Wisdom of the colonial masters
Mano Ratwatte
Courtesy The Island 30-06-2007
The British and American forces are the best trained, best paid and
best equipped armed forces in the world next to Israel. Their Air Forces
deploy state of the art battlefield technologies. They have expensive
pinpoint weapons guidance systems, Infrared and other imagery devices
to spot targets; they have superb aerial and ground intelligence facilities.
They have real time satellite based guidance systems that can recall
or stop an attack within seconds if the target is missed or a mistake
is made.
Yet, over the past 4 years, after the British and American led invasion
of Iraq (on false pretenses) and their justifiable war on terror in
Afghanistan, scores of innocent men, women and children have been killed
by errant air strikes and other military operations.
On Saturday, June 23, the American and NATO supported (and installed)
President of Afghanistan Ahmed Karzai was upset over the deaths of civilians
caught in the middle of fighting between coalition US led troops and
militant fighters. He said "The disproportionate use of force to
a situation and the lack of coordination with the Afghan government
is causing these casualties. You don’t fight a terrorist by firing
a field gun into a target some 30 kilometers away. That is definitely
bound to cause civilian casualties." According to President Karzai,
an incident, where 25 civilians were killed, occurred when NATO forces
came under fire in a village at around sunset and then the NATO forces
went and bombed the village late in the night. He asked the question
?" Even the US military admitted that seven children died recently
on a Sunday (holy Sabbath day for Christians) when they bombed a building
in eastern Afghanistan where al Qaeda fighters were believed to have
gathered.
According to International press reports on CNN and BBC, Karzai stated
"They cannot bring standards from their countries in the West and
try to apply it in Afghanistan. Afghanistan is a different country.
It has different value systems. It has a different community structure.
From now onward, they have to work the way we ask them to work here.
That’s the line."
Karzai’s remarks reflect growing anger among Afghans at the rising
civilian death toll as foreign troops continue efforts to rid the country
of the Taliban. (CNN)
In the past two weeks, nearly a 100 innocents have died when their
aerial attacks missed the targets. When that happens they blame the
Taleban, or the Insurgents or Al-Qaeda terrorists for using civilians
as shields. They are referred to as n skinned. Yet, in this sort of
asymmetric war when someone blows a bomb in Bali or in London the entire
world hears of it. Why?
How will Chilcott and Blake spin the queer state of affairs and double
speak when secret torture camps exist in Poland and Romania, extraordinary
rendition is the modus operandi, suspension of habeas corpus is the
law and AbuGraib was just the tip of the ice-berg and fresh on the minds
of liberals?
Will the Brits and the Americans continue to lecture to adoring gaping
audiences in Colombo about civilian casualties and human rights violations
while explaining their actions? Given the superior wisdom of the colonial
masters of yore, no doubt they will be splitting hairs to differentiate
between their atrocious own conduct and Sri Lanka’s accidental
civilian deaths in the war zone.
"Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of
God." (Matthew 5:9)
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this:
to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself
from being polluted by the world." (James 1:27)
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