Chomsky On War in Afganistan.pdf

The War in

Afghanistan

Excerpted from Lakdawala lecture, New Delhi Online version with notes,

prepared Dec. 30

By Noam Chomsky

The threat of international terrorism is surely severe. The horrendous events of Sept. 11 had

perhaps the most devastating instant human toll on record, outside of war. The word

"instant" should not be overlooked; regrettably, the crime is far from unusual in the annals

of violence that falls short of war. The death toll may easily have doubled or more within a

few weeks, as miserable Afghans fled -- to nowhere -- under the threat of bombing, and

desperately-needed food supplies were disrupted; and there were credible warnings of much

worse to come.

The costs to Afghan civilians can only be guessed, but we do know the projections on

which policy decisions and commentary were based, a matter of utmost significance. As a

matter of simple logic, it is these projections that provide the grounds for any moral

evaluation of planning and commentary, or any judgment of appeals to "just war"

arguments; and crucially, for any rational assessment of what may lie ahead.

Even before Sept. 11, the UN estimated that millions were being sustained, barely, by

international food aid. On Sept. 16, the national press reported that Washington had

"demanded [from Pakistan] the elimination of truck convoys that provide much of the food

and other supplies to Afghanistan's civilian population." There was no detectable reaction in

the U.S. or Europe to this demand to impose massive starvation; the plain meaning of the

words. In subsequent weeks, the world's leading newspaper reported that "The threat of

military strikes forced the removal of international aid workers, crippling assistance

programs"; refugees reaching Pakistan "after arduous journeys from Afghanistan are

describing scenes of desperation and fear at home as the threat of American-led military

attacks turns their long-running misery into a potential catastrophe." "The country was on a

lifeline," one evacuated aid worker reported, "and we just cut the line." "It's as if a mass

grave has been dug behind millions of people," an evacuated emergency officer for

Christian Aid informed the press: "We can drag them back from it or push them in. We

could be looking at millions of deaths." 1

The UN World Food Program and others were able to resume some food shipments in early

October, but were forced to suspend deliveries and distribution when the bombing began on

October 7, resuming them later at a much lower pace. A spokesman for the UN High

Commissioner for Refugees warned that "We are facing a humanitarian crisis of epic

proportions in Afghanistan with 7.5 million short of food and at risk of starvation," while

aid agencies leveled "scathing" condemnations of U.S. air drops that are barely concealed

"propaganda tools" and may cause more harm than benefit, they warned. 2

A very careful reader of the national press could discover the estimate by the UN that "7.5

million Afghans will need food over the winter -- 2.5 million more than on Sept. 11," a

50% increase as a result of the threat of bombing, then the actuality. 3 In other words,

Western civilization was basing its plans on the assumption that they might lead to the

death of several million innocent civilians -- not Taliban, whatever one thinks of the

legitimacy of slaughtering Taliban recruits and supporters, but their victims. Meanwhile its

leader, on the same day, once again dismissed with contempt offers of negotiation for

extradition of the suspected culprit and the request for some credible evidence to

substantiate the demands for capitulation. The UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food

pleaded with the U.S. to end the bombing that was putting "the lives of millions of civilians

at risk," renewing the appeal of UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson,

who warned of a Rwanda-style catastrophe. Both appeals were rejected, as were those of

the major aid and relief agencies. And virtually unreported. 4

In late September, the UN Food And Agricultural Organization warned that over 7 million

people were facing a crisis that could lead to widespread starvation if military action were

initiated, with a likely "humanitarian catastrophe" unless aid were immediately resumed and

the threat of military action terminated. After bombing began, the FAO advised that it had

disrupted planting that provides 80% of the country's grain supplies, so that the effects next

year are expected to be even more severe. All ignored. 5

These unreported appeals happened to coincide with World Food Day, which was also

ignored, along with the charge by the UN Special Rapporteur that the rich and powerful

easily have the means, though not the will, to overcome the "silent genocide" of mass

starvation in much of the world. 6

Let us return briefly to the point of logic: ethical judgments and rational evaluation of what

may lie ahead are grounded in the presuppositions of planning and commentary. An entirely

separate matter, with no bearing on such judgments, is the accuracy of the projections on

which planning and commentary were based. By year's end, there were hopes that

unprecedented deliveries of food in December might "dramatically" revise the expectations

at the time when planning was undertaken and implemented, and evaluated in commentary:

that these actions were likely to drive millions over the edge of starvation. 7 Very likely, the

facts will never be known, by virtue of a guiding principle of intellectual culture: We must

devote enormous energy to exposing the crimes of official enemies, properly counting not

only those literally killed but also those who die as a consequence of policy choices; but we

must take scrupulous care to avoid this practice in the case of our own crimes, on the rare

occasions when they are investigated at all. Observance of the principle is all too well

documented. It will be a welcome surprise if the current case turns out differently.

Another elementary point might also be mentioned. The success of violence evidently has

no bearing on moral judgment with regard to its goals. In the present case, it seemed clear

from the outset that the reigning superpower could easily demolish any Afghan resistance.

My own view, for what it is worth, was that à

U.S. campaigns should not be too casually compared to the failed Russian invasion of the

1980s. The Russians were facing a major army of perhaps 100,000 men or more, organized,

trained, and heavily armed by the CIA and its associates. The U.S. is facing a ragtag force

in a country that has already been virtually destroyed by 20 years of horror, for which we

bear no slight share of responsibility. The Taliban forces, such as they are, might quickly

collapse except for a small hardened core. 8

To my surprise, the dominant judgment -- even after weeks of carpet bombing and resort to

virtually every available device short of nuclear weapons ("daisy cutters," cluster bombs,

etc.) -- was confidence that the lessons of the Russian failure should be heeded, that

airstrikes would be ineffective, and that a ground invasion would be necessary to achieve

the U.S. war aims of eliminating bin Laden and al-Qaeda. Removing the Taliban regime

was an afterthought. There had been no interest in this before Sept. 11, or even in the month

that followed. A week after the bombing began, the President reiterated that U.S. forces

"would attack Afghanistan `for as long as it takes' to destroy the Qaeda terrorist network of

Osama bin Laden, but he offered to reconsider the military assault on Afghanistan if the

country's ruling Taliban would surrender Mr. bin Laden"; "If you cough him up and his

people today, then we'll reconsider what we are doing to your country," the President

declared: "You still have a second chance." 9

When Taliban forces did finally succumb, after astonishing endurance, opinions shifted to

triumphalist proclamations and exultation over the justice of our cause, now demonstrated

by the success of overwhelming force against defenseless opponents. Without researching

the topic, I suppose that Japanese and German commentary was similar after early victories

during World War II, and despite obvious dis-analogies, one crucial conclusion carries over

to the present case: the victory of arms leaves the issues where they were, though the

triumphalist cries of vindication should serve as a warning for those who care about the

future.

Returning to the war, the airstrikes quickly turned cities into "ghost towns," the press

reported, with electrical power and water supplies destroyed, a form of biological warfare.

The UN reported that 70% of the population had fled Kandahar and Herat within two

weeks, mostly to the countryside, where in ordinary times 10-20 people, many of them

children, are killed or crippled daily by land mines. Those conditions became much worse

as a result of the bombing. UN mine-clearing operations were halted, and unexploded U.S.

ordnance, particularly the lethal bomblets scattered by cluster bombs, add to the torture, and

are much harder to clear. 10

By late October, aid officials estimated that over a million had fled their homes, including

80% of the population of Jalalabad, only a "tiny fraction" able to cross the border, most

scattering to the countryside where there was little food or shelter or possibility of

delivering aid; appeals from aid agencies to suspend attacks to allow delivery of supplies

were again rejected by Blair, ignored by the U.S. 11

Months later, hundreds of thousands were reported to be starving in such "forgotten camps"

as Maslakh in the North, having fled from "mountainous places to which the World Food

Program was giving food aid but stopped because of the bombing and now cannot be

reached because the passes are cut off" -- and who knows how many in places that no

journalists found -- though supplies were by then available and the primary factor

hampering delivery was lack of interest and will. 12

By the year's end, long after fighting ended, the occasional report noted that "the delivery of

food remains blocked or woefully inadequate," "a system for distributing food is still not in

place," and even the main route to Uzbekistan "remains effectively closed to food trucks"

over two weeks after it was officially opened with much fanfare; the same was true of the

crucial artery from Pakistan to Kandahar, and others were so harassed by armed militias that

the World Food Program, now with supplies available, still could not make deliveries, and

had no place for storage because "most warehouses were destroyed or looted during the

U.S. bombardment." 13

A detailed year-end review found that the U.S. war "has returned to power nearly all the

same warlords who had misruled the country in the days before the Taliban"; some Afghans

see the resulting situation as even "worse than it was before the Taliban came to power." 14

The Taliban takeover of most of the country, with little combat, brought to an end a period

described by Afghan and international human rights activists as "the blackest in the history

of Afghanistan," "the worst time in Afghanistan's history," with vast destruction, mass rapes

and other atrocities, and tens of thousands killed. 15 These were the years of rule by

warlords of the Northern Alliance and other Western favorites, such as the murderous

Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, one of the few who has not reclaimed his fiefdom. There are

indications that lessons have been learned both in Afghanistan and the world beyond, and

that the worst will not recur, as everyone fervently hopes.

Signs were mixed, at year's end. As anticipated, most of the population was greatly relieved

to see the end of the Taliban, one of the most retrograde regimes in the world; and relieved

that there was no quick return to the atrocities of a decade earlier, as had been feared. The

new government in Kabul showed considerably more promise than most had expected. The

return of warlordism is a dangerous sign, as was the announcement by the new Justice

Minister that the basic structure of sharia law as instituted by the Taliban would remain in

force, though "there will be some changes from the time of the Taliban. For example, the

Taliban used to hang the victim's body in public for four days. We will only hang the body

for a short time, say 15 minutes." Judge Ahamat Ullha Zarif added that some new location

would be found for the regular public executions, not the Sports Stadium. "Adulterers, both

male and female, would still be stoned to death, Zarif said, `but we will use only small

stones'," so that those who confess might be able to run away; others will be "stoned to

death," as before. 16 The international reaction will doubtless have a significant effect on

the balance of conflicting forces.

As the year ended, desperate peasants, mostly women, were returning to the miserable labor

of growing opium poppies so that their families can survive, reversing the Taliban ban. The

UN had reported in October that poppy production had already "increased threefold in areas

controlled by the Northern Alliance," whose warlords "have long been reputed to control

much of the processing and smuggling of opium" to Russia and the West, an estimated 75%

of the world's heroin. The result of some poor woman's back

-breaking labor is that

"countless others thousands of miles away from her home in eastern Afghanistan will suffer

and die." 17

Such consequences, and the devastating legacy of 20 years of brutal war and atrocities,

could be alleviated by an appropriate international presence and well-designed programs of

aid and reconstruction; were honesty to prevail, they would be called "reparations," at least

from Russia and the U.S., which share primary responsibility for the disaster. The issue was

addressed in a conference of the UN Development Program, World Bank, and Asian

Development Bank in Islamabad in late November. Some guidelines were offered in a

World Bank study that focused on Afghanistan's potential role in the development of the

energy resources of the region. The study concluded that

Afghanistan has a positive pre-war history of cost recovery for key infrastructure services

like electric power, and "green field" investment opportunities in sectors like

telecommunications, energy, and oil/gas pipelines. It is extremely important that such

services start out on the right track during reconstruction. Options for private investment in

infrastructure should be actively pursued. 18

One may reasonably ask just whose needs are served by these priorities, and what status

they should have in reconstruction from the horrors of the past two decades.

U.S. and British intellectual opinion, across the political spectrum, assured us that only

radical extremists can doubt that "this is basically a just war." 19 Those who disagree can

therefore be dismissed, among them, for example, the 1000 Afghan leaders who met in

Peshawar in late October in a U.S.-backed effort to lay the groundwork for a post-Taliban

regime led by the exiled King. They bitterly condemned the U.S. war, which is "beating the

donkey rather than the rider," one speaker said to unanimous agreement.

The extent to which anti-Taliban Afghan opinion was ignored is rather striking -- and not at

all unusual; during the Gulf war, for example, Iraqi dissidents were excluded from press

and journals, apart from "alternative media," though they were readily accessible. Without

eliciting comment, Washington maintained its long-standing official refusal to have any

dealings with the Iraqi opposition even well after the war ended. 20 In the present case,

Afghan opinion is not as easily assessed, but the task would not have been impossible, and

the issue is of such evident significance that it merits at least a few comments.

We might begin with the gathering of Afghan leaders in Peshawar, some exiles, some who

trekked across the border from within Afghanistan, all committed to overthrowing the

Taliban regime. It was "a rare display of unity among tribal elders, Islamic scholars,

fractious politicians, and former guerrilla commanders," the New York Times reported. They

unanimously "urged the U.S. to stop the air raids," appealed to the international media to

call for an end to the "bombing of innocent people," and "demanded an end to the U.S.

bombing of Afghanistan." They urged that other means be adopted to overthrow the hated

Taliban regime, a goal they believed could be achieved without slaughter and destruction. 21

Reported, but dismissed without further comment.

A similar message was conveyed by Afghan opposition leader Abdul Haq, who condemned

the air attacks as a "terrible mistake." 22 Highly regarded in Washington, Abdul Haq was

considered to be "perhaps the most important leader of anti-Taliban opposition among

Afghans of Pashtun nationality based in Pakistan." 23 His advice was to "avoid bloodshed

as much as possible"; instead of bombing, "we should undermine the central leadership,

which is a very small and closed group and which is also the only thing which holds them

all together. If they are destroyed, every Taliban fighter will pick up his gun and his blanket

and disappear back home, and that will be the end of the Taliban," an assessment that seems

rather plausible in the light of subsequent events.

Several weeks later, Abdul Haq entered Afghanistan, apparently without U.S. support, and

was captured and killed. As he was undertaking this mission "to create a revolt within the

Taliban," he criticized the U.S. for refusing to aid him and others in such endeavors, and

condemned the bombing as "a big setback for these efforts." He reported contacts with

second-level Taliban commanders and ex-Mujahidin tribal elders, and discussed how

further efforts could proceed, calling on the U.S. to assist them with funding and other

support instead of undermining them with bombs.

The U.S., Abdul Haq said,

is trying to show its muscle, score a victory and scare everyone in the world. They don't care

about the suffering of the Afghans or how many people we will lose. And we don't like that.

Because Afghans are now being made to suffer for these Arab fanatics, but we all know

who brought these Arabs to Afghanistan in the 1980s, armed them and gave them a base. It

was the Americans and the CIA. And the Americans who did this all got medals and good

careers, while all these years Afghans suffered from these Arabs and their allies. Now,

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