“Has the Time to Answer Come At Last?”

We’ve all seen the photos of tortured Iraqis; and the evident lack of remorse on the face of the entire line of command, from the bottom ranks to Rumsfeld to the President.

There are many facets to this; one is fairly obvious. Half of the world hates us. A quarter was ambivalent. No more. I think that Bush has accomplished in nearly four years what it took decades, if not a century or so, for other presidents: turn the ambivalence into hate. Importantly, a large part of this formerly ambivalent section was Muslim.

What Iraq has accomplished is this: we have created hatred that will last a thousand years. It will manifest itself in many ways, not least through terror.

The historian Bernard Lewis, amongst others, says that the Muslim attitude to history is much different than ours. The Muslims cultivate every historical detail of their existence, and importantly in this case, their troubled relationship with the West.

The second aspect of the photos: what horrific deeds humanity is capable of.

About a year ago I was with a South African farmer. He handed me a cup. You know what that is, he asked about an object lying in the bottom. Interestingly, I had just read a book about Vietnam, called Nam, and was astonished and shocked to read about American soldiers cutting off body parts, ears, etc, from dead (or at least I hope they were dead) enemy soldiers (or at least I hope they were soldiers) and wearing them as trophies.

I looked at the farmer who was almost beside himself with anticipation. His intent to shock could not have been more evident and would have given him great pleasure. So, as nonchalantly as I could, I picked up the object within--as if it were an ordinary penny I found on the street—and said: “I don’t know. Looks like an ear, I guess.”

He looked a little disappointed, and then recounted a few stories of his time in Angola. Angola, for those unfamiliar with the country, is to the South African whites (only the whites served in the army then), what Vietnam is to Americans. (Angola, should you not know, yet again we were involved in, supporting the South Africans, and the Angolan rebel leader Savimbi (who was only last year killed), against the “communist insurgents.” And of course there too we are, directly and indirectly, responsible for millions of lives, and maimings from land mines (the Cubans and Russians supported the other side). In the end, the US pulled out all support (reminiscent of the Kurdish debacle in Iraq a few years back) and the South Africans took a hiding from the Cubans—to this day, the South African whites remind me of it bitterly).

Speaking of the incongruity and inexplicable nature of humanity, what I also find odd about this place—South Africa—is that, these days, post 9/11 and now with Iraq, etc, the blacks have become anti-American whereas the whites support the US unequivocally. It’s odd because without American-led sanctions Apartheid would still be very much in existence here today (Nelson Mandela himself concedes as much in his autobiography, stating that the turning point in the ‘struggle’ was Citibank not turning over the South African debt—that, he says, was the beginning of the end, and showed him the importance of banks and commerce in the world).

And yet the blacks here, without a morsel of gratitude, have distinct antipathy towards us. The whites should hate us (seeing as, due to US-led sanctions, they ‘lost’ a country they had to a great extent built up), and yet they support the US wholly.

A strange state of affairs.

Which leads me back to the second aspect, humanity and its seemingly unlimited capacity for terror, under whatever guise or moral imperative.

I read in the New York Times yesterday a fascinating article about the French in Vietnam and what lessons had not been learned, by themselves and later by us. The writer, whose father served in Vietnam, in the end concludes that we should not be too surprised by the photos. War is war, he says, and, in war, such things happen. I repeat: We should not be surprised.

That troubles me. I remember hearing once that anyone is capable of almost anything in any situation. I would like to believe that is not the case. I cannot imagine myself ever torturing anyone. And then you wonder, what if you had witnessed friends killed or maimed? Would you turn into a savage yourself? I guess until one is confronted with the situation one never knows.

What lessons does or can one draw from this entire mess? I don’t like to think passively that war is war and that in war these things happen. That is almost too terrifying to contemplate; and makes it all seem so unavoidable, and therefore to a great extent acceptable. In addition, I don’t like to think that humanity is capable of just about anything. Yet I cannot say that with certainty.

What I do know is this: with Afghanistan, Guantanamo Bay, and now Iraq we have created and continue to create, with each new atrocity, a monster; a monster that will forever haunt us.

I am reminded of the quote by Joseph Needham:

“It is a terrible disadvantage to Christians to be associated with a civilisation which dominated other cultures in the way which the uninhibited Europeans did in the time of their supremacy in arms and weapons. There is bound to be a lot to answer for and a lot to live down when the temporary period of dominance is over.”

So now I wonder, has the time to answer come at last?

Copyright David G. Hochman 2004