"Nothing in the entire world is
more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity."
--Martin Luther King Jr. (1929 - 1968)
Every now and then when some poor country is about to
receive some American military attention, the American people are prepared by
an intense and unceasing propaganda. They are bombarded day in and day out by
what a threat the leader of that country is to the peace loving, civilized and
democratic people of the United States. Newspapers, TVs, Radios, blogs and
anything else that can in anyway convey a message to the people are employed to
present this person as the worst of the worst.
I don�t know if you remember the invasion of Panama in 1989;
but it was just the same then as it is now. Manuel Noriega, the president of
Panama, who incidentally for many years had worked for the CIA (for Bush
Senior), was no longer following the orders from Washington. The US decided to
replace him.
Overnight Mr. Noriega became the most evil man on the
planet. He was the dictator and a drug lord that had to be dealt with. He was
made responsible for the entire drug trafficking in the US. He was made the
most dangerous man in the world. He was the cruelest dictator that ever
existed. In addition we were told that people of Panama deserved �democracy.�
After a short while, the American people started thinking
that if Mr. Noriega were removed, then the drug problem in the US would vanish
as well. So in December 1989, 27,000 American soldiers invaded Panama. However,
in order to keep the democratic tradition alive in Panama, a few hours prior to
the invasion, US military appointed Mr. Guillermo Endara as the new president
of Panama. The ceremony took place inside a US military base in the Panama
Canal Zone.
Well, as you can see the drug problem is still there. Mr.
Noriega turned out to be nothing but a CIA asset who wasn�t following the
orders. After a few months people forgot all about him.
Later, it was Saddam Hussein who became the most evil person
in the world. Once again the media started the same old song and dance routine.
The Gulf War ensued and thousands of people were killed.
Now it is Iran�s turn, and the evil de jour is Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. He is described as
anything from Hitler reincarnate to the most dangerous man on earth. Never mind
that he is not the head of an army, or that he has no real power; the main
thing is that he is EVIL. Never mind that there are no Iranian troops in Canada
or Mexico. Never mind that he does not possess thousands of nuclear missiles;
he is still the most dangerous man alive and we have to do something about him.
It always amazes me to see that people, time and again, fall
for the same old song and dance routine. Don�t you ever get a sense of d�j� vu?
Can�t people see that they are being, so openly, manipulated? Apparently not.
The very people who are preparing us for another war are the
only ones that are going to benefit from it. The majority always lose and most
likely you and I will be among the losers. We are the ones who have to pay for
it, and believe me we will. We are already doing it by having to work more just
to make ends meet. But no amount of money can give one that joy of seeing �our
boys� smashing those evil, backward people, right?
We may feel great for awhile seeing all those smart bombs
killing thousands of people, but the feeling of superiority, along with the
entertainment that war footage provides, will be fleeting. After a few months
of the bloodshed and after a few leaks, one begins to question the wisdom of it
all. But by then most people will have forgotten that they were also one of
those that supported the war.
As you shake your head and hope for it all to end soon, you
are presented with a surge. You hope that if more troops are poured in, things
will cool down. But as soon as you begin to realise that this was a bad idea,
another EVIL man is identified, and you begin to think that something has to be
done about him, otherwise the world as we know it will come to an end. And so
things will just continue to deteriorate and before you know it the country is
involved in a war that it no longer can extricate itself from.
Meanwhile, all these wars and threats of war are frightening
people around the world. People are asking themselves who is going to be next?
There is already a joke going around in the Muslim world about this huge bold
eagle and the fox. It goes something like this: Once upon a time a zebra saw a
fox distraught and running wild in the jungle. The zebra stopped the fox and
asked him what was wrong. The fox answered, "You know about the huge eagle
don�t you?" The zebra answered, "Yes." The fox said, �Well,
she�s gone crazy. The eagle says that she has dreamt that there is an animal
with three testicles that is going to destroy the jungle.� The zebra smiled and
said, �Well none of us has three testicles, so why are you running?� The fox
said, �Because the eagle first pulls out the testicles and then she counts
them.� After hearing this, the zebra started running as well.
Well, one might find this joke funny, but it depicts the
feeling of the people other than the US and its allies. Fear breeds hatred and
hatred leads to war. It is always easy to start a war, but extremely difficult
to end one. As the journalists go around and pat themselves on the shoulder for
coming-up with the best �evil . . ." title of the day, they should realise
that they are unwittingly paving the road to another war.
Copyright � 2007 Abbas Bakhtiar. All rights reserved.
Dr. Abbas Bakhtiar lives in
Norway. He is a management consultant and a contributing writer for many online
journals. He's a former associate professor of Nordland University, Norway.
Contact him at Bakhtiarspace-articles@yahoo.no.