Concerns over the war

AT THIS grim moment, we can do nothing to stop the on-going invasion. But that does not mean that the task is over for people who have some concern for justice, freedom, and human rights. Far from it. The tasks will be more urgent than before, whatever the outcome of the attack.

And about that, no one has any idea: not the Pentagon, the CIA, or anyone else. Possibilities range from the horrifying humanitarian catastrophes of which aid and relief agencies that work in Iraq have been warning, to relatively benign outcomes — though even if not a hair is harmed on anyone’s head that will in no way mitigate the criminality of those willing to subject helpless people to such terrible risks, for their own shameful purposes.

As for the outcomes, it will be a long time before preliminary judgments can be made. One immediate task is to lend what weight we can to more benign outcomes. That means, primarily, caring for the needs of the victims, not just of this war but of Washington’s vicious and destructive sanctions regime of the past ten years, which has devastated the civilian society, strengthened the ruling tyrant, and compelled the population to rely on him for survival.

As has been pointed out for years, the sanctions therefore undermined the hope that Saddam Hussein would go the way of other murderous tyrants no less vicious than he. That includes a terrible rogues gallery of criminals who were also supported by those now at the helm in Washington, in many cases to the last days of their bloody rule: Ceausescu, to mention only one obvious and highly pertinent case.

Elementary decency would call for massive reparations from the US; lacking that, at least a flow of aid to Iraqis, so that they can rebuild what has been destroyed in their own way, not as dictated by people in Washington and Crawford whose higher faith is that power comes from the barrel of a gun.

But the issues are much more fundamental, and long-range. Opposition to the invasion of Iraq has been entirely without historical precedent. That is why Bush had to meet his two cronies at a US military base on an island, where they would be safely removed from any mere people. The opposition may be focused on the invasion of Iraq, but its concerns go far beyond that. There is growing fear of US power, which is considered to be the greatest threat to peace in much of the world, probably by a large majority. And with the technology of destruction now at hand, rapidly becoming more lethal and ominous, threat to peace means threat to survival.

Fear of the US government is not based solely on this invasion, but on the background from which it arises: An openly-declared determination to rule the world by force, the one dimension in which US power is supreme, and to make sure that there will never be any challenge to that domination. Preventive wars are to be fought at will: Preventive, not Pre-emptive. Whatever the justifications for pre-emptive war might sometimes be, they do not hold for the very different category of preventive war: the use of military force to eliminate an imagined or invented threat. The openly-announced goal is to prevent a challenge to the “power, position, and prestige of the United States.”

Such challenge, now or in the future, and any sign that it may emerge, will be met without overwhelming force by the rulers of the country that now apparently outspends the rest of the world combined on means of violence, and is forging new and very dangerous paths over near-unanimous world opposition: development of lethal weaponry in space, for example.

It is worth bearing in mind that the words I quoted are not those of Dick Cheney or Donald Rumsfeld or other radical statist extremists now in charge. Rather, they are the words of the respected elder statesman Dean Acheson, 40 years ago, when he was a senior adviser to the Kennedy administration. He was justifying US actions against Cuba — knowing that the international terrorist campaign aimed at “regime change” had just brought the world close to terminal nuclear war. Nevertheless, he instructed the American Society of International Law, no “legal issue” arises in the case of a US response to a challenge to its “power, position, and prestige,” specifically terrorist attacks and economic warfare against Cuba.

I bring this up as a reminder that the issues are deep-seated. The current administration is at the extremist end of the policy-planning spectrum, and its adventurism and penchant for violence are unusually dangerous. But the spectrum is not that broad, and unless these deeper issues are addressed, we can be confident that other ultrareactionary extremists will gain control of incredible means of devastation and repression.

The “imperial ambition” of the current power holders, as it is frankly called, has aroused shudders throughout the world, including the mainstream of the establishment at home. Elsewhere, of course, the reactions are far more fearful, particularly among the traditional victims. They know too much history, the hard way, to be comforted by exalted rhetoric. They have heard enough of that over the centuries as they were being beaten by the club called “civilization.” Just a few days ago, the head of the non-aligned movement, which includes the governments of most of the world’s population, described the Bush administration as more aggressive than Hitler. He happens to be very pro-American, and right in the middle of Washington’s international economic projects. And there is little doubt that he speaks for many of the traditional victims, and by now even for many of their traditional oppressors.

It is easy to go on, and important to think these matters through, with care and honesty.

Even before the Bush administration sharply escalated these fears in recent months, intelligence and international affairs specialists were informing anyone who wanted to listen that the policies Washington is pursuing are likely to lead to an increase in terror and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, for revenge or simply deterrence.

There are two ways for Washington to respond to the threats engendered by its actions and startling proclamations. One way is to try to alleviate the threats by paying some attention to legitimate grievances, and by agreeing to become a civilized member of a world community, with some respect for world order and its institutions. The other way is to construct even more awesome engines of destruction and domination, so that any perceived challenge, however remote, can be crushed — provoking new and greater challenges. That way poses serious dangers to the people of the US and the world, and may, very possibly, lead to extinction of the species — not an idle speculation.

Terminal nuclear war has been avoided by near miracle in the past; a few months before Acheson’s speech, to mention one case that should be fresh in our minds today. Threats are severe and mounting. The world has good reason to watch what is happening in Washington with fear and trepidation. The people who are best placed to relieve those fears, and to lead the way to a more hopeful and constructive future, are the citizens of the United States, who can shape the future.

Those are among the deep concerns that must, I think, be kept clearly in mind while watching events unfold in their unpredictable way as the most awesome military force in human history is unleashed against a defenceless enemy by a political leadership that has compiled a frightening record of destruction and barbarism since it took the reins of power over 20 years ago.—Courtesy: ZNet.

From protest to work

THE quest for a new political and economic order in Pakistan seems unending. With the leaders it is an obsession, on the people it has inflicted only poverty and ignorance. Imagine, in the middle of the last century Pakistan and South Korea were at similar levels of development. Today an average Korean is nine times richer than a Pakistani.

The reason is obvious and only one: The Koreans had a continuing and profound commitment to economic progress. We all along were distracted by ideology and one or the other form of government. In pursuit of a new way of life, the old values have been lost. Laws enacted to enforce Sharia have become an instrument of harassment.

The end product of General Musharraf’s campaign over three years to make society more tolerant and the political system more pluralistic has been the Legal Framework Order.

All debate and protest now swirls around it threatening to submerge economy and social order once again.

The only achievement that vindicates the otherwise failed past regime is its stringent fiscal and monetary controls which have brought the economy to a stage where it could start growing.

The people suffered the privations of this policy in the form of unemployment and higher cost of utilities and services. Now that they were to reap its benefit it may be denied to them by political unrest.

If the agitation at this early stage grows into a confrontation between the legislators and lawyers on one side and President Musharraf and his civilian government backed by the army on the other, it would result, very likely, not in the repeal of the LFO but in the dissolution of the legislature.

The opponents of the LFO have to wait for the public opinion to denounce the safeguards it purportedly provides against the irresponsible behaviour of the political governments which led to their dismissal in the past. At present it looks more like a war of nerves between the president and his detractors.

The hazards of street agitation against the LFO have grown manifold with its sponsors making a common cause with the public sentiment aroused by the American invasion of Iraq.

In the MMA religious alliance’s procession in Karachi, Osama bin Laden’s portraits were conspicuously hoisted. The vanguard of the procession, again conspicuously, comprised the pupils and alumni of the seminaries who fought alongside Osama in Afghanistan and now are viewed as terrorists by the world and Pakistan alike.

Thus, the clerics of Pakistan have demonstrated a possible link between Saddam and Osama which both deny but which America and its partners in war insist exists.

Pakistan is under watch for its nuclear weapons. Our support to the freedom fighters across the Line of Control in Kashmir is also viewed as terrorism by some — America, our friend and ally against terrorism, among them.

In the British House of Commons debate on Iraq on Tuesday last, Pakistan was mentioned alongside North Korea and Sudan where the world one day might face on Iraq-like dilemma.

In exhibiting their sentiments on Iraq our public leaders, especially those among them who have been the tutors and patrons of the Taliban, must take care that it does not put Pakistan in the ranks of the terrorists, dispelling the international goodwill or doubt that still lingers.

Pakistan has done its duty by Iraq in the OIC at Doha by raising its voice against the forcible disarming of Iraq. That US and Britain have paid no heed to the OIC’s unanimous resolution should cause Pakistan worry that if ever threatened with aggression or sanctions, the OIC would be of little help.

In this context of the world power politics and primacy of national interests, the regret of Maulana Fazalur Rahman and Javed Hashmi that Pakistan has let pass an opportunity to lead the ummah in its crisis is wholly misplaced. Their sentiment may be right but their expectation is unrealistic.

The US counts six members of the OIC, Saudi Arabia among them, as its partners in the war coalition.

If unluckily one day Pakistan is put in the same situation as Iraq is today, it should be content if it gets even a resolution — the OIC would go no further.

To save Pakistan from such an eventuality a heavy responsibility devolves on the religious parties for they hold power in the provinces where the remnants of the Taliban and Al Qaeda, still hunted by the Americans, allegedly seek shelter and get solace and, secondly, the religious groups are also suspected to train and arm the fighters for Kashmir.

If the American and Indian interests ever ominously coincide and India chooses to strike at what it considers our “terrorist infrastructure”, the OIC would not be able to help us, not even the UN Security Council. A more important and far-reaching lesson to be drawn from the Iraq crisis therefore is to find the roots of our security in our own region and not in the Middle East or America. That was also the lesson of the wars fought in 1965 and 1971 which we failed to learn.

In any case, it is time the parliament and the government both got down to the dull task of the safety and progress of their own people rather than the adventure of jihad or leading million-strong marches. So far the legislators, both at the centre and in the provinces, have done little more than shouting and cursing and, in the process, getting discretionary funds for themselves.

General Musharraf must be wondering that by raising their numbers, ironically through the LFO that they disown, he has only added to expense and noise.

The government on its part is so preoccupied with politics that when the prime minister looks at files, it makes a news. The prime minister of a troubled and backward country should pore over files every day and for long hours. It also made a big news when the Sindh cabinet met for the second time. It should be meeting every week as a matter of course.

A grievance continues to be made of the powers of the prime minister having gone to the president and of the chief minister to the governor through the amendments in the Constitution via the LFO.

A short answer to this is that all executive powers still vest in the prime minister and chief ministers, as they did earlier, till it comes to the dissolution of the assemblies and their own dismissal.

The much-feared NSC will act, if it must, but once in five years. For the rest of its time it could do no more than provide sinecures for a dozen or so ageing or budding loyalists.

The laws and rules of business and not the Constitution prescribe where the power resides and how it is to be exercised. Anyone in the hierarchy who cares to learn the law and rules and works hard can wield it. By this criterion a section officer can be more powerful than a secretary or a minister. Arbitrary exercise of power or its abuse is a different matter, however, and all the contention is, in fact, about it. Recently, a minister is reported to have ordered the transfer of an SHO, and another minister intervened to cancel it within an hour. Under the rules, the power of this transfer lies with the superintendent of police. The ministers only exposed the government to ridicule and destroyed the police discipline.

The essence of this argument is that work for the people and fight for power can go on side by side. The governments are finally sustained by work and not by power.

The five Saddam Husseins

IT IS secret that Saddam Hussein has at least five doubles.

Until the war, they had a good life. They could buy clothes from Saville Row, have uniforms made by Italian tailors, and eat caviar and drink vintage wine from France.

They could be fitted with their own shotguns and have their pick of the most beautiful women in Iraq.

But suddenly all that has changed. A satellite picked up a conversation among the doubles in Baghdad. They apparently were arguing.

Saddam Double No. 1 to Saddam Double No. 2: “You have to go into the bunker.”

Saddam No. 2: “Why me? I was in the bunker during Desert Storm.”

Double No. 3: “I’m not going into the bunker. They’re going to bomb the hell out of it.”

Double No. 1: “That’s the reason someone has to go into the bunker. We want them to think it’s the real Saddam.”

Double No. 4: “If I had known the role was so dangerous, I would have never taken the job. Besides, my mistress has claustrophobia.”

Double No. 5: “Why don’t we draw straws for it? The shortest straw goes into the bunker.”

Double No. 2: “Where will the rest of us go?”

Double No. 1: “I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m going to surrender to the Americans. They’ll think they’ve captured the real Saddam and they have to respect the Geneva Treaty.”

Double No. 4: “I’m going to shave off my moustache, grow a beard, go to Switzerland and pretend I’m the real Saddam — and take all his money out of the bank.”

Double No. 3: “I am going to change my name to Mustafa and open a McDonald’s in Basra.”

The satellite lost the doubles for a while. Then it picked them up again.

Double No. 3: “Suppose the real Saddam finds out we were plotting against him? He’ll have his Republican Guard hunt us down and torture us like we did to Saddam’s enemies when we played him.”

Double No. 4: “Couldn’t we talk the real Saddam into hiding in the bunker?”

Double No. 2: “He may be evil, but he is not crazy.” Double No. 3: “As long as we’re going to all this trouble, I’d like to put his sons in a bunker and have a large Iraqi flag at the entry so the Americans know to bomb it.”

Double No. 4: “The U.S. is going to rebuild Iraq, and if we pretend we’re businessmen we can take bribes for everything they bring into the country.”

Double No. 1: “We could even get a job in the new government as doubles for whomever gets elected.”

Double No. 2: “We’ll offer to go on television and tell what it is like to be a Saddam impersonator.”

Double No. 3: “Don’t forget the movie rights.”

While you are reading this, the CIA is sending out signals to the doubles that if they surrender they will get a new name, a safe house in East Hampton, and a good conduct medal. —Dawn/Tribune Media Services

Exposure to alien cultures

ACCORDING to a report in this newspaper (February 17), the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal condemned the PTV’s projection of “obscene” materials. An assembly of the ulema on the same day called upon the government to stop the electronic media from exposing our people to Indian and western cultures, and instead promote Islamic values and traditions. No one will dispute the desirability of spreading Islamic values, but the exclusion of foreign influences may be a tall order.

Without becoming abstruse, let us say that culture encompasses much of what we call our way of life: rituals and customs relating to birth and death, and marriage; societal organization, class and caste distinctions; food, culinary styles, ways of eating; homes and furnishings; festivals and celebrations; notions and mores of romance, love and friendship; patterns of interaction with those who may be older or younger, superiors, inferiors, opponents, or strangers; humour, jokes; language and literary forms; music and dance; visual arts.

In the discussion that follows we will focus on India and defer consideration of the West to another time. Let us first take a quick look at how much our culture is already Indianized. There is no need to shy away from the fact that the regions which compose our country are forever situated on a land mass known as the Indian subcontinent and, for long stretches of time, were ruled by one or another king located somewhere in India. Next, barring a small minority that claims descent from foreign gentry (invaders from the West), most of us are ethnically the same people as the folks in northern and north-western India. Inevitably, then, there are many elements of commonality between their way of living and ours.

The following similarities come readily to mind: At birth a boy is more welcome than a girl; parents have traditionally looked for their children’s spouses within their own caste; parents of Punjabi girls on both sides of the border pay a dowry to the groom’s family; when the girl’s family can afford it (sometimes even if it has to borrow), celebrations connected with the wedding can extend to three or more days (oiling the bride’s hair, covering her hands and feet with spots of henna, reception for the groom’s party and others on the wedding day) with fine food served to the guests on each occasion; recording of gifts received from each guest. A woman’s status takes a big fall if her husband dies, and she is expected to reduce her lifestyle accordingly; widow remarriage is not encouraged in either culture.

The majority of Hindus and Sikhs do not normally eat meat, but the spices used for cooking vegetables and lintels, recipes and the order in which the ingredients are mixed, preparation of rice and unleavened bread (chapati) are virtually the same on both sides..

Identification with one’s caste has revived in the Pakistani Punjab. Last names signifying the bearer’s caste abound. The two major groups among the native gentry (as distinguished from the descendants of foreign invaders) are the Rajputs and Jats. Rathores, Chauhans, Bhattys (Rajputs) and Noons, Tiwanas, Bajwas, Chatthas, Cheemas, Ghummans, Kahloons, Sandhus, Waraich, and others (Jats) will be found among Punjabi Muslims as well as among Sikhs and Hindus in the Indian Punjab, Haryana, and Rajasthan.

Needless to say, the lower-caste Muslims in Punjab (carpenters, blacksmiths, potters, shoemakers, barbers, oilseed crushers, water carriers, etc.) are descended from lower caste Hindus who converted to Islam somewhere along the line. In other words, the great majority of our people in Punjab, and possibly also in Sindh, share common ancestry with groups in India.

A common language is a powerful incentive for people to come together. Punjabi spoken in Pakistan is the same as that spoken in India, and it is the same in popular entertainment programmes offered by radio and television. Urdu and Hindi spoken on the street, in homes, and in most movies are easily understood in both countries. There has been a great deal of mixing between Urdu and Hindi during the last couple of hundred years, and it goes on at the popular level.

Note also that Urdu is just about the only language in the world which has no verbs of its own. Almost all of its verbs come from Hindi without modification; only a few are taken from Farsi (for instance, “azmana” which derives from Farsi “azmudan”). Classical music in Pakistan is the same as the Indian. The fact that Muslim musicologists (Amir Khusro and others) contributed a great deal to its development does not change its origin.

There are Arab, Iranian, Central Asian, Bangladeshi, Malayam, and Indonesian cultures-all of them belonging to Muslim peoples — but is there such a thing as an Islamic culture? As the late Maulana Maududi would have had it, music, dance, romantic poetry, painting of human subjects, and sculpture cannot be Islamic any more than gambling or drinking can be. There is Muslim art, but Islamic art is a contradiction in terms for the most part. We have holidays and celebrations that may be called Islamic. Certain forms of greeting, and expressions of encouragement, praise, gratitude, regret common in Muslim usage may also be called Islamic. But on the larger scale, the import of the advice that we should stick with Islamic culture, to the exclusion of alien influences, is not clear.

It is likely that the ulema, and the conservatives generally, are agitating more against obscenity than against the cultural expressions referred to above. But, then, all of us — even Europeans and Indians-disfavour obscenity and have made laws to discourage it. It is moot whether, and to what extent, a book or a movie can corrupt its readers or viewers. But if obscene movies, books, periodicals, symbols, gestures, and actions press upon us wherever we look, their message is bound to influence the way we use our minds and imaginations. Thus they shape our character and personalities.

What is obscenity? We can probably agree that it is associated with the explicit and public display of sex-related acts or parts of the human body. But this agreement will not exhaust the subject, for that which looks obscene to a Pakistani may not appear the same to a French woman. According to the United States Supreme Court (Miller v. California, 1973), if the average person, applying contemporary community standards, finds that a publication or presentation is likely to arouse prurient interests or lascivious thoughts and desires in the viewer’s mind, well, then the material in question is obscene.

The court’s reference to the prevailing community standards is one way of identifying obscenity. Another is to consult the scriptures and act on the criteria they provide in making a determination. In actual practice, the likelihood is that prevailing standards, more than the scriptures, will influence attitudes and judgments.

As a point of departure, let us say that sexual activity in public view is indisputably obscene. On another plane, note that any number of American and European women will wear a “halter,” in the summer that shows all of their backs, arms, and bellies, and shorts that show virtually all of their legs. Is that obscene? Americans and Europeans may think of such attire as a trifle provocative but not obscene.

But a Pakistani woman dressed in this fashion, and appearing in public, will probably be arrested. Many Muslim women in the Arab world wear skirts that show their legs, but a Pakistani Muslim woman doing the same will cause a stir. As in other countries, fashions in Pakistani women’s dress come, go, and return. For the last ten years or so, tailors in Lahore and Islamabad, who stitch women’s clothes, have cut the shirt’s neck and back low enough to make the wearer look a bit like an exhibitionist. The “shalwar” is cut short enough to show one’s ankles. Is this obscene, improper, daring, or just attractive? Take your pick, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the more conservative among us regarded it as obscene. More than the fashions in women’s clothing, the obscenity which the critics want to shut out from our television screens is the one projected in western and Indian movies. Those in love are shown as scantily dressed, using a lot of explicit body language. Wiggling of hips, tight hugs, and even rolling on top of each other were shown in the Indian, especially Punjabi, movies even before independence. But all of this is now being done much more blatantly; the gentle, sentimental kiss on the cheek has gone out of fashion.

What can be done to stop these trends? The Pakistan Telecommunications Authority has recently asked internet providers to block a hundred or so websites that show pornographic material. But it transpires not only that blocking even that many websites is technically very hard, but that there are countless other websites that do the same and of which no one can keep track. Banning cable or dish antennas has not worked in Iran and it will not work in Pakistan.

In other words, there is nothing that public authorities can do to keep out western or Indian influences. They can be excluded only if the internet users and movie viewers choose, of their own accord, not to look for them. That is a choice our young people will, or will not, make depending on how their families have raised them.

On their part, the ulema should temper their concern for our morals with a sympathetic understanding of our need for a bit of fun. They are much too stern for most of us to take as our models. Many of them will not let us have even a good laugh, not to speak of playing a few hands of bridge, listening to Iqbal Bano, or mixing soda with anything that might elevate one’s spirit. If they do not step down from their high horse to the ground where we mortals stand, their audience will continue to diminish.

E-mail: syed.anwar@attbi.com