For the second time in seven years, the government has decided that our country can go to war, can kill in our collective and individual names.
The target will be the people of Iraq, as it has been for seven years. Since 1991, our country also has taken part in an embargo against Iraq, an embargo that aid organizations estimate kills at least 60,000 Iraqi children under the age of five every year, victims of hunger and disease.
As a citizen opposed to murder, whether committed individually or organized by government in our collective names, I can do little but shout my outrage from the sidelines.
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The decision by the government, supported by Reform and the Tories, to go to war as part of a “coalition” manufactured by an embattled American president reeks of hypocrisy, haste and the need to show the Americans we’re their friends.
This is moral hypocrisy.
The political class of 1997 is big on Christian values, holding Parliament Hill prayer meetings that draw scores of MPs who talk about how faith infects their judgments and values.
What part of “thou shalt not kill” do they not understand?
This is political hypocrisy.
In a conversation with American president Bill Clinton, prime minister Jean ChrŽtien signalled hours before the phoney House of Commons debate took place last week, without a vote, that Canada would join.
There is also diplomatic hypocrisy.
Iraq is condemned as a dangerous rogue country for invading Kuwait in 1991, killing separatist Kurds inside Iraq and manufacturing “weapons of mass destruction.” We must take the word of the inspectors on the latter point, while remembering that they over-estimated Iraq’s strength and lethal power in 1991.
On the Kurd issue, our NATO ally Turkey has attacked and killed those same Kurds who also want to carve a bit of Turkey into an independent state. There is no talk of invading Turkey.
On the issue of invading and occupying neighbors, our good and powerful friend China kills and jails its own dissenting citizens and brutally occupies Tibet. ChrŽtien says the way to make them act nicer is make them richer through trade, not with embargoes and bombs.
This is a hasty decision, recently elevated from ongoing problem to “crisis” by the Americans. Canadians know few of the facts. Our information is at best flimsy and unreliable. History has shown that the first casualty in any war or buildup to war is truth.
The propaganda excesses and misinformation campaigns of the 1991 Gulf War should be fresh in our memories before we believe at face value the “news” being manufactured by politicians and generals.
Finally, there is the obvious truth that Canada’s small contribution is not needed by the U.S. war machine. Canada and other countries are along for the ride to make this look like a United Nations campaign, rather than an American effort.
“We believe Canada cannot stand on the sidelines in such a moment,” ChrŽtien intoned in the House of Commons last week. No doubt, many Canadians agree.
Unfortunately, he is acting in my name too and I do not.
