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International Network of Engineers and Scientists Against Proliferation |
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Bulletin 18 - Editorial |
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Editorial
Yesterday - Does the Past Still Matter?
This is the first INESAP Information Bulletin since two years.[*] Much has happened since. After the incredible terror attacks on New York and Washington it appears like remote history. But it may be more burning than ever. At least it represents a frozen viewpoint of the era before the attack. It describes and analyzes developments which provide a background for what happened. History is a process, marked by singular events such as the fall of the Berlin Wall, the wars in the Gulf or on the Balkans, and the latest terror attacks. The periods before and after are not disconnected. It is important not to ignore the link between past and future and not to repeat previous mistakes.
This Bulletin has previously warned that arming the world, that the use of power and force is counterproductive, may provoke terror and create enemies that one day could adversely affect US security. What seemed hypothetical became real. The United States of America, the most powerful country, is a victim of terror. Before, others were. A million killed in Ruanda did not receive comparable attention. Because it is not our civilization? Who knows that inthe days before September 11 the US Air Force flew numerous attacks on Iraq? Who remembers the casualties of previous operations, from Vietnam to Kosovo? Not to speak of those who have no chance to survive from the beginning of their life because they do not fit into the system. How can we ignore that those who are now enemies such as Saddam Hussein or Osama bin Laden once were supported by US policy as long as they served its interest?
Should we really forget that George W. Bush was going to undermine the system of international law, the ABM Treaty, the START process, the Biological Weapons Convention, the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, the Landmines Convention, the International Criminal Court, the Kyoto Protocol to prevent climate change? That Bush announced the abrogation of the ABMTreaty in a school class? That US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld compared international treaties with "a plate full of spaghetti"? That the US was preparing war in space, to dominate the world, according to the US Space Command? Is this all history now? Or will it be justified by the terror attacks? If this is the case then nothing has been learned from the past.
The shock about death and destruction offers the great opportunity for an international coalition against terror. The United States should use the enormous solidarity to become a real world leader, in political, not military terms. If Bush, seeking revenge, launches a massive attack and kills innocent people, he will multiply victims and create more terrorists. Then, indeed, it is the first war of the 21st century. Building missile defense may become morally justified now, but it will not help to prevent any of the threats experienced on September 11. It will only give the American people a false sense of security and justify the continuation of wrong politics.
 Original cover graphic of this Bulletin |
There is no justification for terror. Terror cannot be fought with counterterror but only by preventing the causes and roots for terror. Otherwise it will lead to a chain without end. The causes and roots of terror need to be prevented. The main message of this Bulletin is that one needs to think about alternatives. It is a call to move beyond missile defense, to stop the missile race before it becomes unstoppable.
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