MGG Pillai Commentary View

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Are we slavishly following the West?

SADDAM HUSSEIN'S TRIAL IS an example of victor's justice: First the trial, then the execution. That he will die is certain. But Iraq would be even more volatile either way. But putting to trial former leaders for what they have to do as leaders – that of Saddam Hussein is one, of Slobodan Milosevic another – would redound on US and European leaders once the worm turns, as it will. The United States realises this, and have offering aid in return for not clamouring for Americans to be tried in an international court. The publicity surrounding the trial of defeated leaders is deafening, giving the impression they do not have a case. But they do. And present it effectively. The Milosevic trial at the Hague was seen by Serbs as a punishment for not following Western dictates. His death, and burial in his country estate in Serbia, was a national event in his country, and the Western agenda over what was Yugoslavia is in shambles.

The Americans wanted the Saddam trial to be in public in Iraq, and controlled it. As usual, it misjudged the mood. The Americans supported Saddam killed for which he is now charged. Saddam is already a hero of the insurgency. He would be an even greater hero, whether executed or not. The United States will lose either way. Despite the spin, the Americans want the trial to end in an execution. He ran a secular state; the Americans turned it into an unworkable 'democratic' state in which the Muslim sectarian divisions hold sway; now it is a religious state controlled by the Shia religious groups. Iraq was invaded for its oil; today, people wait for an hour and more for petrol; yet it has the largest potential reserves in the world.

The newspapers used to carry reports about China, where it was said it was victor's justice in the courts. You do not hear that now. China after all keeps the United States from being like Iraq. The poor in the United States look to China, even if they do not physically, for goods the United States cannot provide cheaply. But everything is for sale in the United States. The IBM branch of personal computers is now owned by a Chinese corporation. In this race for profit, Washington now feels the heat from its own people. The Dubai purchase of rights to operate US ports is now challenged in the United States. But what is important is that the Americans and the British are afraid of competition from outside Europe and America. It now is working out a strategy to contain China in its backyard.

To contain the new non-White competitors, the Bush administration began a war on an adjective. It believed the terror was orchestrated by the Muslims and Islam, but in political correctness would not blame either. But that was not how the Muslims perceived it. They found themselves attacked, especially by the governments around the world which had bought, or we forced to accept, the American view. It gave these governments the opportunity to put the Islamicists down, for staying in power, often on the most spurious ground. It has raised the confrontation between the people and their governments in distant lands. In Indonesia, we are told how the government is pro-American and harasses the pro-Islamic lobby. This, we are told, is a good thing. But the spin that follows it, usually inept, makes sure it is not.

When the industrial revolution hit Europe in the early 19th century, people became workers, and moved from the farms to work in the cities. The uncertainty this caused led to Karl Mark and Engels, among others, to plot a plan to support them. Communism, in various forms, and the rise of the left wing movements, was the result. Communism, we are told, was defeated by the free world, though it was the market that defeated it. The people of Russia was better off under Communism than under capitalism today. In St Petersburg, what was Leningrad then, groups of white Russians go around killing anybody not White to keep the city white. This phenomenon is already happening in Europe and the United States. It is played down by the Western press, especially in the non-Western states. But the phenomenon is too widespread to be ignored.

The US war on terror was stopped in its tracks by Osama bin Laden and his Al-Qaeda network. He used the same techniques the Americans had used to challenge Islam. This is, whatever you might call it, a religious war. The Christians are trying to push the Muslims into irrelevance, but the Muslims are fighting back. The British faced a similar war in India. But that took 90 years to fruit: from the Brahmin, Mangal Pandey, who objected to lard on the bullets the East India Company provided, to Mahatma Gandhi, who perfected the non-violent fight for independence, who led the movement to fight for independence. Only the Muslims could have stopped the United States in an open war. But their victory would not last 90 years, probably half that. The tactics used to confront the invader is different.

We are led to believe that the only truth comes from the West, all others are not, and should be cast aside. That is not true. Each society has its own culture, sense of justice, religion, values, as the West has. But it is the Western values that predominate so that we in the Third World believe in them, regarding our values as anti-deluvian. I had dinner in Nilai township the other day. The house I went to could not be lived in unless you had a car. The authorities built the houses as they would in California. It is lonely. Even if you had a car, you are at risk. It is an inconvenient housing estate, made out of a rubber or oil palm estate. It is a bedroom community, like many in the West. There is no bus or taxi route. It is a chore living in it. But the houses cost more than a million ringgit. But thirty or so years down the road, only those who can afford the inconvenience will live there. But is that the society we are striving to build here.

The British knew what they wanted, used every trick in the book to obtain it. They lost the war but won the peace. The Americans would not win the war nor the peace, as the mess in Iraq now shows. They have found an opponent in Osama bin Laden, who uses Islam the way the Americans use Christianity. What started the conflict in India against the British was religious, but the fight for independence did not involve the religions until late in the day. In Iraq, the Americans made no bones about it. They came to Iraq to steal its wealth, and to enrich its rich backers. They destroyed the country, never got what they wanted, now want to withdraw because Iraq is untenable. But they cannot, without a civil war. Those who oppose the Americans in Iraq know it, and increase the pressure.

The British made sure Iraq was kept secular and ruled by the Sunni since l920. It made sure that its prime ministers were Sunni. That was rigorously followed by the leaders who followed. The Americans changed that, and pay the price. The Sunnis – who form a minority in this mosaic of religions – know now they will never get back into power, and destroy what the Americans have not. The oil piplelines are now blown apart. Today, the Americans are on the retreat, do not crow about their 'successes', and are ready to cut and run. It is a failure which has become normal to them: Philippines, Liberia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea, Vietnam. The freed slaves of America were sent to form the government in Liberia; their descendant rulers were machine gunned on the beach by a native revolt. Whether Saddam Hussein is found guilty or not does not matter.

The United States see to it that only 'favourable' news of the trial is put out. But they have lost there too. The press is not with them in Iraq and its military adventures, though they supported the Bush agenda to crush the country. It is only later that they turned against the Bush adventure on terror and Iraq. But the American press, owned by US corporations, echoed its owners – then and now. I have read reports asking for Bush to make up his mind on going to war and commentaries that the United States will lose – in the same paper though before the war began and now. The United States are accidental imperialists, suffused by corporations who only look at their bank accounts as proof it is successful.

M.G.G. Pillai
pillai@streamyx.com