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I
noticed the Danny Morrison quote that Anthony McIntyre
used to open his 10 April contribution "Baghdad
- First They Cheered And Then They..."
In
particular, it was the point Morrison made about Tony
Blair being the same man who stood on the streets
of Omagh in August of 1998 and "declared that
no cause is worth shedding one drop of innocent blood."
The
concern for human life on the one hand, and the callous
indifference to human suffering on the other, is British
foreign policy at its most glaring arrogance -- witness
British Defence Secretary Geof Hoon's suggestion the
other day that mothers of Iraqi children killed by
cluster bombs would "one day" thank Britain
for their use.
To
Hoon and the rest of the British (and US) military
establishment, the "liberation" of Iraq
is a greater concern than the loss of these mothers'
children. Hence the reckless targetting of residential
areas resulting in the deaths of civilians, under
the assumption that Saddam Hussein or any other Iraqi
Minister may or may not be in a specific home or restaurant.
But
to Blair and Hoon, as with Bush and Rumsfeld, the
ultimate "liberation" of Iraq makes these
"mistakes" and the loss of life worth it,
and as Hoon says, the Iraqi people will one day thank
the foreign invaders and occupation forces for "liberating"
them from their friends and their families.
Imagine
the cries of outrage and disbelief if the IRA or the
INLA had suggested that the relatives of people killed
by republican actions would one day thank them, that
the liberation of Ireland from the Brits would be
greater than the loss of life taken to achieve that
goal?
What
would the reaction have been if the Reals had said
that after Omagh? We know what Blair said -- "no
cause is worth shedding one drop of innocent blood."
As
we watch the bombs fall, as we watch the RIR and the
Desert Rats and the 101st and 82nd and other divisions,
brigades and regiments shoot their big guns or throw
their grenades at off-camera targets, as we hear of
the "dozens" of enemy forces killed at this
firefight or that airstrike, I'm struck by the absence
of a particular phrase used in the last war -- "collateral
damage."
Even
if the media outlets refer to dead children, their
mothers, and their grandparents killed by errant or
targetted missiles or by checkpoint shootings, no
longer is it a matter of concern, because the greater
cause is more important than the bumps and minor inconveniences
along the way, and "collateral damage" implies
that there was ever concern for "innocent blood".
The
death of innocent civilians, we were warned before
the war, is regrettable, but in war, it's going to
happen, and it should not detract from the greater
goal. That warning, coming before civilian deaths,
showed the utter lack of concern for the very people
Bush and Blair claim to have liberated.
This
is the message of Britain, this is the message of
the United States. It is barbaric, it is brutal, it
is arrogant, especially taken in the context of their
position on "innocent blood" in Ireland.
But bully for the bullies. It is their war, they are
enjoying it. I expect nothing less from them.
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