ALEXANDRIA, 26 July 2003 — Borneo had its headhunters who stuck the heads of their adversaries on poles outside their homes; native Americans used to scalp their enemies, while, despite the superficial civilized veneer of the West, we circulate photographs of the bloodied torsos of our foes throughout the media.
Over the last centuries we mistakenly thought we had progressed. We believed that our societies had become more humane, more respectful of the dead; societies which adhered to intricate laws and rules of war, which had evolved over time.
Instead, what do we find? America, once the beacon of the new world, a shining light of justice and liberty, has regressed.
Not for the US “the world’s lone superpower” the niceties of the Geneva Conventions. Donald Rumsfeld’s boys don’t bother with arrests and trials. They prefer to put bounties on the heads of those on their “Wanted Dead or Alive” list in true Wild-West style before sending out a “posse” not to hang the alleged wrongdoers from the old oak tree but to bomb their homes, not only killing them but also anybody else who happens to be inside. In the case of Saddam Hussein’s sons, Uday and Qusay, a 14-year-old boy and a bodyguard.
Perhaps Slobodan Milosevic should consider himself fortunate. His capture happened in those kinder days when we still kept up the pretence of being civilized societies. He got a jail cell in The Hague and a trial, which enumerates and judges his alleged crimes. Whatever the wrongdoing of Uday and Qusay, we will never know, and, more to the point, neither will the long-suffering Iraqis.
Rumsfeld’s excuse for showing the gruesome pictures of Saddam’s sons was the Iraqis should see that their oppressors are dead, but a quick poll showed that 80 percent of the Iraqi people are still skeptical. Others have commented that it isn’t up to the invaders to deal with their dictators and, indeed, how humiliating is this for a proud people?
Not only are pictures being circulated of the dictator’s sons, but members of the Iraqi interim council are being invited to view the Pentagon’s handiwork at Baghdad Airport, while photographers and cameramen will be allowed to take their own pictures. Perhaps they will hand out Pepsis and cheese sandwiches as they do before a Texan execution.
What is even more worrying is the US administration’s oblivion to charges of hypocrisy. It cares not that earlier this year its own Gen. John Abizaid, now commander of US troops in the Middle East, launched a scathing verbal attack on Al-Jazeera for doing just what it has done now, “disrespecting the dead by showing photographs of corpses on television.
Further, there were criticisms of Iraqi television for broadcasting footage of American prisoners of war sitting in comfortable chairs drinking tea. This contravenes the Geneva Conventions, was their clarion call.
It must be said that there are those within the US military who are unhappy about this latest turn of events. The Guardian reports that while serving officers are not allowed to comment, Col. Dan Smith, a retired military intelligence officer, said: “We have a tradition of respecting the dead. We objected to the showing of bodies of American servicemen. It’s kind of ironic that we turn around and display dead folks now.” And that’s an understatement.
Let’s face it. The Geneva Conventions and the international norms of war mean little more than the paper they are written upon during these troubled times as we suspected when 670 men were hauled off in chains to Guantanamo without their protection, many facing secret military trials or kangaroo courts as they’ve been termed by the lawyer for Australian detainee David Hicks.
The Geneva Conventions have become one-way tickets, there for America’s convenience, as the BBC discovered when it tried to speak to Pakistani detainees in Guantanamo. It’s against the Geneva Conventions, said the official who escorted them on a tour of the facility before ending their visit and separating their reporter and cameraman from the media group.
The US believes that guerrilla attacks on their military personnel will dwindle now that Uday and Qusay have died, but even as their battered heads filled our screens, America suffered yet more casualties with the deaths of three of its soldiers, members of the 101st Airborne Division, which led the charge on the brothers’ safe-house in Mosul. In today’s climate, the hunting season is open on America’s enemies, while US soldiers cannot be held responsible for war crimes or crimes against humanity and are not answerable to the International Criminal Court.
There is not only a legal but also a moral inequity here, and I am surprised that the world’s leaders either cannot see it or are prepared to overlook it. Perhaps, just as Borneo’s headhunters put the heads of their enemies on poles to frighten off would-be attackers, the US is doing the same, and it is apparently getting away with it.
— Linda S. Heard is a specialist writer on Mideast affairs and can be contacted on [email protected]
