January 31, 2004
A Primer for AHer@ B A Little Girl
Who cannot understand why People kill each Other
Your question is well posed. There is nothing in the world or universe
Which obliges or constrains people to injure, torture, rape or kill each other
The answer must be sought within themselves, in their very own wishes
First, though people look separate and think of themselves as individual units
They really are not. It is better to think of them as connected, as if swimming
In a plasma or electric field, each person representing a node of greater intensity
Within the medium B much like fish are both connected and separated by water
In order to increase the friction between them, humans set up barriers B
Artificial lines which define the inner (good) from the outer (bad) group
Rivers, for example, which could enhance community, are used to divide
Language, skin color, religion, are all available to act as impregnable walls
Despite much evidence to the contrary, people are determined to believe
That they themselves are immune to the improvidence that befalls Aothers@
That the butterflies they hunt will not fly over and increase the other=s wealth (a)
That organisms, such as those of SARS, TB or flu will volunteer to stay away
Modeling themselves on their own experience as children, little and helpless,
Humans divide their groups into parental figures whom they call leaders
And who police, rule and tend to; and the rest, needy, powerless, competing.
Since the leader decides on war, he can easily be blamed if things go wrong
Next, they decide that violence shall be used as a Alast resort@ in any conflict.
Since all conflict over any issue whatsoever, has the potential to be irresolvable
All that is best in a society must be harnessed for that ultimate case of survival
Its cohesion, knowledge, religion, science, technology B yea, even its youth
The stage is now set and all that remains is the easy task of finding enemies
Traveling to find good enemies, as during the Crusades, is now outmoded
The present trend is to trick an enemy into attacking first, thus proving his evil.
Claiming ownership of the world guarantees an abundant supply of enemies
Once a war starts, a great deal of self-adulation happens about its rightfulness
The Vietnam war, for instance, had well over twenty-two different justifications (b)
But in this, people must be very careful to see themselves only as rational adults
No behavior ever stemming from childhood B that despised, conflict-ridden time
Today, as the United States presidential candidates (all men), vie for attention
None in the public will ask how they were treated their first hour after birth
What their mother=s unconscious assumptions were while raising her child
Whether she dawdled with him, how she held, cleaned, fed or talked to him
In honored centers of knowledge, studies about the importance of early years
Must be kept in a different category and hermetically separated from war talk
For fear that the hubris and self-aggrandizement of those who fight, might deflate
And how then would the many vent their rage at not being mother=s angel?
And don=t count on the United Nations to stop war. They want Adevelopment@
A term which in its very definition encourages greater war-waging potential (c)
And one which assumes that oil will be available as a principal source of energy
Though it will be depleted well before another source of energy can replace it (d)
People want wars, need them to maintain and bolster their psychological defenses
Were they not to kill, they might see that they are one, all with a limited free will.
Killing makes them feel independent, superior. That is why they tried to kill you.
And that is why they kill each other.
Notes
(a) The problem occurs when Papua New Guinea butterflies fly over to Indonesia.
(b) Summers, Harry G., On Strategy: A Critical Analysis of the Vietnam War, 1982, p. 98; cited in Kevin Phillips, American Dynasty B Aristocracy, Fortune, and the Politics of Deceit in the House of Bush (Viking/Penguin Group, New York, N.Y.), 2004, p. 312.
Summers, a military scholar, shows that for only the years 1949-1967, the United States had 22 official reasons for its involvement in Vietnam. He reports that even generals who held commands in Vietnam admitted to uncertainty regarding the objectives of the war.
(c) Waring, Marilyn, Counting for Nothing B What Men value and What Women are Worth, 2nd Edition (University of Toronto, Toronto, ON.), 1999.
Hall, Francoise, AWar Institutionalized B The United Nations System of National Accounts,@ October 31, 2003, 7 pages.
As its measure of human development, the United Nations uses the Human Development Index (HDI), based on four components B Life Expectancy at Birth; Adult Literacy; Combined Primary, Secondary and Tertiary Gross Enrolment; and per capita Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
The fourth component, GDP, purports to measure the income-generating production of a country (whether or not the resources are owned by the country=s residents). It has no deficit side. It consists of the sum of consumer expenditures, gross investment outlay and government expenditures on goods and services.
War capacity is included in the GDP in terms of the value of weapons production, profit, capital and Amanpower.@ A thriving war machinery thus increases a country=s GDP and hence its human development index. Until weapons are used, the value of their production exceeds the demand for their use B that is, their Aconsumption@ by the government.
(d) BP Amoco, Statistical Review of World Energy, 2000 (BP Amoco, London, England), 2000, p. 4; cited in Michael Klare, Resource Wars B The New Landscape of Global Conflict (Henry Holt, N.Y.), 2001, p. 19.
Klare, Michael, Resource Wars B The New Landscape of Global Conflict (Henry Holt, N.Y.), 2001, p. 19.
MacKay, Neil, ABush planned Iraq >Regime Change= before becoming President,@ The Glasgow Sunday Herald (Scotland), September 15, 2002; cited in Kevin Phillips, American Dynasty B Aristocracy, Fortune, and the Politics of Deceit in the House of Bush (Viking/Penguin Group, New York, N.Y.), 2004, p. 255; and in John Bonifaz, Warrior-King B The Case for impeaching George W. Bush (Nation Books, New York. N.Y.), 2003, pp. 87-88.
Phillips, Kevin, American Dynasty B Aristocracy, Fortune, and the Politics of Deceit in the House of Bush (Viking/Penguin Group, New York, N.Y.), 2004, pp. 254-255.
United States Department of Energy, International Energy Outlook, 1999, Table A4. Figures for 2000-2020 are for the Areference case,@ which assumes modest but not major increases in the price of oil; cited in Michael Klare, Resource Wars B The New Landscape of Global Conflict (Henry Holt, N.Y.), 2001, p. 39.
At the beginning of 2000, the world=s proven reserves of petroleum were 1,033,000,000,000 (1.033 trillion) barrels B sufficient oil to sustain global consumption (at the then-current rate of 73,000,000 barrels per day) for another forty years B until 2040.
The United States Department of Energy, however, predicts a very rapid rise in consumption. It estimates that between 2000 and 2020, world oil consumption will increase by almost 50 percent (an average of 2 percent per year), spurred by development in Asia B a virtual doubling of demand by China, India and the Middle East. At this rate, the existing supply will disappear around 2025 to 2030.
Scientists are working on new fuel sources, notably hydrogen. However, few policy makers expect a real alternative to oil before 2020, or more likely 2030. A severe unfulfilled world demand for oil, therefore, is likely between the years 2000 and 2020.
In 2000, the United States imported 50 percent of its oil consumption, a figure predicted to rise to 66 percent by the year 2020.
The Report, September 2000, of the Project for the New American Century, ARebuilding America=s Defenses B Strategy, Forces and Resources for a New Century@ B in the writing of which Vice-President Dick Cheney participated (well before 9/11) B calls for taking over Iraq as part of a larger oil-minded Pax Americana. The Report considers that to Afight and decisively win multiple, simultaneous major theater wars@ should be a Acore mission@ of the U.S. military. It calls for sharp increases in U.S. defense spending and the creation of AU.S. space forces@ to control outer space. It seeks to acquire military control over the Persian Gulf region, seeing regime change in Iraq as part of an overall strategy. It describes the U.S. military forces abroad as the Acavalry on the new American frontier@ and advocates Aunquestioned U.S. military preeminence@ in the world.
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