On Western Terrorism: From Hiroshima to Drone Warfare

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On Western Terrorism: From Hiroshima to Drone Warfare

by Noam Chomsky

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Comment on this title and you could win free books! Synopses & Reviews Table of Contents Comment on this title and you could win free books! ISBN13: 9780745333878 ISBN10: 0745333877 Condition: All Product Details

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Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

In On Western Terrorism Noam Chomsky, world renowned dissident intellectual, discusses Western power and propaganda with filmmaker and investigative journalist Andre Vltchek. The discussion weaves together a historical narrative with the two men's personal experiences which led them to a life of activism.

The discussion includes personal memories, such as the New York newsstand where Chomsky began his political education, and broadens out to look at the shifting forms of imperial control and the Western propaganda apparatus. Along the way the discussion touches on many countries of which the authors have personal experience, from Nicaragua and Cuba, to China, Chile, Turkey and many more.

A blast of fresh air which blows away the cobwebs of propaganda and deception, On Western Terrorism is a powerful critique of the West's role in the world which will inspire all those who read it to think independently and critically.

Synopsis:

In On Western Terrorism Noam Chomsky, the renowned scholar and arguably the world's greatest dissident intellectual, discusses the West's complicity in acts of terror with filmmaker and investigative journalist Andre Vltchek.

Chomsky and Vltchek address a wide range of issues: from colonialism and its impact on today's world to the destruction of the environment and local cultures. Beginning with a careful exploration of the concepts of terrorism, colonialism and genocide, they then apply them to Western foreign policy across a number of case studies.

A blast of fresh air which blows away the cobwebs of propaganda and deception, On Western Terrorism is a powerful and controversial critique of the West's role in the world.

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About the Author

Noam Chomsky is a world renowned linguist and one of America's foremost social critics. He is Institute Professor in the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy at M.I.T. He is the author of numerous books for Pluto Press, including Fateful Triangle, The New Military Humanism, Power and Terror and A New Generation Draws the Line.

Andre Vltchek is a novelist, filmmaker, investigative journalist and playwright. He is the author of a number of books including Indonesia (Pluto, 2012).

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Table of Contents

1. Western Imperialism and its Impact on the World
2. When is Genocide a Genocide?
3. Eastern Genocides? Comparing the Terror of Western Imperialism with Alleged Crimes Committed by Communist Soviet Union and China
4. Dissent: The Treatment of Dissidents
5. Western Propaganda and the Press
6. The Ways Forward

http://www.powells.com/biblio/0745333877?p_isbn&PID=36683

The Chomsky/Vltchek Worldview

19 Oct

Chomsky and Vltchek: ON WESTERN TERRORISM (working title) 7 ...

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            Recently I read On Western Terrorism: from Hiroshima to Drone Warfare, published in 2013 by Pluto Press here in London, and consisting of a series of conversations between Chomsky and the Czech filmmaker, journalist, and author, Andre Vltchek, who is now a naturalized American citizen. Vltchek in an illuminating Preface describes his long and close friendship with Chomsky, and explains that these fascinating conversations took place over the course of two days, and was filmed with the intention of producing a documentary. The book is engaging throughout, with my only big complaint being about the misdirection of the title—there is virtually nothing said about either Hiroshima or drone warfare, but almost everything else politically imaginable!

            Vltchek, previously unknown to me, consistently and calmly held his own during the conversations, speaking with comparable authority and knowledge about an extraordinary assortment of topics that embraced the entire global scene, something few of us would have the nerve to attempt, much less manage with such verve, insight, and empathy. After finishing the book my immediate reaction was that ‘Chomsky knows everything’ and ‘Vltchek has been everywhere and done everything.’ Omniscience and omnipresence are not often encountered, being primary attributes commonly attributed by theologians to a monotheistic god! Leaving aside this hyperbole, one is stunned throughout by the quality of the deep knowledge and compassion exhibited by these two public intellectuals, and even more by their deeply felt sympathy for all those being victimized as a result of the way in which the world is organized and Western hard power has been and is being deployed.

            The book left me with a sense of how much that even those of us who try to be progressive and informed leave untouched, huge happenings taking place in domains beyond the borders of our consciousness. It suggests that almost all of us are ignoring massive injustices because they receive such scant attention from mainstream media and our access to alternative sources is too restricted. And, maybe also, are capacity for the intake of severe injustice is limited for most of us. The book is well worth reading just to grasp this gap between what we care about and what is actually worth caring about.  Somehow, part of what is so amazing about this exposure to the range of concerns that preoccupy Chomsky and Vltchek is the degree to which their knowledge and ethical sensitivity seems so comprehensive without ever appearing to be superficial. How do they find the time, perseverance, and energy? Of course, it helps to be blessed with high intelligence, clarity of spirit, astonishing retentive gifts, and a seeming refusal to sleep, rest, and recreate (which was among the traits I found so intimidating long ago in Noam’s Vietnam writing, my first encounters with his political thought, having earlier been awed by his revolutionary linguistics approach).

            While appearing to be on an equal footing throughout this dialogic text, Vltchek does acknowledge his reverential admiration for Chomsky, this extraordinary iconic American intellectual who has remained situated on the front lines of global critical debate for the past half century. In Vltchek’s words: “”The way I saw it, we were fighting for the same cause, for the right of self-determination and real freedom for all people around the world. And we were fighting against colonialism and fascism, in whichever form it came.” “For Noam, fighting injustice seemed to be as natural as breathing. For me, it became both a great honor and great adventure to work with him.” (ix) Vltchek believes that the lines of inspiration beneath a photo of the great English scholar/seer/activitst, Betrand Russell, which hangs ion the wall in Chomsky’s MIT office are also descriptive of what drives Chomsky to such heights: “”Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind.” (vi, xv).

 

             Vltchek shares with Chomsky an outlook that interprets the world on the basis of a deep structure of moral and political indictment directed at Western imperialism. Vltchek expresses this shared understanding clearly: “After witnessing and analyzing numerous atrocious conflicts, invasions and wars on all continents, I became convinced that almost all of them were orchestrated or provoked by Western geopolitical and economic interests.” (ix). The extent and gravity of the accusations is expressed statistically by Vltchek: “Along with the 55 million or so people killed as the direct result of wars initiated by the West, pro-Western coups and other conflicts, hundreds of millions have died indirectly in absolute misery, and silently.” (1) Chomsky agrees, wondering about which is the worst crime that should be attributed to the West, positing the destruction of the 80-100 indigenous people living in the Western Hemisphere before the European settlers arrived, as one option. In reflecting upon this, he abruptly shifts direction by observing, “..we are moving toward what may in fact be the ultimate genocide—the destruction of the environment.”(2) Chomsky laments that despite the overwhelming evidence of this self-destructive momentum, the challenge continues to be largely ignored by the public and the government, even in the face of dire warnings from the scientific community.  The capitalist obsession with profits and capital accumulation, combined with psycho-political control over the dissemination of knowledge in even the most democratic of societies, makes it almost impossible to ‘see’ these threatening dimensions of social, economic, and political reality.

            In a sense these conversations are an extended intellectual journey through the cartography of victimization brought about by Western colonial and post-colonial undertakings. Vltchek says early on “Colonialism continues but it appears that it is much more difficult for local people to point the finger and say exactly what is happening and who their enemies are.” (6) Chomsky responds “Some of the worst atrocities in the world have been committed over the last few years in the Eastern Congo. Three to five million people have been killed.” Aside from the magnitude of such a catastrophe what is so startling is its relative invisibility. This process of horrifying violence and unawareness is deeply troubling to both Chomsky and Vltchek. Chomsky repeatedly, and tellingly, refers to such victims as ‘un-people,’ those in non-Western realms whose death and suffering barely register on Western consciousness unless there are self-interested geopolitical reasons in a particular context to take non-Western suffering seriously. Both of these authors also view such tragedies as outcomes of global corporate greed, the struggle for control of Africa’s abundant natural resources leading these private sector actors to fund factions and militias that are out front, doing the fighting and killing. The true culprits hide behind curtains of evasion to remain invisible to the public. The media is shockingly complicit by reporting only on what is in view, avoiding critical investigative journalism.  Chomsky and Vltchek help us to realize that an array of powerful forces are using their wealth and influence to prevent us from seeing. We are allowed to see only as much as the gatekeepers of the public mind want us to see, and yet we are not relieved from using our capacities for sight. Reading Chomsky and Vltchek removes the scales from our eyes, at least temporarily, as they have managed to elude these gatekeepers, but at considerable risk, with a display of moral courage, civic responsibility, and extraordinary intellectual energy. I learn a lesson in civics from their vigilance: as citizens of constitutional democracies we retain the freedom, and hence possess a heavy responsibility to see for ourselves what is being done in our name, and not being content by becoming informed about distant victimizations, but learning to heed above all those that are proximate, and once we see what is nearby, we have a responsibility to act.

            Without venturing onto the terrain of ‘Orientalism’ the conversations are sensitive to what Chomsky refers to as “intellectual and moral colonization” that reinforces patterns of “political and economic colonization.” In this regard, he goes on to observe that “The main achievement of hierarchy and oppression is to get the un-people to accept that it’s natural.”(17), that is, to induce passivity and resignation among the ranks of the victimized.  The moral consciousness of the perpetrators is also deliberately neutralized. When Chomsky inquires as to whether Europeans have “any consciousness of colonial history” Vltchek responds: “No, grotesquely there is very little consciousness.” He adds that such ignorance is “shameful and revealing”: “Europeans make sure that they remain ignorant of their horrid crimes, about the genocides they committed and are still involved in. What do they know about what their governments and companies were and are doing in DR Congo?” (20)

            But just as the devil resides in the details, so too do angels of perceptions many of whom inhabit the pages of this book, and a few can be briefly mentioned here. The conversations weave a fabric of awareness that shifts back and forth between lamenting inattention and denial to the exposure of occurrences and realities that are unfamiliar yet crucially revealing. Without extending this commentary too much further, let me note some of the areas of agreement between Chomsky and Vltchek that corrected or collided with my own understanding. First, the comparison between China and India in which China is praised almost without reservation and India is condemned almost without qualification, surprisingly close to the approach taken by that arch consevative V.S. Naipaul [See Naipaul’s India, A Wounded Civilization(1977)] Their essential argument is that India is exceptionally cruel in its cultural practices, and has done relatively little to alleviate poverty, while China has made extraordinary progress that is spread widely throughout the country. Both confirm‎, contrary to Western propaganda and consistent with what I also experienced during a visit a year ago, that young university students in China seem fearless, raising sensitive controversial issues in public venues. In effect, India gets too much credit in the West because it possesses the trappings of liberal democracy, while China’s achievements are downplayed because socialist values are mixed with predatory capitalist practices. My own love of India has blinded, or at least numbed me, to the worst of India, and has consistently thrilled me with its cultural vibrancy and rich heritage, which included Gandhi and his incredible mobilization of a militant nonviolent challenge to the then still mighty British Empire.

            The two conversationalists agree that the most encouraging political moves in the world from a progressive perspective have been made in Latin America. There are political experiments, as in Bolivia and Venezuela, that express the energies of a socialist populism with original regional and national features, and there is an encouraging set of hemispheric moves to repudiate the main signs of a crippling past dependency on the United States. Chomsky and Vltchek point out that in Latin America, and Asia, the United States has supported vicious and repressive political forces so as to secure the wealth generating interests of corporate America, personified by what might be called ‘the United Fruit Syndrome,’ or more popularly, the perpetuation of ‘banana republics.’ A telling argument made in the book is that the military dictatorships in Latin America that the U.S. helped install and sustain in the 1970s and 1980s were far more oppressive and exploitative of their populations than were the Stalinist governments in control of East Europe during the Cold War decades.

            There is agreement among the authors that the heroes of the liberal establishment should be recast as villains. Two such exemplary individuals are Winston Churchill, reviled here for his criminal outlook toward African colonial peoples, and George Kennan, who is portrayed as a leading architect of the American global domination project put into operational form during the period of American ascendancy soon after World War II. Part of this exercise of demonization by Chomsky and Vltchek is to illustrate the mind games of liberal hegemonic ideology that treat such political luminaries as paragons of moral virtue. It continues the tradition of critical perception of the ruling elites that Chomsky so brilliantly set forth in American Power and The New Mandarins back in 1969.

            Chomsky and Vltchek both persuasively accord great significance to the almost forgotten Indonesian massacre of 1965 in which more than a million people were sacrificed in a massive bloodbath designed to clear the way for a neoliberal takeover of the wealth producing capacity of the country. The governments of the United States and Australia have much blood on their hands in encouraging this atrocity, and its aftermath that included genocidal incidents in East Timor.  The authors are negative about Asia other than China, supposing that it has swallowed a huge dose of poisonous cool aid called ‘neoliberalism.’

            Such illustrative discussion just scratches the surface of these exceptionally perceptive conversations. It would be misleading to suggest that these two progressive interpreters of the whole world were in complete agreement. Chomsky is somewhat more tentative about developments in Turkey or in writing the obituary of the Arab Spring than is Vltchek who seems less nuanced in some of his commentary. Chomsky welcomes improvements and positive trends, while Vltchek believes that only structural change can make a sufficient difference to bring real hope to oppressed peoples.  

            In a similar vein, Chomsky seems more convinced than in the past that keeping hope alive is almost a duty expressive of solidarity with those currently victimized. More than before Chomsky is articulate about his belief that without the belief that positive change is possible, there will be no challenge mounted against an intolerable status quo.

 

            The book ends with Chomsky depicting two trajectories for the human future: either a continuation of ecological sleep leading to species suicide or an awakening to the ecological challenge, with accompanying improvements. (173) As Chomsky has aged, although far more gradually than is normal, he has somewhat mellowed, and seems less pessimistic and assured overall than when I first came to know him in the late 1960s. I would say that Chomsky’s maturity has endowed him wisdom that acts as a complement to his astonishing command over the specifics of the whole spectrum of political concerns. This substantive authoritativeness set him apart long ago as our foremost intellectual and most beloved commentator on the passing scene of world events, but now he has also become a ‘wise elder,’ and whose views of the world deserves the greatest respect from all of us.

http://richardfalk.wordpress.com/2013/10/19/the-chomskyvltchek-worldview/

Noam Chomsky’s lacuna

• October 13, 2013 5:02 pm
• International, Reviews
• 1 comment

 

ON WESTERN TERRORISM. From Hiroshima to drone warfare.

Noam Chomsky and Andre Vltchek.  Published by Pluto  Press 2013.

Reviewed by Jane Shallice

On Western Terrorism is a printed version of an extended conversation between Noam Chomsky and Andre Vltchek, a film maker, political commentator, journalist and novelist which took place in 2012.  As ever when you read Chomsky you know how important he is to us all as a public intellectual, one who has written and spoken out consistently since the Vietnam War as an activist and his anti-imperialist / anti colonialist stance is second to none.  Over two days Chomsky and Andre Vltchek had a filmed conversation debating “the responsibility of western nations for the countless onslaughts and for centuries of terror that they spread all over the world.”  Whilst the catalogues of horror they discuss could lead to inertia and feelings of helplessness, Chomsky returns again and again to the position that there is always a choice:  to do something or to do nothing. At least in the attempt to do something, this could change the outcomes.

This is also a discussion between two activists, who start from the position that as a result of Western colonialist and neo colonialist wars since 1945 between 50 and 55million people have died, whilst many more millions have died or have led impoverished lives due to the practices of the colonialist states.  The context of such calculations is framed by Chomsky’s reminder that there have been genocides against the indigenous populations of the Americas since the 15^th century, only to be followed by the extermination policies of the US government against the native north Americans in the 19^th century.   But he also emphasizes that there are millions dying today from diseases and conditions of life that  could be easily rectified given the resources of the planet and the knowledge that we now have. He then states that we are moving to what could be the ultimate genocide the extermination of life on this planet itself. For him, the problem is the lack of any rigorous analysis of the use for example of fossil fuels and CO2 emissions driving global warming. …“these are very fundamental problems.  They are kind of intrinsic in the market-oriented societies , where you do not consider  what we call externalities. Things that don’t enter into any particular transaction, those that affect others: that is not included”.

The discussion ranges over the actions of the USA and its cohorts over the last forty or fifty years and is an important prompt for those of us who have been active for many years.  They refer to Orwell’s term “unpeople” to describe those people who, for the imperialists, “do not matter”, those who are the poor and the oppressed; the expendable.

A significant area which is well covered is that of Indonesia, too seldom described or analysed by the left. Some attention was paid when there was the break away of East Timor, but relatively little is given to one of the largest Muslim states and little written about the legacy of another colonialist operation which took place with devastating results in 1965.  After 1945 the US had decided to support Sukarno at a time when the US was opposing the old imperialists in the region, as they were considered to be blocking the way for the penetration of US imperialist aims. In 1958 Eisenhower supported a coup attempt to break away the outer islands, which were rich in mineral resources but  this failed. However the coup in 1965 again with US support, did not fail and there was a resultant massacre of the Communists, the intellectuals and the Chinese minority population.  It is argued that this was a precursor for the economic policies that we later saw in Chile in 1973, which is always stated as the way that the neoliberal policies of the US were trialed. In Indonesia however eight years before Chile there was “the imposition of an extreme pro market economic system force fed by the university of California at Berkley through its Indonesian collaborators at the client institute of the university of Indonesia.”  A clear neoliberal agenda was enacted.  Both men wanted to stress the importance of the linkages of policy between Eastern Asia and Latin America, with them emphasizing that the Brazilian coup occurred the year prior to 1965.  Since Suharto Indonesia, the largest Muslim state, has developed into been seen as a “rising Asian economy”, with its economy rising by around 6.5% pa until 1997 when following the Asian financial crisis Suharto was ousted. It is a state, which Pankaj Mishra in the LRB 10 Oct 2013, has described as a mix of lunar landscapes, with all the ravages evident of a neoliberal exploitation of resources, and a place where low cost airlines bring in the shoppers to spend.  As he describes it is “a democracy fundamentally designed to give ever more power to the rich”.

Despite the analysis of Indonesia, there is a however an absence in the book; whilst describing and analysing the colonial and neocolonial relationships, almost nothing is said about the economic system which generates this form of domination and exploitation. There is hardly a mention of capitalism and nothing about the vital drive to, as Marx said in Capital, “Accumulate , accumulate! This is Moses and the Prophets”.  There will be no let up from these interventions while capital’s life blood requires the control of productive factors and markets. The significance of this lacuna is important, because if there is no recognition and understanding of that which drives the imperialists to maintain and increase the inequality of relationships between states, the import of these events is somehow never revealed.  In much of Chomsky’s writings one feels this is a significant absence.

http://socialistresistance.org/5545/noam-chomskys-lacuna