If you hold a vigil, please let the press/radio know in
advance (take your own photograph and send it in to your local paper
if they don't send a
photographer) AND please also send a report to us at info [at] j-n-v [dot] org
There will be more materials appearing on the JNV website
(www.j-n-v.org) over the next 48 hours.
Best wishes
Maya Evans
Milan Rai
Justice Not Vengeance
www.j-n-v.org
Gabriel Carlyle
Voices in the Wilderness UK
www.voicesuk.org
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HOW TO STOP BIN LADEN:
The World Needs Justice, Not More Terror
JNV briefing #75, 21 January 2005
[A PDF version of this briefing, to print out and distribute, is available
on-line here]
EXPLAINING AL QAEDA-THE WRONG ANSWERS
Five days after the 11 September attacks, President Bush said that Osama
bin
Laden was 'the prime suspect'. He added, 'Now, I want to remind the American
people that the prime suspect's organization is in a lot of countries-it's
a
widespread organization based upon one thing: terrorizing. They can't stand
freedom; they hate what America stands for.'
Addressing Congress on 20 Sept. 2001, President Bush said,
'Al Qaeda is to
terror what the mafia is to crime. But its goal is not making money; its
goal is remaking the world-and imposing its radical beliefs on people
everywhere.' He added, 'Americans are asking, why do they hate us? They hate
what we see right here in this chamber-a democratically elected government.
Their leaders are self-appointed. They hate our freedoms-our freedom of
religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and
disagree with each other.'
Prime Minister Blair told the House of Commons on 14 Sept.
2001 that Parliament had been specially recalled because 'these attacks were
not just
attacks upon people and buildings; nor even merely upon the USA; these were
attacks on the basic democratic values in which we all believe so
passionately and on the civilised world'.
EXPLAINING AL QAEDA-THE REAL ANSWERS
The US Government's official '9/11 Commission' reported that bin Laden's
grievance with the United States 'started in reaction to specific US
policies'. Bin Laden and his group 'say that America had attacked Islam...
Americans are blamed when Israelis fight with Palestinians, when Russians
fight with Chechens, when Indians fight with Kashmiri Muslims, and when the
Philippine government fights ethnic Muslims in its southern islands.' The
US
is also 'held responsible for the governments of Muslim countries, derided
by al Qaeda as "your agents".
Such charges, says the Commission, 'found a ready audience
among millions of
Arabs and Muslims angry at the United States because of issues ranging from
Iraq to Palestine to America's support for their countries' repressive
rulers.' (The 9/11 Commission Report, New York: Norton & Co, 2004, p.
51)
WHAT THE CIA'S BIN LADEN EXPERT SAYS
The Commission's analysis may have drawn on the writings of Michael Scheuer,
who served in the CIA for 22 years, and who headed the CIA Counter-Terrorism
Centre's bin Laden task force (1996-1999). Scheuer, who retired in Nov.
2004, wrote two recent books as 'Anonymous': Through Our Enemies' Eyes and
Imperial Hubris: Why the West Is Losing the War on Terror. (He was unmasked
in the Boston Phoenix Scheuer contests the view put forward by George W.
Bush and Tony Blair: 'We in the United States and the West make a mistake
when we argue, as has [New York Times columnist] Thomas L. Friedman, that
bin Laden's attacks are "not aimed at reversing any specific U.S. foreign
policy," or, as Steve Simon and Daniel Benjamin did in Survival in early
2002, that bin Laden has "no discrete set of negotiatiable political
demands".' (Through Our Enemies' Eyes, p. 256)
Scheuer argues that Osama bin Laden has 'clear, focused,
limited and widely popular foreign policy goals', including: 'the end of
U.S. aid to Israel
and
the ultimate elimination of that state; the removal of U.S. and Western
forces from Iraq, Afghanistan, and othr Muslim lands; the end of U.S.
support for the oppression of Muslims by Russia, China, and India; the end
of U.S. protection for repressive, apostate regimes in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait,
Egypt, Jordan, et cetera; and the conservation of the Muslim world's energy
resources and their sale at higher prices.'Scheuer observes that, 'Bin Laden
is out to drastically alter U.S. and Western policies toward the Islamic
world, not necessarily to destroy America, much less its freedoms and
liberties. He is a practical warrior, not an apocalyptic terrorist in search
of Armageddon.' (Imperial Hubris, p. xviii)
Scheuer wrote, while still a serving CIA officer, 'Bin Laden
has been precise in telling America the reasons he is waging war on us. None
of the
reasons have anything to do with our freedom, liberty and democracy, but
have everything to do with U.S. policies and actions in the Muslim world.'
(Imperial Hubris, p. x) Scheuer goes further, arguing that 'the United
States, and its policies and actions, are bin Laden's only indispensable
allies'. (Imperial Hubris, p. xi)
WHAT CAN WE DO?
The 9/11 Commission also asked the question, 'What can we do to stop these
attacks?' It suggested that, while bin Laden's campaign had begun in
reaction to US policies, 'it quickly became far deeper': 'To the second
question of what America could do, al Qaeda's answer was that America should
abandon the Middle East, convert to Islam, and end the immorality and
godlessness of its culture... If the United States did not comply, it would
be at war with the Islamic nation'. (The 9/11 Commission Report, pp. 50-51)
The Commission produced no evidence that al Qaeda had such
a maximalist programme. Michael Scheuer vigorously disputes this view, drawing
a
distinction between 'the things a Muslim would find offensive', and things
which a Muslim might regard as an attack on Islam or on Muslims. 'Part of
bin Laden's genius is that he recognized early on the difference between
those issues Muslims find offensive about America and the West, and those
they find intolerable and life threatening.' (Imperial Hubris, p. 10)
Jason Burke, Chief Reporter for the London Observer, points
out in his book Al-Qaeda, 'While bin Laden's discourse may be based on an
interpretation
of
Islamic history, his power is derived from playing on the current social,
economic and political problems of the Muslim world.' (Al-Qaeda, Penguin,
2004, p. 25)
In the case of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, bin Laden
and other non-Afghan Muslims 'went there to fight the Red Army not because
the Soviets
were atheists and communists' but because of their brutal invasion.
(Imperial Hubris, p. 10) After the invasion was reversed, the mujahideen
did
not continue armed action against the atheist and anti-Islamic Soviet Union.
When the grievance ended, so did the mujahideen war.
Scheuer, as already pointed out, argues that Osama bin Laden
has 'clear, focused, [and] limited' foreign policy goals. The goal is not
the
establishment of an Islamic fundamentalist state in the US, whatever the
9/11 Commission asserts, but deep change in US foreign policy.
WHAT WOULD MAKE AL QAEDA STOP?
After 11 September, bin Laden said, 'Just as they are killing us, we have
to
kill them so there will be a balance of terror... We will do as they do.
If
they kill our women and innocent people, we will kill their women and
innocent people until they stop.' (Cited in Through Our Enemies' Eyes, p.
247, emphasis added) Intervening in the closing days of the 2004
presidential election, bin Laden told the American people, 'Your security
does not lie in the hands of Kerry, Bush, or al-Qaeda. Your security is in
your own hands. Each and every state that does not tamper with our security
will have automatically assured its own security.' (BBC, 30 Oct). This was
translated by CCN as, 'Any nation that does not attack us will not be
attacked.' 'Us' is meant to refer to the community of Muslim nations and
populations, and 'attack' has a broad meaning, as former CIA official
Michael Scheuer explains.
Writing before the invasion of Iraq, Scheuer commented:
'How will [al Qaeda] recognise victory? Easy, by forcing drastic changes
in U.S. foreign
policy... when U.S. and British forces evacuate Saudi Arabia and the rest
of
the Arabian peninsula; when the United States has terminated all aid to
Israel; and when the U.S. and UN embargoes on Iraq are lifted.' (These
achievements, bin Laden believes, 'will lead inevitably to destruction of
Israel and what bin Laden has called the regimes of "hypocrites" in
Saudi
Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, and elsewhere.') (Through Our Enemies' Eyes, p. 256)
To these goals, one might add the ending of the US-UK occupation of Iraq
and
presence in Afghanistan.
LEGITIMATE GRIEVANCES
Underlying these demands are legitimate grievances against the West: Western
support for Israeli oppression of the Palestinians; the invasion of Iraq
and
Afghanistan; the brutal sanctions imposed on Iraq (now lifted); and US-UK
support for dictatorial regimes in the Middle East. These are immoral
policies which should be reversed because they are wrong. So is the policy
of ignoring-or supporting-oppression in Chechnya and elsewhere.
It so happens that reversing these immoral policies would
drain most if not
all of the hatred which fuels al Qaeda. This is how we can stop bin Laden.
War, retaliation and violence simply adds to his appeal.
PUNISHMENT OR SURVIVAL
The governments of Britain and the United States can pursue the path of
punishment and preventive violence, or they can seek to bring this wave of
terrorism to an end. Bringing al Qaeda-style terrorism to an end means,
above all, reducing the motivation that exists to carry out terrorism. This
does not mean 'negotiating with terrorists' or 'capitulating to their
demands', but seeking justice and human rights for all, including the
peoples of Palestine and Iraq.
The answer to terrorism is justice, not more terrorism.
London and Washington must also stop practising the terrorism of the powerful-invasion,
occupation, and indirect terrorism via oppressive states. We should
recognise that in much of the world the U.S. is regarded as a leading
terrorist state, and with good reason.' Noam Chomsky (Chomsky, 9/11, Seven
Stories, 2001, p. 23)
Justice Not Vengeance (JNV): t: 0845 458 9571, e: info [at] j-n-v [dot] org,
w: www.j-n-v.org
