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When
the Iran-Iraq war broke out in 1980 we learned of
it on the blanket from somebody coming back from a
visit, a priest at mass or as a result of something
shouted over from H5. The latter’s ability to
inform to any extent was invariably determined by
wind direction and the willingness of the person tasked
with shouting the news to bellow loudly enough so
that H4 would pick it up.
For
us, there wasn’t a great deal to choose between
the two warring nations. We were republican protestors,
deprived of reading material and normal intellectual
stimulation, so picking either Iran or Iraq was a
case of IRA with a Q stuck on to the end of it or
alternatively IRA with a N. We knew nothing about
Saddam or Iraq. We did know that Iran had undergone
a revolution the year before. That it was of a fundamentalist
type didn’t seem to matter greatly - revolution
was a nice word. It had overthrown the Shah who was
a friend of the Americans, not all that long booted
out of Vietnam; American servicemen had died in a
helicopter collision trying to rescue some of their
captured comrades or hostages and this suggested to us ‘anti-imperialists’
that ‘IO Tolie’ couldn’t have been
that bad. Maybe even a bit like Ortega. We had no
access to newspapers, books or television so didn’t
know what he looked like. And in our minds’ eye
his name was spelt phonetically.
This
was all back in the 1980s, the decade in which we
opposed the US government as in every revolutionary
situation it backed only Contra governments. It still
only backs Contra governments but because many of
us who raved so loudly about American imperialism
and labelled ‘contra’ anybody who disagreed
with us are now in the Contra government up at Stormont
our outspoken opposition to ‘US imperialism’
is much more muted. Many of us now like to perform
Mexican waves for American presidents after they have
bombed Sudanese pharmaceutical factories, an act described
by Christopher Hitchens as a war crime. And we are
happy enough to let Andrew King of the Socialist Workers
Party lead ethical opposition against such people.
But in our brave new world of doublethink this is
the revolutionary thing to do and only contras refuse
to support Contra governments.
A
memorable phrase from the days of the Iran-Iraq war
was that of the war criminal Henry Kissinger: ‘pity
they can’t both lose’. Such sentiment has
instinctively shaped the way I have thought about
the war that may soon be launched by America and Britain
against Iraq. But the victims in this war will be
innocent Iraqi men, women and children. And awareness
of that prompts me to feel it is better that this
war does not start rather than vainly hope that both
sides lose in one which is fought. Bush or Blair are
hardly concerned with upholding international law
or mounting humanitarian intervention in the region
otherwise they would surround Tel Aviv and oust Sharon.
For
that reason I ventured down to the Culturlann last
night for the second in a series of Marxist Forums
organised by the Socialist Workers Party, where Barbara
Muldoon was to deliver a lecture on the background
shaping the growing momentum towards war. Normally,
I avoid the ‘far left’ like the plague due
to their sloganising, bombastic rhetoric and strategic
myopia. But people like Barbara Muldoon and her colleagues
in Belfast have been at the forefront of all those
issues I had long thought we republicans should have
been immersed in. Often isolated, speaking at miniscule
meetings, and subject to unpleasantries from hecklers,
they have never opted for respectability and the easy
life. It is not a student fad for many of them - some
have been at it as long as I was in prison; enough
time to get six degrees back to back. Talented, they
will hardly go places within their own careers due
to their political outlook. As a party I do not support
them, and I find their democratic centralism anathema.
But as conscientious individuals they do protect a
socialist discourse at a time when an ideological
assault in defence of capitalist values is being driven
home even in local and formerly radical papers.
Last
night’s event kicked off with Barbara Muldoon
reminding her audience that a war will take place
regardless of what happens in the coming weeks. She
claimed it will be a war completely without justification.
America has cobbled together a tissue of lies in advance
of attack 'just like they did prior to invading Kuwait’
when they alleged that invading Iraqi troops were
pulling babies out of incubators. Part of the lecture
urged people to be alert to a series of buzzwords
in the media which number among them 'humanitarian
intervention', 'rogue states' and ‘known terrorists’:
they are simply code for America preparing to attack
some poor country. The chief purveyor of this target-setting,
the US media, was criticised severely for its central
role in demonising Iraq.
Operation
Desert Storm was addressed in some detail during the
evening. Comparison was drawn between the behaviour
of US forces who buried Iraqi troops alive and the
SS who inflicted similar atrocities on their opponents
during World War two.
UN
imposed sanctions came under particular scrutiny.
It was stated that there were now one million Iraqi
citizens dead as a result of these. Furthermore, the
levels of radiation in the country are 84 times the
safety level and child leukaemia is up by 500% all
of which the UN remains indifferent to. The audience
was urged not to be taken in by the ruse that any
forthcoming UN backing for the war would in some way
make it justified. Its role is one of player posing
as referee.
Barbara
Muldoon argued that oil greases the West’s interest
in the region. She pointed out that there little in
the way of humanitarian concern was on display when America
backed Saddam Hussein against the newly installed
Ayatollah Khomeni in Iran despite it being public
knowledge that Saddam had gassed 180, 000 Kurds. Most
interesting of all she ended her lecture by drawing
attention to a strategic think tank document reported
on in this week's Sunday Herald. Put together
before the inauguration of George Bush as president
this report amounted to a call for US domination on
a global scale, part of which meant crippling Iraq.
Ominously some of those involved in the think tank
are now in the Bush government.
This
lecture was not as well attended as the previous Marxist
Forum sponsored event on Che Guevara. That was the
sole disappointing feature of the evening because
the delivery was every bit as powerful as Brian Kelly’s
on the Cuban revolutionary. Those who were there engaged
in a robust exchange of views at the end. One thing
that was certain was the knowledge as we left the
hall that we would need to do much more. If the anti-war
movement in Belfast can refrain from going to war
on each other, as it did last December, the possibility
exists that pressure will emanate from that quarter
and flow into a wider pool of opposition that might
just save the lives of innocent Iraqis. As for Saddam
Hussein in all of this - if he finds his way to sharing
a cell at the Hague with Henry Kissinger, then progress
will have been made.
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