If I can make one person think once more about one issue, I've done all I can. Maybe I take things too seriously...or maybe you don't take things seriously enough.

Friday 28 March 2008

The News

Today was one of the rare days when I have enough money to wander into the Student Union shop and purchase a paper. So I buy the Guardian, fully expecting to absorb myself for an hour or two before I actually need to knuckle down and do something with my life. So I grab a comfortable chair, discard the sport section and the offer of 25 free songs and 1 audiobook, and flip the paper open.

The Guardian's headline story was fine: new powers for the City watchdogs. But what were they running alongside it? An article about the visit by M and Mme Sarkozy.

This managed not to annoy me much. I just assumed it was a slow news day. And, as I continued to move through the paper, that appeared to be the case. A two page spread on the Presidential visit, and some references to a man having a baby (not the topic of this post).

And then, on page 15, fully half an hour after starting the paper, an article catches my eye. For the unitiated, page 15 is usually around the end of the England-based news, and so tends to be fairly minor stuff. But not today. Languishing, on page 15, in what is supposedly an anti-war newspaper, is an article that announces that the Ministry of Defence have finally admitted guilt for the beatings and subsequent deaths of 8 Iraqi civilians, after months of trial.

Let me fill you in a little more. Several Iraqi civilians were 'detained' by members of the Queen's Lancashire Regiment. At some point during this detention, at least one of these civilians died. The coroner's report indicated cause of death being asphyxiation, but also pointed out the fact that there were 93 (yes, that's right, 93) individual wounds on his body.

Not only this, but apparently the court in which the trial was going on heard that the British Army officers ignored a ban from 1972 which forbade the use of "hooding, stressing, sleep deprivation, food deprivation and worse."

But that isn't the worst of it. The real horror here is not that such a thing happened. The real horror is that, somehow, at the court martial, they all got off. One enlisted man pleaded guilty to the charge; however, 6 others, including the officer in charge, were aquitted of all charges. And, just to cap it off, none of the soldiers had been charged with murder: all were charged with negligence.

I don't know about anyone else, but to me, this highlights exactly why I'm against modern warfare. Now, before anyone tries, I'd like to indicate that at no point do I think the enlisted men are at fault here. However, I think that the current atmosphere of fear regarding the transient and evasive 'terrorist threat' has lead to the rapid dehumanisation of much of the Middle East. This then makes it possible for officers to order the 'softening up' of detainees, which then means the enlisted men are forced to carry out abhorrent acts in the name of 'national defence'.

But what sickens me most is that all of this is done in the name of 'patriotism'. Let me be frank. I am a white Australian, which means I am of British stock. However, I have seen firsthand the destruction caused in my country by the British Empire. In the past, an abhorrent and disturbing amount of blood has been shed underneath, and in the name of, the Union Jack. What saddens me is that the current rulership of Britain seems determined to enforce a fear of that flag, by continuing the brutality and slaughter in the name of it. All of this, and then people wonder why it is that the Iraqi people weren't glad to see soldiers wearing the Union Jack entering the country. Hell, I'm not happy having the Union Jack on my own nation's flag.

If Britain wants respect on the world stage, it will need to learn to stop being the world's playground bully. After all, as anyone who was bullied will know, you don't respect the bully. You hate him. And the moment you see a way to take him down, you will. So my proposal is this: if you really want national security, stop pissing people off! Instead of shipping 'suspected terrorists' off to Guantanamo in the name of 'security', start helping them! Remove people like Robert Mugabe, not through violence, but through diplomatic and aid-related intervention. Do that, and maybe people will be less inclined to blow you sky high.

- - - - - - - - - -

Reference:

UK admits breaching human rights convention over detainee's death

8 comments:

Nighthood said...

COMMENTING!

But yeah, good blog post. Very interesting. And the gaurdian is good, barring the unnecessary feminist bits.

The Javahammer said...

while some of our colonial past is certainly awful we, as a country know that and I disagree with any idea that people are being taught to fear the union jack. What happened in that camp was awful and the trial seems to have problems I dont think you can justify the idea that the actions of those soldiers are somehow representative of what the government encourages.

Lukasa said...

I think you've missed my point. People aren't being taught to fear the Union Jack. That isn't necessary. The acts which are committed under it are enough for people to learn to fear it.

Furthermore, it doesn't matter whether the country knows it. What matters is that it has left a legacy that is not easily undone. And it doesn't help that the current administration clearly has no qualms about acting in a similar fashion to an imprealistic power.

Finally, I don't think the government overtly encourages that kind of behaviour. What it does encourage, implicitly, is the dehumanisation of the people involved. The western world now suffers from a fairly overt Islamophobia, which is in no small part due to the incredible overexposure in the media of 'Islamic Fundamentalists'. This conveniently ignores the large number of 'Jewish Fundamentalists' and 'Christian Fundamentalists', many of whom are as worth of the tag 'terrorist' as HAMAS or similar organisations.

My problem comes from the depressing fact that I suspect that the Colonel in charge would have thought twice if that had been a white person he had been ordered to 'interrogate', and furthermore, I believe that no court martial would have hesitated to convict them. And so I worry that the Western world is signing its own death warrant by failing to ask the simple question: "Why do these people want to kill us?"

The Javahammer said...

Again luka I can't agree. The acts of these soldiers are hardly representative of the British Army. You get some bad people in wars, always have done. Its only the mass media of today that allows it to be reported.

And no, the colonial legacy cannot be undone. it can, however be remembered as a shameful part of our history and with this knowledge we can move forward into a more tolerant future.

I also doubt that race had anything to do with this. The soldiers may have been racist but the government certainly isn't. Islamophobia is also a product mainly of the horrifically ignorant society of today, rather than the government who work fairly closely with the Muslim Council of Britain to try to overcome such prejudice.

Iain "DDude" Dawson said...

It is a thought provoking post, especially the part about dehumanisation.

Iain "DDude" Dawson said...

Good post, very thought provoking, especially the point on dehumanisation, which is sadly inspearable from our lives due to the hegemony of our modern gloabalised culture.

(this is, even if I do say so myself, an awesome sentance.)

Iain "DDude" Dawson said...

well, this makes me look stoopid. I tried to comment, my internet crashed, so I tried again, and it turns out that my half-written post is already here. Ho-hum.

Barry White said...

Hold the phone, I want to pull you both up on the use of "Islamophobia", a term which is bandied about too damn often. Most folks, and most media outlets come to think of it, seem to use the term (and its cohort, "anti-Islamic racism") as if it refers to a particular ethnic group. It's used both to lump people of various nationalities and background into a psuedo-homogenous block and also used to imply that if you take issue with Islam (be it political, fundamental, militant or whatever) then you are guilty of racism, which is a fabrication.


Anyway, I was about to write more and didn't I see that you're all in TF2. So I'm off to join you.