One of the C-SPAN channels has live coverage of a program sponsored by the government-supported United States Institute of Peace. It focuses on the need for “reconciliation” in Afghanistan (although it is unclear who is to be reconciled with whom). Speakers address such topics as “justice” (particularly for women), economic growth, and creating a stable society.
One would think that an agency calling itself an Institute for Peace might regard the ending of war in that country as its first priority: what is more destabilizing and economically destructive to a society than the bombing of cities and the killing of people? It can be said that “justice” (i.e., the redistribution of violence) is being carried out there, but not with any prospect of enhancing the well-being of the ordinary Afghan people.
When I was a child, World War II was conducted by a governmental agency with the more honest name of the “War Department.” Invasive wars are now conducted in the name of “Defense,” and rationalized in the name of “Peace.” The spectacle is as grotesque, twisted, and contradictory as those war-supporters who, at the same time, pretend to be Christians!
I know one man who, during the George W. phase of the wars against Iraq and Afghanistan, was passionately anti-war. He went so far as to resign from his church because it refused to take a principled stand against these wars. This man is a liberal Democrat. Once Obama was elected to the presidency, he did a 180 degree reversal and became a strong supporter of these same wars. His rationale, like those speaking on C-SPAN this morning, was that “justice” and “stability” — particularly for Afghan women — had to brought to a country torn asunder by a war whose destructive powers serve agendas unrelated to peace.
