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The Darfur conundrum KA Dilday - openDemocracy

Tags: conflict, darfur, peace on 2007-04-04 -All Annotations (0) -About

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The war in American hearts and minds Andrew Stroehlein - openDemocracy

Tags: conflict, fear, security, us, waronterror on 2006-09-12 -All Annotations (0) -About

more fromwww.opendemocracy.net

Fallows surveys dozens of security and terrorism experts to reach the assessment that al-Qaida is now mostly neutralised and sidelined, but that America's greatest danger remains the national feeling of vulnerability and the corresponding public pressure on politicians to provide security at any cost. This leads to disproportionate reactions and inappropriate spending priorities, both at home and abroad.
the widespread belief in an existential threat helps explain the sweeping changes in attitudes to security in everyday civic life - from armed soldiers patrolling public places like Grand Central Station in New York City and additional security checks on transport (some perhaps sensible, others bizarre: does my 3-year-old really need to take off her shoes for our fellow airline passengers to feel safe?). These measures are quite unsettling to those who recall a country that once rejoiced in extensive freedom of movement.
When torture became a matter of public debate in the US soon after 9/11, it was the surest sign imaginable that something had really slipped in the American mind. That is also when it started to hit me just how traumatised Americans were, how the conflict mentality had warped their basic moral compass. Call me naïve or nostalgic, but the very idea of even discussing the use of torture is something I never expected to see in the country of my birth.
The widespread belief in an existential war affects political decision-making on everything
Then they show a GoogleEarth-assisted look at potential targets in the Chicago area. Rail lines in blue, major highways in yellow, important landmarks and monuments as green circles, key commercial buildings as yellow circles, significant electricity infrastructure in red ... pretty soon the map of greater Chicago is just a pile of cluttered graphics, impossible to make out anything clearly. There are just too many targets; too many things to be afraid of.
And even if people are getting used to believing they are living in wartime, this offers no great comfort, because when such a prevailing attitude exists for too long, a generation emerges that knows nothing else and can imagine nothing better. Surely Americans are not as deeply consumed by a conflict mentality as the young Afghans I spoke with in Kabul in 2002 who wanted their country to declare another war, this time on Pakistan. "But you've just been through decades of civil war, and your country is in ruins: don't you want peace?", I asked. "What is peace?" one of the group of 20-somethings replied.