unfortunate and had barbaric overtones. George Bush's first public angst and cosmetic anguish on the December 30 2006 reality TV show was perhaps too belated and ham-handed a reaction. But perhaps implicit in his unanticipated utterance were the first emerging symptoms of deep concern.
Isn't it particularly strange that the United States was in such a remarkable hurry to topple Iraq , along with a dim-witted , compliant Tony Blair as a co-conspiratorial accessory? We were all inundated with relentless propaganda about the demonic prospects of WMDs and deadly chemical weapons threatening Israel and world-peace? Damn the impotent , toothless Unites Nations, which was in any case wagging it's tail with prodigious energy. And who cared for second-third world opinion., anyway. An elaborate cross-border invasion was planned , and GI Joes in high boots gleefully roughed out the hiding Iraqi President from an underground hole , displaying his ragged hirsute face like the NBA championship trophy to flashing bulbs.
Frankly, shouldn't George Bush and Tony Blair be hauled up for invading a foreign country , blatantly violating all international norms, for perceived possession of weapons that never existed, for fabricated lies and distorted military intelligence that led the world astray? And since the WMDs were never found, Bush-Blair found a convenient argument in pontificating about " providing freedom" from dictatorial regimes . In that case, why does Bush practise double-standards by supporting a military dictator called Pervez Musharraf ? Technically , don't the people of Pakistan deserve their" freedom" as well ? And even as Saddam stands vanquished, those who genuinely publicly defy world opinion and have proclaimed from roof tops about their nuclear intentions and rich uranium possessions are roaming around with unrivalled audacity; North Korea and Iran, are just two, amongst others aspiring to be in the nuclear stable.
I suggest Bush watch a film called The Good German , which has just recently released . . Even Nazi war criminals who perpetrated the worst form of despicable human genocide protested, pleaded and persuaded their cases in a post-Second World war trial. Americans had even tacitly supported some Nazi officers because it suited their commercial and political interests. We all know Saddam Hussein was not a paragon of benevolent leadership. He ruled with a brutal hand, ruthlessly exterminating opposition ( including his own son and son-in-law) and had indeed ordered an official execution of rebels who had plotted a coup against him. He had also massacred Kurd rebels using poisonous gas forcing them to peregrinate to cold mountains, shivering, impoverished and facing certain extinction..
But wasn't Saddam given a fait accompli when handed over like a prized prisoner to a seething revengeful Iraqi government, a puppet on a string? Didn't the US overtly once provide Saddam full backing during the fruitless Iran War, almost encouraging him as their front, just like they had done with Osama Bin Laden against the Soviet troops in Afghanistan ? Didn't the Americans turn a blind eye to Saddam's experiments with chemical weapons against Kuridsh rebels ? Wasn't the entire hearing and judicial process a complete mockery of fair justice? Was Saddam, despite his maniacal obsession for political power, an international terrorist, a threat to millions of daily airline passengers, like Osama ? And yet the US and many members of the western were quick to actually applaud the " justice meted out, " totally oblivious of the merciless method of the ghastly hanging. It's preposterous, and shows how little America in particular understands countries , cultures and needs of people and everything else east of New York.
George Bush gets away with his domestic constituency in the US, because it's denizens know as much about world affairs as Paris Hilton about Uttar Pradesh politics. To the cherubic, friendly, corpulent grand-mother of 60 years doing security checks at Walt Disney's Magic Kingdom in Orlando , Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein could just as well be evil characters from a comic book trying to sabotage Mickey Mouse's roller-coaster ride . I don't think the average happy-go-lucky-essentially peace-loving American who is as much intimidated by the towering skyscrapers of Manhattan and the New York madness as we are, is even aware of the rising world-wide hostility towards his own country, the escalating threats to American lives abroad, and the declining moral force of America as a superpower nation. Which explains why Bush routed Sen John Kerry in the presidential race despite Kerry handsomely trouncing the incumbent man in the Oval Office in the televised debates.
History repeats itself with precise finesse. Despite several masterpiece Hollywood films on the Vietnam disaster, Bush did not learn his lessons , even as people miles away realized the futility of war by just watching a Oliver Stone cinema. Iraq is America's new Vietnam. It's taken Vietnam decades to bounce back; Iraq could well become a perennial conflict zone as Shias and Sunnis indulge in mindless acts of mutual recrimination. Over 3000 American soldiers are dead, and so far reportedly more than 35000 Iraqis have been killed since the US occupation. It costs the US exchequer over USD 2 billion a week to fund the remote-control Xbox 360 war in Iraq; frankly, if the US administration were to give that astronomical charity to some countries in Africa and Asia, we will witness the end of rampant poverty, the closure of civil strife, an improvement in education and health, and the prevalence of democracy. For Americans, freedom is a breakfast cereal because life looks different when you own 33% of the world's wealth. We cannot transplant democracy, it has to evolve from within the framework of it's social structure and economic health. Mr Bush, to use an insurance industry phrase, freedom is not sold, it has to be bought.
Bush may have successfully sent Saddam to the gallows, but in that hasty act of primitive revenge and parochial thinking , he has plunged the world into a never-ending cascading romantic clinch with global terrorism, making a martyr of the man they mauled. He was right. December 30 , 2006 is indeed a " milestone" day.
21 days after Saddam's execution, his ghost walks tall. There is life after death, after all.
About the AuthorSanjay Jha Sanjay Jha is a hard-core “Congressi” largely on account of being enchanted by the incredible brilliance of the Gandhi-Nehru mystique, its array of in...Read Morefirst published:January 19, 2007, 16:10 ISTlast updated:January 19, 2007, 16:10 IST
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Even as TV channels went expectedly berserk with repeated clips of dusky Indian Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty's racial trauma on TV reality show Celebrity Big Brother, the media cacophony even threatening to jeopardize British PM Tony Blair's departing moments in 10, Downing Street, the tragic slaughtering of over 100 school-children in bomb attacks in Iraq went virtually unnoticed. That hardly makes for public attention and TRP ratings; perhaps if the entire school was annihilated into dust, then maybe the news would have at least featured behind the latest bulletin on cricket coach Greg Chappell's faltering vision.
A fortnight after witnessing the repugnant, gruesome execution of Iraq's former dictator, the Wrangler cow-boy munching pretzels in his Texas ranch declared that the entire exercise was indeed unfortunate and had barbaric overtones. George Bush's first public angst and cosmetic anguish on the December 30 2006 reality TV show was perhaps too belated and ham-handed a reaction. But perhaps implicit in his unanticipated utterance were the first emerging symptoms of deep concern.
Isn't it particularly strange that the United States was in such a remarkable hurry to topple Iraq , along with a dim-witted , compliant Tony Blair as a co-conspiratorial accessory? We were all inundated with relentless propaganda about the demonic prospects of WMDs and deadly chemical weapons threatening Israel and world-peace? Damn the impotent , toothless Unites Nations, which was in any case wagging it's tail with prodigious energy. And who cared for second-third world opinion., anyway. An elaborate cross-border invasion was planned , and GI Joes in high boots gleefully roughed out the hiding Iraqi President from an underground hole , displaying his ragged hirsute face like the NBA championship trophy to flashing bulbs.
Frankly, shouldn't George Bush and Tony Blair be hauled up for invading a foreign country , blatantly violating all international norms, for perceived possession of weapons that never existed, for fabricated lies and distorted military intelligence that led the world astray? And since the WMDs were never found, Bush-Blair found a convenient argument in pontificating about " providing freedom" from dictatorial regimes . In that case, why does Bush practise double-standards by supporting a military dictator called Pervez Musharraf ? Technically , don't the people of Pakistan deserve their" freedom" as well ? And even as Saddam stands vanquished, those who genuinely publicly defy world opinion and have proclaimed from roof tops about their nuclear intentions and rich uranium possessions are roaming around with unrivalled audacity; North Korea and Iran, are just two, amongst others aspiring to be in the nuclear stable.
I suggest Bush watch a film called The Good German , which has just recently released . . Even Nazi war criminals who perpetrated the worst form of despicable human genocide protested, pleaded and persuaded their cases in a post-Second World war trial. Americans had even tacitly supported some Nazi officers because it suited their commercial and political interests. We all know Saddam Hussein was not a paragon of benevolent leadership. He ruled with a brutal hand, ruthlessly exterminating opposition ( including his own son and son-in-law) and had indeed ordered an official execution of rebels who had plotted a coup against him. He had also massacred Kurd rebels using poisonous gas forcing them to peregrinate to cold mountains, shivering, impoverished and facing certain extinction..
But wasn't Saddam given a fait accompli when handed over like a prized prisoner to a seething revengeful Iraqi government, a puppet on a string? Didn't the US overtly once provide Saddam full backing during the fruitless Iran War, almost encouraging him as their front, just like they had done with Osama Bin Laden against the Soviet troops in Afghanistan ? Didn't the Americans turn a blind eye to Saddam's experiments with chemical weapons against Kuridsh rebels ? Wasn't the entire hearing and judicial process a complete mockery of fair justice? Was Saddam, despite his maniacal obsession for political power, an international terrorist, a threat to millions of daily airline passengers, like Osama ? And yet the US and many members of the western were quick to actually applaud the " justice meted out, " totally oblivious of the merciless method of the ghastly hanging. It's preposterous, and shows how little America in particular understands countries , cultures and needs of people and everything else east of New York.
George Bush gets away with his domestic constituency in the US, because it's denizens know as much about world affairs as Paris Hilton about Uttar Pradesh politics. To the cherubic, friendly, corpulent grand-mother of 60 years doing security checks at Walt Disney's Magic Kingdom in Orlando , Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein could just as well be evil characters from a comic book trying to sabotage Mickey Mouse's roller-coaster ride . I don't think the average happy-go-lucky-essentially peace-loving American who is as much intimidated by the towering skyscrapers of Manhattan and the New York madness as we are, is even aware of the rising world-wide hostility towards his own country, the escalating threats to American lives abroad, and the declining moral force of America as a superpower nation. Which explains why Bush routed Sen John Kerry in the presidential race despite Kerry handsomely trouncing the incumbent man in the Oval Office in the televised debates.
History repeats itself with precise finesse. Despite several masterpiece Hollywood films on the Vietnam disaster, Bush did not learn his lessons , even as people miles away realized the futility of war by just watching a Oliver Stone cinema. Iraq is America's new Vietnam. It's taken Vietnam decades to bounce back; Iraq could well become a perennial conflict zone as Shias and Sunnis indulge in mindless acts of mutual recrimination. Over 3000 American soldiers are dead, and so far reportedly more than 35000 Iraqis have been killed since the US occupation. It costs the US exchequer over USD 2 billion a week to fund the remote-control Xbox 360 war in Iraq; frankly, if the US administration were to give that astronomical charity to some countries in Africa and Asia, we will witness the end of rampant poverty, the closure of civil strife, an improvement in education and health, and the prevalence of democracy. For Americans, freedom is a breakfast cereal because life looks different when you own 33% of the world's wealth. We cannot transplant democracy, it has to evolve from within the framework of it's social structure and economic health. Mr Bush, to use an insurance industry phrase, freedom is not sold, it has to be bought.
Bush may have successfully sent Saddam to the gallows, but in that hasty act of primitive revenge and parochial thinking , he has plunged the world into a never-ending cascading romantic clinch with global terrorism, making a martyr of the man they mauled. He was right. December 30 , 2006 is indeed a " milestone" day.
21 days after Saddam's execution, his ghost walks tall. There is life after death, after all.
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