The United States should be in the dock, not Bradley Manning. By Owen Jones. The Independent, June 2, 2013.
Seven Myths About Bradley Manning. By Chase Madar. The Nation, June 3, 2013.
Jones:
There
has always been a somewhat Orwellian quality to US foreign policy: “we have
always been at war with Islamic fundamentalism”, for example. And yet in the
1980s, US arms were distributed through Pakistan’s secret services to the
Afghan mujihadeen: they were freedom-fighters, you see. Then we ended up in a
never-ending war in Afghanistan, battling on behalf of a corrupt and undemocratic
government, against Islamic fundamentalist elements. Several hundred miles
away, the US is proactively backing Syria’s jihadists alongside its Islamist
fundamentalist ally, Saudi Arabia. Waves of Islamist fighters were recruited by
the calamity of Iraq.
There
is nothing patriotic about the poorly scrutinised actions of the US foreign
policy elite. Scores of young men or women are sent to be killed or maimed:
those who call for bringing them to safety are smeared as “unpatriotic”. US
civilians are put at risk of “blowback”, a CIA word for the unintended
consequences of foreign interventions. They can even fail disastrously on their
own terms. Back in the 1950s, the US helped overthrow Iran’s last
democratically-elected Prime Minister, Mohammad Mosaddegh, fuelling
anti-American sentiment that helped drive the Iranian Revolution.
That is
why Manning has done us such a service. He has encouraged us to scrutinise the
hidden realities of US power, and consider the dire consequences of decisions
shrouded in secrecy. His actions should compel us to build a more open,
balanced world, where great powers are less able to throw their poorly
understood weight around. It would be a long-term investment: the US is in
long-term decline, and autocratic China may take its place, quite possibly
using its power more unjustly. Better, then, to challenge this world order now.
I
happen to believe the creation of such a world is not a naïve fantasy. It can
and must be built. And however your trial goes, you, Mr Manning, will be
remembered for your own contribution in building it.
