November 12, 2001

Western Civilization B

A Short History of its Aerial Bombardments

1903 Orville and Wilbur Wright fly the first motor-driven machine

Defying gravity for twelve seconds while covering forty yards

The world is ecstatic. Dreams of freedom, peace, perfection

Immortality and even divine power seem within reach

1911 Lieutenant Giulo Cavotti has flown his monoplane from Italy

The North African desert below him is home to 600,000 Arabs

Over the Oasis of Tagiura, he drops a Danish Haasen hand grenade

The death toll is unknown in this, the first site ever to be bombed from the air

1914-18 The Acolonial shortcut@ of bombing civilians is inadmissible in Europe

But four years of stalemate on the ground makes pilots imprecise

And accidents routinely happen over the center of cities

Civilians joining en masse the ten million dead the war produces

1920 Mohammed Abdille Hassan of Somaliland rebels against British rule

The AMad Mullah@ must be killed and in what better way

Than with a man-hunt from the air B a first success which serves as precedent

For the henceforth systematic bombing of restless natives and savages

1925 American legionnaires in the service of Spain follow their orders

Chechaouen, capital of the Jibala people

A town of 6,000 inhabitants, clinging to the mountainside of northern Morocco

Becomes the first city ever to know death from the air

1937 German legionnaires in the service of Spain follow their orders

Guernica, capital of the Basque people

A town of 6,000 inhabitants, clinging to the mountainside of northern Spain

Becomes the first European city ever to know death from the air

1939-45 The Germans kill 40,000 in England over six months, using conventional bombs

The British kill 50,000 in Hamburg overnight, using incendiary bombs

Then they kill 100,000 in Dresden overnight, using incendiary bombs

The Americans kill 100,000 in Tokyo overnight, using the new napalm bombs

1945 From the Enola Gay, Paul Tibbets drops Little Boy over Hiroshima

Within one minute 100,000 are dead

Within weeks 100,000 die from radiation sickness

Over the next 12 years, one of every seven newborn has a birth defect

1946-54 The Second World War has killed forty-six million people

Colonies are indispensable for re-building

In Vietnam, the French try the bait-and-trap method of subduing

They drop sacks of rice, wait, then bomb those who have gathered

1950-53 Americans dominate the airspace over Korea

In three months they destroy all the North Korean cities

Without encountering resistance

In a war that kills five million people

1954-62 The French change the conditions of warfare with the helicopter in Algeria

They seed the countryside with antipersonnel fragmentation bombs

Drop paratroopers to smoke out guerillas on the ground

Then hunt the men from the air as they are fleeing for their lives

1960 The United States has 10,000 nuclear bombs, 1,000 of which are hydrogen bombs

A ten-megaton hydrogen bomb has five time the explosive power

Of all the bombs dropped on Germany during the Second World War

A fifteen megaton hydrogen bomb is equivalent to 1,200 Hiroshima bombs

1962 The Soviet Union explodes a fifty-megaton bomb

Bigger than any exploded to date B the equivalent of 4,000 Hiroshima bombs

Then for several days in October, the world teeters on the brink of annihilation

Until Nikita Khrushchev humbly removes his bases from Cuba

1964-75 The United States drops the equivalent of 640 Hiroshima bombs on Indochina

From 1966 to 1971, it drops 500,000 cluster bombs, made to kill humans

And when these explode into their 285 million secondary bombs

It equates to seven bombs for every Indochinese man, woman and child

1969 At home, the United States and the Soviet Union together

Have enough nuclear weapons to destroy the world population 690 times

In Vietnam, the United States inaugurates the fuel-air bomb

Bridging the gap between conventional and nuclear weapons

1975 On the thirtieth anniversary of Hiroshima

The United States has a nuclear capability

Equivalent to 100,000 Hiroshima bombs

With the systems to deliver it simultaneously everywhere on earth

1980 On the thirty-fifth anniversary of Hiroshima

The United States and the Soviet Union

Together have a nuclear capability

Equivalent to 1,000,000 Hiroshima bombs

1991 The United States bombs an enemy, Iraq

Which it itself has helped arm during the preceding ten years

An erstwhile ally whom it now accuses

Of possessing Aweapons of mass destruction@

2001 The United States= own airplanes

Are used as bombs

To destroy two of its icons

One commercial, the other military

The United States declares Afghanistan the culprit

And in one month, drops 8,000 bombs on this country, the size of Texas

At home, it hastens its work on missiles launched from outer space

And the use of lasers rather than bombs to kill earthlings

In the year 2001

Western civilization

Is at the helm of the world.

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Acknowledgments

Sven Lindquist is a source of inspiration. His steady refusal to use the usual euphemisms for killing (Aemploying violence,@ Aprojecting military force,@ Aputting pressure on the enemy,@ Aengaging the enemy in combat,@ etc...) is very welcome and refreshing. Most of my information was taken from his book published in Sweden in 2000, and translated by Linda Rugg, under the title, A History of Bombing, (The New Press, New York), 2001.

References

The following page numbers refer to Lindquist, Sven, A History of Bombing, translation from Swedish by Linda Rugg, (The New Press, New York), 2001.

1903 B The First Airplane

Lindquist, page 26-28.

Harris, William and Judith Levey, The New Columbia Encyclopedia (Columbia University Press, New York), 1975, page 41.

1911 B The First Bomb from the Air

Lindquist, pages 1-2.

1914-18 B The First World War

Lindquist, pages 2-5 and 40.

1920 B The Somaliland War

Lindquist, pages 2 and 42.

1925 B Chechaouen, Morocco

Lindquist, pages 5 and 51.

1937 B Guernica, Spain

Lindquist, pages 5 and 72-74.

1939-45 B The Second World War

Lindquist, pages 81, 83, 95, 102, 107-108, 147 and 175.

1945 B Hiroshima

Lifton, Robert and Greg Mitchell, Hiroshima in America B A Half Century of Denial (Avon Book, New York), 1995, pages xii and 231.

Lindquist, pages 111-112, 147 and 175.

1946-54 B The French Vietnam War

Gilbert, Martin, The Second World War B A Complete History (Revised Edition), (Owl, Henry Holt, New York), 1989, page 1.

Lindquist, page 135.

1950- 53 BThe Korean War

Lindquist, pages 126-127 and 130-131.

1954-62 B The Algerian War

Lindquist, pages 144-145.

1960 B Stockpiling Atomic Bombs

Lindquist, pages 136, 141 and 148.

1962 B The Super-Bomb

Lindquist, pages 151-152.

1964-75 B The American Vietnam War

Lindquist, pages 155- 157 and 163.

1969 B More Weapons

Lindquist, pages 157-158 and 160.

1975 B More Weapons and Better Delivery

Lindquist, page 165.

1980 B More and Better Weapons

Lindquist, page 168.

1990-91 B The Gulf War

Lindquist, page 173.

2001 B The Afghanistan War

Skahill, Jeremy, KGNU, Democracy Now, 11/09/01 (Reporting the announcement of the United States Department of Defense).

Grossman, Karl, Weapons in Space, (Seven Stories Press, New York), 2001, pages 28,52, 61 and 66.

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