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Sunday 13 January 2002
Afghanistan
On Saturday morning 12 January,
I was on a peace vigil. Not a big one, but a quiet, limited public demonstration
in Swansea. There were just nine of us, this morning. Every Saturday morning since
early October, the Swansea Quakers have held a half-hour peace vigil, to mark
rejection of the “war against terrorism” in Afghanistan. We
stand in silence , on the prominent lawn in front of the Quaker Meeting House
in the city centre. Simply by being there, with our posters, we attract the attention of
passers-by and remind them of the wrongs that are being done in Afghanistan.
The vigil expresses my position precisely. It is not that
I am a pacifist [R] I acknowledge the importance of learning to use force, and of
skill in deploying it. When faced with the personal challenge at the
age of 18, I completed my National Service (1954-56). I respect military and
policing skills, and I consider them indispensable to a well-ordered society. Long
hair and sandals are not my style. But it was wrong
to go to war , in October. It was quite wrong to react to the World Trade
Center attacks by declaring “war on terrorism”. Bush was wrong, however great the
popular pressures. And Tony Blair was wrong to make common cause with Bush,
uncritically and enthusiastically. I am not
censorious about the mistakes that they both made. I have not joined
the political outcry against “America”. I would probably have made the same mistake,
surrounded by the baying of the hounds of war. But it was nevertheless a mistake. The
right course was to use diplomacy and international investigative integration.
That would also have been the most effective
way of tracking down Osama Bin Laden, and the Al-Quaida network. The passions of war
have exacerbated other problems, triggered new conflict between India and Pakistan,
aggravated relations between Israel and Palestine,
and raised levels of tension and anxiety throughout the world. It
was an awful mistake, and we must learn from it. We all
now face the task of recovering from that mistake. That is why, each week, I
take up my position with the Quaker vigil. The continuing bombing of Afghanistan, against
the wishes of the new Government, is an outrage. Bush’s action has wrongly promoted brute
force as an acceptable tool of international action, downgrading diplomatic and negotiating
skills. He has legitimated all who seek to counter “terrorism” by reciprocal aggression.
He has grievously weakened the United Nations. He has gratuitously deepened religious
divisions at a global level.
He has heightened anxieties throughout the Middle East. Bush
was not strong enough to resist the hounds of war. I do not condemn him. He is
a weak man, who has an even weaker political mandate. Our task is now to pick up the pieces,
and re-build our world. Blair’s mistake was different.
When, on that fateful Tuesday afternoon (11 September), he had to decide what to do, he made
the wrong choice. Again, I have sympathy with him, for it was an awful decision to have to make,
and it is clear that the decision must have been made by Wednesday 12 September. For my part, I accept that in the
circumstances Blair could not have pursued outright opposition to the American action. Public
passions were running too high. But the Americans should have been allowed to fight their
war alone, and to take full responsibility for it. Britain should have joined the European
reaction, committing peacekeeping forces at a later stage if appropriate.
Instead, by his assiduous and enthusiastic support, Blair destroyed any sense that Britain
was capable of independent diplomatic judgment. That was another mistake, from which we
must now recover. Politics, for me, is about future action.
What can we do now, today and tomorrow, to improve the condition of mankind? That
is the question. What do you
think? Drop me a line.
