Op-Ed Published in the Springfield News, Springfield, Oregon, March 27, 2005

It is unfortunate that Ward Churchill's participation in the upcoming Wayne Morse Center for Law and Politics conference at the UO has been canceled. As one of only two senators voting against the 1964 Gulf of Tonkin resolution that led us deeper into the Vietnam quagmire, I doubt that Sen. Morse would have approved of Churchill's exclusion.

Churchill's voice is admittedly a strident one. His fury and contempt directed at America's long history of overt and covert violence toward other peoples, our oblivious and indifferent majority, and our flaccid press are difficult to hear or understand by knee-jerk patriots blind to the realities to which he refers.

Churchill suggests that 9/11 was "chickens coming home to roost" -- a predictable consequence in response to America's long history of overt and covert violence abroad. If we change our ways, the motivations for terrorism will disappear. From this line of reasoning, our approach to terrorism should be preventive rather than military - a much less costly (in both lives and treasure), more sensible, more effective, and more Christian approach.

Since WWII, U.S. policies and covert operations have included assassinations or coups against elected and populist leaders in Iran, Guatemala, Chile, Indonesia, Panama, and Ecuador, and unsuccessful attempts in Nicaragua, Venezuela, and Cuba. In Vietnam, we canceled a scheduled re-unification election in 1956 and installed an unpopular puppet government in the south, instigating a long war that killed over two million Vietnamese. The CIA trained and supported right-wing death squads throughout Latin America, and, ironically, provided terrorism training to bin Laden and other mujahadeen in Afghanistan. We have inflicted massive aerial assaults on civilian population centers (Hanoi, Panama City and twice on Baghdad). Our 1991 infrastructure destruction in Iraq followed by sanctions have caused an estimated half-million deaths of Iraqi children. The Gulf and Iraq wars have each brought about some 100,000 Iraqi deaths, primarily civilians, inflicted upon a largely helpless country, and our use of depleted uranium shells in both wars has left the entire country radioactive. Churchill takes his message from a line in the film, The Cotton Club: "You've got to learn that when you push people around, some people push back."

It doesn't help Churchill's popularity that bin Laden delivered essentially the same message in his statement broadcast to the American people shortly before our 2004 election. His words were largely dismissed and transmitted incompletely by our oblivious media, and were understood by few among the historically and politically under-informed American public.

But it is usually wise to listen to our enemies. It is also likely that Jesus would recommend this, having been quoted in Luke as saying, "Love your enemies; do good to them which hate you." Listening is the most basic expression of care, without which good cannot be done. Bin Laden attempted to explain that our foreign policies are the source of anti-American feelings and their most extreme form, terrorism. As he simply and clearly explained, 9/11 was both a retaliation for past American aggression and a warning. We are not invulnerable and can assure our own safety only by respecting the safety and well-being of others throughout the world.

To be safe and respected, as well as self-respecting, we must change our international policies of domination and exploitation, irrespective of our transient leadership, with or without terrorist threats, motivated not by fear but by conscience.

Jack Dresser, Ph. D., is a research scientist and veteran of the Vietnam Conflict. He is a Springfield resident.
 

To read Ward Churchill's controversial article yourself, click here:
http://www.kersplebedeb.com/mystuff/s11/churchill.html

To read Bin Ladens statement of November 2004, click here:
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/79C6AF22-98FB-4A1C-B21F-2BC36E87F61F.htm
 

Add your comments, or read more in our blog...

Copyright 2004 Jack Dresser, Ph.D.