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Opinion

A contest

By Douglas Lummis


あるコンテスト

ニューヨーク・レビュー・オブ・ブックス』に、 あるコンテストのお知らせが掲載された。 「テロリズム」を定義した人に 1,000ドルの賞金を出すというものだ。

The following advertisement appeared in the Oct. 11 edition of the New York Review of Books:

"CONTEST: $1,000 (¥120,000) prize to the first person who offers a definition of 'terrorism' that both a) captures its character as a mode of combat, and b) excludes all U.S. military strategy and tactics. Respond to NYRB Box 16050. Society for Promotion of Accuracy in Political Speech. Frank Bardacke, Douglas Lummis, Jeffrey Lustig, founders."

The sponsors of this advertisement are not worried that they might have to pay anyone $1,000. The thing cannot be done.

Terrorism is a tactic of violent combat. It means killing or injuring non-combatant civilians intentionally and randomly. Of course, this violates the laws of war. According to the laws of war, fighters must try to kill or injure only members of the enemy's military forces. If this rule is followed, civilians on both sides can feel relatively safe. But if fighters begin to kill civilians, this sense of safety is destroyed. Since the killing is random, no one can know who will be next. Those who use this tactic hope that by terrifying the enemy population they can gain an advantage. That's why it's called "terror."

This tactic can be used by a government or by an anti-government organization. A classic act of terror is to throw a bomb into a crowded restaurant or to blow up a bus full of commuters. The bomber doesn't know or care who will be killed. (This is the difference between terror and assassination: the assassin always chooses the victim carefully.)

Bombing crowded cities from airplanes is the same tactic on a larger scale. Not only are restaurants and buses blown up, but buildings, schools, homes, places of worship, everything. The bomber pilot does not know or care who is in those buildings. And it is well known that one of the purposes of bombing cities is to "lower the morale" of the enemy population. "Lower the morale" means to spread terror.

Recently the United States and its allies have been claiming that their new technology makes possible "pinpoint bombing," so that few non-combatants are killed. Right after the Gulf War, I visited Iraq to see if this was true. I saw private homes, hospitals and public markets that had been bombed. If the pinpoint technology is as good as they say, then we must assume these places were bombed intentionally.

In any case, the possible use of nuclear weapons is still part of U.S. military strategy (and the strategies of the other nuclear powers). There are no pinpoint nukes.

The purpose of this contest is not to promote cynicism, but to reduce it. Americans have learned the horror, grief and despair that come with a terrorist attack. It is time to take the next step and recognize that terrorist attacks carried out by their own government bring the same horror, grief and despair to others. Gandhi's words are worth quoting again: Seek an eye for an eye and the whole world goes blind.



Shukan ST: Oct. 18, 2002

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