Rumsfeld's Pet Tyrants

"When it comes to "the war on terror," North African governments can teach even U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld a thing or two. And Rumsfeld seems to have been in a mood to listen on his sweep through Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco earlier this week. "Each country has been, in its way, providing moderate leadership and been constructive in...the struggle against violent extremism," he said at the outset of his trip. "It's something we value and want to strengthen."

"But a closer look at how North African regimes have dealt with Islamic fundamentalism gives pause for thought. Long before the Al Qaeda attacks of 9/11 alerted the Bush administration to the political advantages of declaring a global war on terrorism, North African governments had discovered that they could use the struggle against terrorism and Islamic extremism as a pretext to justify cancelling elections, neutering opposition, locking up political opponents, closing down political debate, and securing Western economic and military assistance."

This piece gives a glimpse into what has been the standard practice of our foreign policy, dating back through the Cold War. Much of the problems of the world today can be traced back directly to the world being carved up into two halves; half for the Soviets, half for us. For our part, we supported any regime that claimed to be anti-communist, even the most repressive and brutal. The results, long after the end of the Cold War still ring loudly. Much animosity still exists towards us, from the populations that lived under U.S. sponsored repression. Now, we're continuing the practice for the war on terror.

Nothing really changes. As long as a government is friendly to us, we'll give them any kind of support they need, no matter how much suffering it brings, as long as they claim to be "fighting terrorism". Just as in the past, these governments are really only interested in suppression of any opposition to their authority, which of course leads to desperation by the repressed, leading to insurgencies and terrorism. As always, we're not interested in little details like that. We don't care that it's the governments themselves that have caused most of the suffering, giving the people no alternative but violence. All we care about is whether their government is friendly to ours. That's the way it's been, and nothing has changed.

This is why the war on terror is a farce. As long as governments rule in opposition to the wishes of their people, there will be terrorism, committed by both sides. The people running our government know this, which is why they've insisted from 9/11 on, that this "war" will last for decades to come. They know their actions and support of certain governments will perpetuate the violence. There never should've been a war on "terror", but a war only on the people who attacked us. If we'd been committed to that, and used the amount of resources we've used so far just in Iraq alone, Al-Qaeda and it's memory would be practically gone by now. But that was never the plan.