THE PACIFIST DELUSION

[Guest guest]

MOST Americans seem to understand the gravity of the situation that terrorism has put us in - and the need for some serious military response, even if that means dangers to the lives of us all. But some still insist on posturing while on the edge of a volcano.

 

In the forefront are college students who demand a "peaceful" response to an act of war. But others, who are old enough to know better, are still repeating the pacifist platitudes of the 1930s that contributed so much to bringing on World War II.

 

A former ambassador from the weak-kneed Carter administration says that we should look at the "root causes" behind the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. We should understand the "alienation" and "sense of grievance" against us by various people in the Middle East.

 

It is astonishing to see the phrase "root causes" resurrected in this context. It was precisely this kind of thinking, which sought the "root causes of crime" in the '60s, creating soft policies toward criminals, which led to skyrocketing crime rates.

 

On the international scene, trying to assuage aggressors' feelings and look at the world from their point of view has had an even more catastrophic track record. A typical sample of this kind of thinking can be found in a speech by British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain in 1938:

 

"It has always seemed to me that in dealing with foreign countries we do not give ourselves a chance of success unless we try to understand their mentality, which is not always the same as our own, and it really is astonishing to contemplate how the identically same facts are regarded from two different angles."

 

Like our Carter-era ambassador, Chamberlain sought to "remove the causes of strife or war." He wanted "a general settlement of the grievances of the world without war."

 

In other words, the British prime minister approached Hitler with the attitude of someone negotiating a labor contract, where each side gives a little and everything gets worked out in the end. All Chamberlain's concessions simply led to new demands from Hitler - and contempt for him by Hitler.

 

What Winston Churchill understood at the time, and Chamberlain did not, was that Hitler was driven by what Churchill called "currents of hatred so intense as to sear the souls of those who swim upon them." That was also what drove the men who drove the planes into the World Trade Center.

 

Pacifists of the 20th century had a lot of blood on their hands for weak- ening the Western democracies in the face of rising belligerence and military might in aggressor nations like Nazi Germany and imperial Japan.

 

In Britain during the 1930s, Labor Party members of Parliament voted repeatedly against military spending, while Hitler built up the most powerful military machine in Europe. Students at leading British universities signed pledges to refuse to fight in the event of war.

 

All of this encouraged the Nazis and the Japanese toward war against countries that they knew had greater military potential than their own.

 

Military potential only counts when there is the will to develop it and use it, and the fortitude to continue with a bloody war when it comes. This is what they did not believe the West had. And it was Western pacifists who led them to that belief.

 

Then as now, pacifism was a "statement" about one's ideals that paid little attention to actual consequences. When disarmament advocate George Bernard Shaw was asked what Britons should do if the Nazis crossed the channel into Britain, the playwright replied, "Welcome them as tourists."

 

What a shame our schools and colleges neglect history, which could save us from continuing to repeat the idiocies of the past, which are even more dangerous now in a nuclear age.

 

[Gauracandra]

Its scary how delusional some of these pacifists are. I was in total shock about 1 year ago watching a history program on Jimmy Carter's response to terrorism. At one point his administration was going to execute a hostage release or such, and he actually said "Can we use rubber bullets?" because he didn't want to kill the terrorists.

 

Jimmy Carter might have been a nice guy, but he was a completely inept leader. The way you handle bad guys is not with a kid glove. You KILL THEM.

 

Now we are seeing on a number of college campuses, the suburban white boy Gen-X slackers who never had do anything trying to pretend they now have a cause. "Stop this unjust war" is what one protestor said on TV the other day. Ummm... excuse me..... where is the war first of all, and what the hell is unjust about it. Yeah, its some 20 something kid who was raised on Captain Crunch and TVs Married With Children. Never had to work a day in his life. No doubt is attending college on government loans. But hey "Stop this unjust war".

 

These guys are idiots. Do they have a solution besides sitting around the camp fire, holding hands, and living in delusion that Bad Guys are really Good Guys who are misunderstood? Nope. Thats all they've got. Pathetic.

 

Gauracandra

[JRdd]

I agree that it would be foolish to allow the aggressors to get away with it. Utterly foolish. Please don't misunderstand that, just because I also see the value in prayer.

[livingentity]

Must see tv - Sunday at 4 p.m. PST a documentary called "Under the Veil" on CNN. I saw a small portion of this the other night and I think the pacifists protesting military action against the Taliban should watch this one very carefully.

 

[This message has been edited by livingentity (edited 09-22-2001).]

[Maitreya]

living entity,

 

I saw it and it is powerful.Saira Shah, the brave correspondent who did the piece,brings to light life in present day Afghanistan.And it is not pretty, especially if you are in a female body.

 

After watching this one will want to fight to free the Afghani's from the Taliban.

[livingentity]

UPDATE:

 

"Under the Veil" will also be shown tonight on CNN at 8 p.m. pst.

 

Anyone with access to CNN needs to watch this.

[livingentity]

Yes, this documentary is incredible. I will not go into any details of the part that I saw. I would like for others to see it also and come back to discuss it here. I will say that after seeing that portion the other night I was ready to go over there and take care of them myself.

 

Originally posted by Maitreya:

living entity,

 

I saw it and it is powerful.Saira Shah, the brave correspondent who did the piece,brings to light life in present day Afghanistan.And it is not pretty, especially if you are in a female body.

 

After watching this one will want to fight to free the Afghani's from the Taliban.

 

[dasanudas]

'Under the veil' didn't scratch the surface.

there are others here in Oz that illustrated more graphicly what is going on behind those covered faces.

I thought one statement rather imcomprehensible, when some minister was asked why they execute some women like a public sporting event, in their local sports arena? Which was donated to them thru international funding. He replied "well if the international community wishes to build them another place they won't use the stadium anymore."

I thought maybe they should try an international telethon to raise funds for them. So long as they give out their address where to send donations

[Guest guest]

[From today's Boston Herald]:

 

You click on the Web site and see a home video of an Afghan woman on her knees in the middle of the Kabul Ghazi Sports Stadium.

 

 

 

She wears a baby-blue burqa. That's the head-to-toe covering, slits for eyes, no peripheral vision, that the Taliban requires be worn by women who, before 1997, made up 70 percent of that country's teachers, 40 percent of its physicians, 60 percent of its university teachers and half of its government workers.

 

 

 

The kneeling woman looks behind her as a bearded man approaches with a machine gun. He puts its barrel to the back of her head. She turns to face the ground. And he shoots. Bam. No preliminaries. No hesitation, proclamations or last words. You see something dark exit the woman's head. You see what appears to be the impact of the bullet splaying dirt beneath her, before she falls. It's dated Nov. 16, 1999.

 

 

 

Scroll down. It's the Live Photos of Massacre of 300 at Yakawlang site, dated January 2001. Click here for ``movie clips.'' You see burqa-covered skeletons and clots of blood on walls.

 

 

 

Then there is the Afghan Refugees Eating Grass site: freezing temperatures kills 18 children, Jan. 16, 2001. There is the Afghan Children of Garbage in Pakistan site. Pre-schoolers eat from overturned garbage bags.

 

 

 

There is the site showing men hung by their necks from cranes. Another shows a home video of a public throat-slashing. At both, crowds strain for close-up views.

 

 

 

It quickly becomes clear that opportunities to view Taliban atrocities are sickeningly endless at The Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan's (RAWA) website. Its creators warn you: the photos herein are not for the faint of heart.

 

 

 

But they were put there as witness to homegrown terror by an underground Taliban-opposition group known as the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan that is trying to galvanize the international community over the Taliban's subjugation of women.

 

 

 

At risk of torture or even execution, RAWA members have secretly filmed murders of alleged adulterers and prostitutes and gays before thousands in the Kabul stadium donated to the once cosmopolitan city by the United Nations.

 

 

 

Ironically, the same Internet some believe was used by terrorists to plan the World Trade Center attacks is what has enabled these women to communicate beyond their borders. Only most of us weren't paying attention.

 

 

 

``The world, it seems, has become emotionally immune to the continuing tragedies of Afghanistan.'' So wrote a reporter in an ``inside Afghanistan'' feature distributed by Taranaki Newspaper Limited on Sept. 5, just six days before the attack. Surely, we're paying attention now.

 

 

 

Some of what we've learned: that bombing Afghanistan ``back to the stone age'' won't likely get us far. It's already there.

 

 

 

Even if RAWA exaggerates, even if reports of modest improvments are true, about a third of Kabul, scholar Barnett Rubin wrote in yesterday's New York Times, ``is as ruined as the World Trade Center'' by a decade of war.

 

 

 

And children starve. And refugees freeze. And women die from diseases such as appendicitis because male doctors are still officially forbidden from seeing women and women doctors - women anything - can't work.

 

 

 

A brother or husband must accompany women to market lest they speak to shopkeepers, and excite them. Women who paint their nails have reportedly lost fingertips and, for wearing makeup, are publicly lashed.

 

 

 

Also on RAWA's Web site, alongside shots of grinning men displaying amputated hands in the streets of Kabul, there is the Painting by Afghan Children site.

 

 

 

It looks nothing like you'd see your own children draw. Where primitive sketches of rainbows and stick-figure families should be are pictures of guns and bloody bodies and bearded men hitting women. Two drawings show men hanging upside down, tied to poles, either dying or dead. Beside one is a woman weeping into her hands. A child watches. The child of the dead man, perhaps, a self-portrait of the artist.

 

 

 

[livingentity]

I am convinced more than ever that the taliban are demons from the depths of hell. I could not close my eyes last night after the show without seeing the images of the dead and tortured. I had horrid dreams. I am speechless.

[Caitanyachandra]

Are we sure that taleban is behind this?

 

[This message has been edited by Caitanyachandra (edited 09-23-2001).]

[Guest guest]

Originally posted by Caitanyachandra:

Are we sure that taleban is behind this?

 

 

Who cares?

 

Perhaps it is Caitanyachandra?

 

Watch your back Caitanyachandra.

 

 

 

[livingentity]

Behind what? The nightmares of death and torture that they are obviously performing in afganistan or the nightmare of Sept.11?

Originally posted by Caitanyachandra:

Are we sure that taleban is behind this?

 

[This message has been edited by Caitanyachandra (edited 09-23-2001).]

 

[JRdd]

I dont have TV but I followed that link and the pictures were awful! I had to stop after I saw the series showing the children digging through the garbage for food. that just broke my heart. I felt physically sick to my stomach for a long time today after seeing that.

[Guest guest]

Tell the rainbows why it is necessary for war.

 

Death to demons.

[livingentity]

If anyone has any doubts about the taliban go through the RAWA site (thank you RA for the link). They are demons and nothing short of death to these demons will release the Afganistan people from their hell.

Originally posted by rand0M aXiS:

Death to demons.

 

 

[This message has been edited by livingentity (edited 09-24-2001).]

[mahak]

Haribol, the pacifists ask about the terrorists"What do they want?.

 

What they want is the following.

 

1> Destruction of all western culture

 

2> Death to all Christiasns, Jews and Hindus

 

3> The end of all scientific advancement

 

4> The end of everything but Islam according to fanatic fundamentalism

 

There is no discussion with those who think their mission of life is to "rise out of the desert to serve allah and kill the infidels and the world they have wrought. There is no negotiation.

 

They have the same mentality as the so-called christians had during the 200 year crusades. Paradise awaits those who kill the infidel. Unfortunately, chickens are coming home to roost, but this is the nature of history. One mans terrorist is anothers holy man or liberator.

 

The goal of fundamental Islam, proposed by bin Lauden as well as Khomeni in the late seventies, is that the glory days of Muhammed return, in other words, live in a waste land and kill all who are outside your cult.

 

Pure evil, nothing more, nothing less. Pacifism to these guys mean that you wish to go back to 600 C.E. and all the great life they had back then.

 

mahak