INDIA
DEFENCE CONSULTANTS
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‘The Ugly American’ An IDC Analysis
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It’s always difficult to justify or analyse why USA in spite of meaning well is disliked so much. Their success in eliminating the Taliban and al-Qaeda from Afghanistan has been a great contribution to the civilized world. They have saved both Afghanistan and
Pakistan of
Muslim secular
societies. We
reproduce below an article by Salman Rushdie which very sensitively and candidly offers bouquets as well as brickbats to ‘the Ugly American’, and America
and Anti-Americanism By
Salman Rushdie They
told us it would be a long, ugly struggle, and so it is. America's war
against terror has entered its second phase, a phase characterized by the
storm over the status and human rights of the prisoners held at Camp X-Ray
(Guatanamo Bay in Cuba) and by the frustrating failure of the United
States to find Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar. Additionally, if America
now attacks other countries suspected of harboring terrorists it will
almost certainly do so alone. In spite of the military successes, America
finds itself facing a broader ideological adversary that may turn out to
be as hard to defeat as militant Islam –– anti-Americanism
–– which is presently becoming more evident everywhere. The
good news is that these post-Taliban days are bad times for Islamist
fanatics. Dead or alive, Osama bin Laden and Mullah Omar look like
yesterday's men, unholy warriors who forced martyrdom on others while
running for the hills themselves. Also, if the persistent rumors are to be
believed, the fall of the terrorist axis in Afghanistan may well have
prevented an Islamist coup against President Pervez Musharraf in Pakistan,
led by the more Taliban-like elements in the armed forces and intelligence
services — people like the terrifying General Hamid Gul. And President
Musharraf, no angel himself, has been pushed into arresting the leaders of
the Kashmiri terrorist groups he used to encourage. Around
the world, the lessons of the American action in Afghanistan are being
learned. Jihad is no longer quite as cool an idea as it was last fall. States
under suspicion of giving succor to terrorism have suddenly been trying to
make nice, even going so far as to round up a few bad guys. Iran has
accepted the legitimacy of the new Afghan government. Even Britain, a
state which has been more tolerant of Islamist fanaticism than most, is
beginning to distinguish between resisting "Islamophobia" and
providing a safe haven for some of the worst people in the world. America
did, in Afghanistan, what had to be done, and did it well. The bad news,
however, is that these successes have not won new friends for the United
States outside Afghanistan. In fact, the effectiveness of the American
campaign may have made some parts of the world hate America more than they
did before. Critics of the Afghan campaign in the West are enraged because
they have been shown to be wrong at every step –– no, American forces
weren't humiliated the way the Russians had been; and yes, the air strikes
did work; and no, the Northern Alliance didn't massacre people in Kabul;
and yes, the Taliban did crumble away like the hated tyrants they were,
even in their southern strongholds; and no, it wasn't that difficult to
get the militants out of their cave fortresses; and yes, the various
factions succeeded in putting together a new government that seems to have
broad support among the people. Meanwhile,
those elements in the Arab and Muslim world who blame America for their
own feelings of political impotence are feeling more impotent than ever.
As always, anti-American radicalism feeds off widespread anger over the
plight of the Palestinians, and it remains true that nothing would
undermine the fanatics' propaganda more completely than an acceptable
settlement in the Middle East. However,
even if that settlement were arrived at tomorrow, anti-Americanism would
probably not abate. It has become too useful a smokescreen for Muslim
nations' many defects –– their corruption, their incompetence, their
oppression of their citizens, their economic, scientific and cultural
stagnation. America-hating has become a badge of identity, making possible
a chest- beating, flag-burning rhetoric of word and deed that makes men
feel good. It contains a strong streak of hypocrisy, hating most what it
desires most, and elements of self- loathing. ("We hate America
because it has made of itself what we cannot make of ourselves.")
What America is accused of –– closed- mindedness, stereotyping,
ignorance –– is also what its accusers would see if they looked into a
mirror. These
days there seem to be as many of these accusers outside the Muslim world
as inside it. Anybody who has visited Britain and Europe, or followed the
public conversation there during the past five months, will have been
struck, even shocked, by the depth of anti-American feeling among large
segments of the population. Western anti-Americanism is an altogether more
petulant phenomenon than its Islamic counterpart and far more
personalized. Muslim countries don't like America's power, its
"arrogance," its success; but in the non-American West, the main
objection seems to be to American people. Night after night, I have found
myself listening to Londoners' diatribes against the sheer weirdness of
the American citizenry. The attacks on America are routinely discounted.
("Americans only care about their own dead.") American
patriotism, obesity, emotionality, self-centeredness: these are the
crucial issues. It
would be easy for America, in the present climate of hostility, to fail to
respond to constructive criticism, or worse: to start acting like the
overwhelming superpower it is, making decisions and throwing its weight
around without regard for the concerns of what it perceives as an already
hostile world. The treatment of the Camp X-Ray detainees is a worrying
sign. Secretary of State Colin Powell's reported desire to determine
whether, under the Geneva Convention, these persons should be considered
prisoners of war was a statesmanlike response to global pressure — but
Mr. Powell has apparently failed to persuade President Bush and Donald
Rumsfeld. The
Bush administration has come a long way from its treaty-smashing
beginnings. It should not abandon consensus-building now. Great power and
great wealth are perhaps never popular, yet, more than ever, we need the
United States to exercise its power and economic might responsibly. This
is not the time to ignore the rest of the world and decide to go it alone.
To do so would be to risk losing after you've won. (Courtesy:
NYT 04 Feb) |