2- Leading Global Terror.
Being the guardian of the international community and the
guarantor of its security, USA will award itself the legitimate monopoly of war
on terror. War on terror or counterterrorism in accordance with Chomsky is the
way by which States conceal their own terrorism, since the third Reich. In
fact, more than focusing on who is a terrorist and who is not, or which are the
criteria by which we can consider a group as terrorist or not, the focus must
be put on acts. By doing so, we observe that terrorism does not only come from
clandestine organizations, but from States also. So the closest definition to
reality seems to be the one found in dictionary of 1959 that defines terrorism
as the systematic intimidation as a «method of governing or securing
political or other aims» no matter who the subject is. Nonetheless,
States have invented a bunch of elastic terms that could be interoperated in
the way they need. Among the most used ones, we can name «Surgical
Strike», «Collateral Damage», «Clean War»,
«Preventive War» and «Humanitarian Intervention».
A surgical strike is a military attack which results in, was
intended to result in, or is claimed to have resulted in only damage to the
intended legitimate military target, and no or minimal collateral damage to
surrounding structures, vehicles, buildings, etc (16). Collateral
damage is the term by which, USA and its allies call their
«Unintentional» or «Incidental» injury or damage to persons
or objects that would not be lawful military targets in the circumstances
ruling at the time (17).
(16)Shultz, Jr., Richard H.; Shultz, Richard H.; Pfaltzgraff,
Robert L.; Shultz, Jr., Richard H.; Pfaltzgraff; Shultz, Richard H. (1992).
The Future of Air Power: In the Aftermath of the Gulf War. DIANE
Publishing. ISBN 1585660469.
(17)Department of Defense Dictionary of Military and
Associated Terms, 12April 2001 (Amended Through 23 January 2002, P77.
The notion of «Clean War» is strongly related with
the two preceding ones. It's kind of war which wants to show a new face of war,
a war on which only military objectives are targeted. This obviously
unrealistic, wars could not be clean, it impossible to have clean wars
targeting military objectives only, above in modern conflicts that are
asymmetrical and where the civilians occupy the first ranks of casualties.
Preventive War was used in Iraq in 2003, while Humanitarian
intervention has been used in the first Gulf war toward the Iraqi aggression to
Kuwait and in the Yugoslavian intestine War. For some scholars, that has been
used as a pretext to annihilate Iraq for being a power and for its antagonism
against West, and Yugoslavia for being the only socialist country in Europe
after the fall of the East bloc, and an obstacle for America's Eurasian
control.
Inventing such notions takes part from the USA propaganda
machine, discrediting enemies, and presents ones-self as being the good and its
enemies the evil.
Washington's unilateral declaration of counter-terror
according to its criteria will represent a major obstacle to the legitimate
right of people to self-determination. This Right can either be exerted toward
a colonial or racist power, or a despotic regime.
After the declaration of war towards terror, many governments
facing armed dissidence are going to become strong allies for Washington in
achieving its aim. Concerning the spoiled and capricious child of International
Relations; namely Israel, it will use the pretext of terrorism to eliminate the
Palestinian resistance. Sri Lanka, Turkey, Russia and so forth, facing armed
liberation movements in Tamil Eelam, Kurdistan, and Caucasia did the same. In
Colombia,
the government with the aid of Washington will try to
eliminate armed dissidence evoking the pretext of narco-terrorism i.e. that
means fighting terrorist groups that get financing from drug traffic. Claiming
such allegation the Colombian government could conduct under USA benediction
one of the dirtiest «low-intensity conflicts» in the world. In
Colombia, «Chainsaw massacre» is unfortunately not only a movie's
title and it is also the only country in the world in which a whole political
party has been physically eliminated; namely, «Patriotic Union with more
than 5000 assassinated members.
The notion of «terrorist» the actual international
context has become a real dilemma. Terrorism is now synonym of the annihilation
of the whole jurisdictional warranty that a freedom fighter may enjoy and a
danger for his life and moral and physical integrity. In Fact, freedom fighters
and according to international instruments; namely; the Geneva conventions of
1949 and their additional protocols of 1977, enjoy their status of fighters as
well as regular soldiers do. The most important provisions of these conventions
according to irregular fighters, i.e. who do not belong to a regular Army, is
that they must not be punished for carrying weapons, and so they could not be
judged neither for that nor by an ordinary criminal court. In case of capture,
they must imperatively enjoy the status of war prisoner that represent the
major warranty for their lives and physical and moral integrity. According to
article 17 of the third Geneva convention related to the status of «War
Prisoner», a captured war prisoner can only be asked to give only his
surname, first names and rank, date of birth, and army, regimental, personal or
serial number, or failing this, equivalent information. No physical or mental
torture, nor any other form of coercion, may be inflicted on him to secure from
them information of any kind whatever. Prisoners of war who refuse to answer
may not be
threatened, insulted, or exposed to any unpleasant or
disadvantageous treatment of any kind.
If Regular soldier obtain that status automatically for the
simple fact of being regular soldier, irregular ones in order to obtain such
advantageous status are restricted to respect several conditions found in
article 4 of the same conventions; namely:
(a) that of being commanded by a person responsible for his
subordinates;
(b) that of having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at
a distance;
(c) that of carrying arms openly;
(d) that of conducting their operations in accordance with
the laws and customs of war.
Notwithstanding, such status is subordinated to the will of
governments. In fact, even if a group of irregular soldier respects those
conditions, only government have the right to apply or not. In a spirit of
vengeance, hard feelings and animosity, governments do whatever they can to
destroy and chastize individuals that have contested their authorities by
weapons and they rather usually treat irregular fighters as criminals of common
law to judge them in ordinary courts. This choice shows the superiority of
governments upon irregular groups and his will to punish severally the
individuals who dare carry weapon against his authority. With 9/11 events, this
practice is going to be generalized and becoming legitimate more and more,
annihilating then all the warranties that a prisoner could have, even the most
fundamental ones. One of the most perverse illustrations of an actual war
prisoner mess is «Guantanamo». If in other states potential war
prisoners are treated as common law prisoner. The ones in Guantanamo do not
even have a legal status. US officials, argued that because prisoners in
Guantanamo, were caught
doing terrorism, they could not enjoy such status. They are
considered as illegal fighters, so they have what they deserve, because they
are terrorists. Such statement does not have a legal value and fundament at
all, and it is not really honorable for a great Democracy.
Waging his global war against international terror, USA and its
allies have become them-self the main source of global terror.
II- From war against Communism to war on Narco-terrorism
in Latin
America.
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