To:

Zcom_simple
Home » Z Blogs » Noam Chomsky's Blog » The Afghanistan Food Crisis

Hello,

Blogs are a familiar feature on the internet - where users post content in an accumulating manner, with comments, and search options, etc. They facilitate expression and exploration, and via attached comments, also debate and synthesis.


Reading and
Navigating Blogs

Our blogs are quite powerful. Each writer can post, as is typically the case. Sustainers who have the option can also post, however. All Blogs appear in the blog system, and sometimes also in content boxes the top page of ZNet - and always via the left menu of the top page - and can be found via searches, etc.

Commenting on blogs follows the blogs, attached at the bottom, and blog comments, like all others, are also visible in many places that show comments including in the forum system. In addition, the entire blog system gathers content for everyone - but one can look at the accumulating content in many ways.

  • For example one can look at one writer's efforts - so one is seeing what is effectively a blog system for that one writer, or Sustainer.
  • One can also look at the content by topic, seeing blogs that are tagged as being about a certain topic - or place, as well. Thus, when doing that, it is a blog system about a topic, or a place, with many contributors.
  • One can look at only writer blogs, or only sustainer blogs, as well.
  • One can look at blogs for particular Groups, too.

All this is easily done using the left menu. Searches allow even more variables and refinements.


Creating Blog Posts

If you are a Sustainer with permission, and are logged in, you will see a link in the left menu for you to post a blog - and you can use that to post one, and then tag it various ways (such as with a topic or place, or a group tag), and once you do, it is in the system with you as the author.

You can also use the console button to the left to post a blog - anytime and from anywhere in the site, as long as you are logged in.

Meanwhile, enjoy the blogs - and, by the way, if you are a Free Member or a Sustainer with a ZSpace page, of course you can put one or more content boxes on it, pulling blog links of any sort you may want to filter for, for example, by you or by your friends or by others - and by topic, about places, for groups, etc.

Blogs

9

Noam Chomsky's Blog

Web Address: http://www.zcommunications.org/zspace/noamchomsky
Bio: (More)

All Chomsky Blogs

Recent Chomsky Content

Znetarticle_icon ZNet Articles
Zmagarticle_icon ZMag Articles
Zcommentary_icon ZCommentaries
Zaudio_icon ZAudios
Zvideo_icon ZVideos
Zblogpost_icon Blog Posts
Zbook_icon Books
Zvideo_icon ZStores

The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Noam Chomsky at Sep 04, 2005

PDF Version

Printer Friendly Version
Change Text Size a- | A+
I plead guilty of failing to write anything at all about this at the time when it mattered, or even to mention it except in some scattered interviews and a few remarks in talks. That failure was deplorable, since the threat of bombing, and then the bombing, were among the most disgraceful acts of modern history, as was known instantly. In these few scattered remarks, I quoted the international relief agencies, which bitterly denounced the threat of bombing, then the implementation of the threat. As they warned, the threat of bombing, which forced them to leave the country, and then the bombing itself, put huge numbers of people at risk of starvation. …That starvation could cause death of millions was the clear, explicit, unmistakable message of just about every international aid agency and those who cared about the people of Afghanistan. That was the message they were desperately seeking to convey. I did report their message in a few talks and interviews, but far too little… As to the facts, the basic story is this. On Sept. 16, five days after 9-11, the NY Times reported that Washington delivered to Pakistan a series of demands. Among then, Washington "demanded...the elimination of truck convoys that provide much of the food and other supplies to Afghanistan's civilian population." It is worth reading and re-reading that statement. It would have been extraordinary if, say, 1000 people in Afghanistan's civilian population were relying on the convoys that the US ordered be eliminated. But it wasn't 1000. The numbers were estimated by the agencies at about 5 million. Simply think for a moment about what those orders meant. The fact that there wasn't an enormous outcry of protest is utterly scandalous. The aid agencies did protest vigorously. You don't have to go to exotic sources to discover that. By late September, after the threat of bombing but before it began, the UN Food and Agricultural Agency estimated that 7 million Afghans might face starvation if bombing were initiated. At the same time, you could read in the NY Times that "The country was on a lifeline, and we just cut the line," quoting aid workers who were evacuated under the threat of bombing, as virtually all were. Just to cite a few of a flood of other examples, a director of the UN World Food Program said that after the bombing began, the threat of humanitarian catastrophe, which was already very severe, had "increased on a scale of magnitude I don't even want to think about." A spokesperson for the UNHCR said that "We are facing a humanitarian crisis of epic proportions in Afghanistan with 7.5 million short of food and at risk of starvation." After two weeks of bombing, the NYT reported that the number of Afghans in need of food had risen from 5 million to 7.5 million -- and the lifeline was cut. After a month of bombing, Harvard's leading specialist on Afghanistan wrote in the prestigious journal International Security that "millions of Afghans [are] at grave risk of starvation" (winter issue). And so it continues. …Returning to the events of September-October 2001, to put such a mass of people at risk of "silent genocide" -- to borrow the term used by UN agencies for far lesser threats -- is a crime of the highest order, and failure to condemn it vociferously and to organize to stop it is a bitter condemnation of the US and its allies. To repeat, I unhappily accept my share of the blame for barely mentioning it when the evidence was so overwhelming and the actions of such extreme criminality. Considerably later, I did write about it, though still far too little, also citing the shocking reports from the most respectable mainstream sources months later of mass starvation and other horrors, and quoting the pleas of some of the most prominent anti-Taliban Afghan individuals and organizations to stop the bombing, which was destroying the country. But that was far too late, for which, again, I plead guilty. All of this would have been horrendous enough even if there had been a credible reason for driving the aid agencies out of the country, demanding termination of the flow of food, and then the bombing with its shocking expected effects. But there was no credible reason. After several weeks of bombing, the US and UK concocted the claim that they were bombing to rid the country of the Taliban. One may decide for oneself how to react to placing 7.5 million people at "grave risk of starvation" to implement that goal, but it is irrelevant, because that was not the goal. The bombing was undertaken to compel the Taliban to turn over to the US people the US suspected of involvement in 9-11, but without presenting the evidence that the Taliban requested -- because Washington had no evidence. The head of the FBI conceded in Senate testimony 8 months later that after the most intensive international investigation in history, the FBI could only report that it "believed" the plot might have been hatched in Afghanistan but that it was implemented in Europe and the UAE, all US allies. These are, again, crimes of extraordinary magnitude, as is the failure to protest them vigorously and to act to terminate them. …In the few comments I made about this horrifying atrocity at the time, I mentioned that we would never know the consequences, because they would not be investigated. The reasons for believing that were quite strong: the powerful don't investigate their own crimes. Take Vietnam. We do not know, literally within millions, how many Indochinese died in the US wars, and polls show that what the population believes is vastly below even the official figures. Same with innumerable other cases. And the same held true in this case. Though as noted, I did cite in print later the reports I could find from mainstream sources, they were few and scattered. Such topics are simply not investigated, unlike the crimes of official enemies, where huge investigations are undertaken to unearth any scrap of evidence that might give some idea of the scale of their crimes. But more important, the answer to that question has no bearing whatsoever, precisely none, on assessment of the pre-bombing orders to Pakistan, the threats that drove the aid agencies out of the country, or the bombing itself. It's the merest moral truism that actions are evaluated in terms of the range of anticipated consequences. We understand the truism very well with regard to official enemies. Take, say, Khrushchev's sending missiles to Cuba in 1962, acts that carried a significant risk of nuclear war. Sane people regard that as an act of criminal lunacy, whatever the motives. I do not know whether there were Communist party hacks who were so utterly depraved that they "indict" those who warned of the threats on the grounds that there was no nuclear war. I don't know of any, but perhaps there were some... These observations are really elementary. It is a remarkable comment on the moral and intellectual culture in which we live that so many fail to comprehend them -- with regard to ourselves, that is; with regard to enemies everyone rightly takes them for granted.

Comment On This Blog Post  See All Comments (23)

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Sophphilo, Zubub at Jan 12, 2006 08:13 AM
If any rational person still had any lingering respect for Chomsky, this blog of his will have expunged the last iota. Sheer, unmitigated madness. If Chomsky can make the liberation of Afghanistan from the most reactionary, repressive government on the planet into an imagined genocide with millions (secretly) starving somewhere, then we've gone beyond Winston in 1984: here belief that 2+2=5 is entirely voluntarily. Z-Net sect members who lap up this stuff are beyond the need of evidence or argumentation; only a professional deprogrammer could help them. In lieu of such, these people would be better off following the Reverend Moon or Ron Hubbard who, at least so far as we know, are not afflicted with such serious delusions. What's striking about Chomsky's toughing it out whenever he is caught telling egregious lies (the US perpetrated genocide and mass starvation in Afghanistan, Robert Faurisson is "just an apolitical liberal" who says "nothing anti-semitic per se", Diana Johnstone's genocide and massacre denial in Srebrenica and Bosnia is "serious" work, etc), is that he can count on an army of unshakably loyal cult members to stand by his side through thick and thin. Moon and Hubbard would be green with envy.

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Kunt, Immanuel at Oct 12, 2005 22:10 PM
I'm starting to think that Bush went to Afghanistan to get the opium trade going so he could get it for cheap. Then he and his buddies could sit around the oval office smoking dope and dreaming up new ways to bankrupt the government and wage wars against brown-skinned people across the globe.

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Sloszewski, Stevel at Oct 02, 2005 04:58 AM
Bottom line - any sane and moral administration would not bomb a starving country. any sane and moral administration would do what it could to help a ravaged country when it is as easy as it would be for the United States (this isn't even considering what the US is responsible for and what the US owes the region). This is all common sense. People who have their head on straight can see it plainly.

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Cacioppo, Jonas at Oct 01, 2005 23:46 PM
The NYT did report that, on September 16, 2001, "Washington has ... demanded ... the elimination of truck convoys that provide much of the food and other supplies to Afghanistan's civilian population," under the headline PAKISTAN ANTITERROR SUPPORT AVOIDS VOW OF MILITARY AID.* Wasn't the Taliban the target, as they were harboring bin Laden and his associates? Wasn't that the truth? Rumsfeld conceded at one point that no "good targets" existed within Afghanistan, hence the need for carpet bombing. I supported the war against Afghanistan, as its regime was giving logistical and material support for the orchestrator of the attacks on our country four years past. But the implication that our government gave an order whose consequence was to cut off the CIVILIAN population from food seems unconscionable. How would have that action helped remove the Taliban, which held the Afghan people in the iron chains of a brutally violent and sexist society, from power? The Taliban has since been decentralized, elements of its former self remain, having fought our troops in recent months, and the same warlords still rule most of the country. The Afghans have a new cage. And bin Laden, guilty of murdering over 3,000 Americans, is nowhere to be found. *Pakistani support is characterized as "antiterror", implicitly noting that criticism of such support may be construed as "proterror". Why would Pakistan, that is Musharaff's regime, "avoid" giving military aid is another question.

Reply this comment

Person

By Mjc7373, Mcorbin at Sep 14, 2005 21:00 PM
" Is it of no import that the Nazi purpose was extermination, whereas US military in Afganistan carelessly and needlessly caused thousands of civilian deaths but in the process of attacking military targets in the service of a desirable goal, not of subjugating the Afgan people?" The ends justify the means?

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Jbrownil, Jbrownil at Sep 14, 2005 02:58 AM
To the point on the Khmer Rouge - Chomsky openly and repeatedly condemned them (as with all of our crimes in indochina). What he also did was criticize the US for paving the way for their rise to power. He then went on to further criticize the official body count as too high because the US, for it's own reasons, exaggerated the numbers. I think we have now covered the three most rehashed arguments against Chomsky.

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Erasmus472001, Libertas47 at Sep 13, 2005 08:15 AM
MCorbin & Graeme: I am impressed by the logical consistency of your arguments but still disturbed by the tone of absolute certainty and your unwillingness to accept that there are gradations of evil, as well as qualitative categories in which the "war crimes" the US commits are equated to those of Nazi Germany. Is it of no import that the Nazi purpose was extermination, whereas US military in Afganistan carelessly and needlessly caused thousands of civilian deaths but in the process of attacking military targets in the service of a desirable goal, not of subjugating the Afgan people? What sources document your claim that the Sudan bombing killed 30,000? And speaking of Sudan and in re your comment about the crimes of speaking out or not; why has Chomsky (correct me if I'm wrong) not posted on Sudan/Dafur and the oppression and mass murder of African blacks by Arab Islamicists? I suspect that is has something to do with a worldview that refuses to indict anyone with the full force of rage that is reserved for the USA (and speaking of the lapse in condemning the Kmer Rouge genocide?). Why would someone write an favorable introduction to a Holocaust denier's screed in France were he not unable to rationally assess gradations of evil (Chomsky defended this as upholding freedom of speech, an absolutist position blind to the larger context and the enormity of Nazi evil). n

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Mjc7373, Mcorbin at Sep 11, 2005 19:37 PM
"The point remains unrefuted that Chomsky grossly exaggerates" WFP estimated 3.5 million on the brink of starvation, that was Chomsky's figure as well. How did the Washington post come up with 1.5 million? Only by the Post's lone assessment can you try to prove that Chomsky's got the wrong number, and as I said, I'm very skeptical. "e.g.the failure to protest or stop the bombing, not just the bombing, was "a crime of the highest order" Bombing civilians is not a crime? According to international law it is. And failure to stop our government from breaking "the supreme crime against humanity" (Nuremberg Trials) http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/nuremberg/NurembergIndictments.html is something we have to take responsibility for. Chomsky would only be "crying wolf" if there were no crime committed, which there certainly was.

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Erasmus472001, Libertas47 at Sep 11, 2005 07:24 AM
McCorbin: Yes, I did read the link and while it backs the point of very little progress in 4 years (despite the fact that, as I argued "notable progress has been made" politically), it really does not, as you said in the original post, document Chomsky's points, which were focused entirely (with the exception of that dark hint of unknown subsequent deaths) on the events of 2001. My reaction to the WFP data was that it, again, shows how difficult progress is in the area of food production sans economic modernization and in conditions of severe draught and continuing turmoil spearheaded by the Taliban/Al Qaeda attempt to reinstall their murderous despotism. The point remains unrefuted that Chomsky grossly exaggerates; e.g.the failure to protest or stop the bombing, not just the bombing, was "a crime of the highest order", the demolition of the WTC and the bombing of the pharmaceutical plant in Sudan were equivalent atrocities, the USA is "the world's leading terrorist state", etc. etc. and as a result has the effect of the boy who cried wolf much too often. This is unfortunate, for were his overwrought moralism less dominant, his fine ethical intelligence could have much more influence in this world (is it only an elite conspiracy that keeps him from being listened to or consulted by the MSN?) 20

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Mjc7373, Mcorbin at Sep 11, 2005 02:44 AM
libertas47: Did you read the link I offered? http://www.wfp.org/country_brief/indexcountry.asp?region=6§ion=9&sub_section=6&country=004 Here is some of what you would find if you did: World Hunger - Afghanistan (last updated 28/07/05) While notable progress has been made....millions of Afghans still live with poverty, a crumbling infrastructure and a landscape that's riddled with mines. ....A 2003 nationwide vulnerability assessment found that some 3.5 million Afghans are extremely poor and chronically food insecure. An additional three million are seasonally food insecure. senssensibilityr: The World Food program and Chomsky cite the same statistics that I have heard repeatedly while following events in Afghanistan. So far your Washington Post's 1.5 million figure is new to me, I have never heard it before and I am highly skeptical.

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Erasmus472001, Libertas47 at Sep 09, 2005 20:35 PM
What is important to note is that Chomsky often makes good points (any ethical person is concerned over the risk of causing mass starvation), but in his over-the-top exaggerations and totalistic, shrill hectoring indictments, muddies the waters for a rational progressive perspective (for an example of a balanced assessment on Afgh. see Richard Falk's 12/2001 analysis: http://www.ssrc.org/sept11/essays/falk.htm or Ahmed Rashid: http://www.asiasource.org/news/special_reports/rashid.cfm It comes as no surprise, given the country's history, that it is still a "shithole" in terms of material life and human rights, although after 5 years we should have seen much more progress (not to mention the war crimes committed by the Northern Alliance, heroin trafficking, the return of the Burkha, etc.)Rashid, for example, indicts US policy in this area severely, but, unlike Chomsky and his followers, begins in reality and has no singleminded and simplistic ideological axe to grind.

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Senssensibilityr, Senssensibilityr at Sep 09, 2005 07:18 AM
From Frontpage, if someone can refute this that would be great: Now, the last edition of The Washington Post for 2001 featured as its lead front-page story the final word about Chomsky's spurious claims. "Massive Food Delivery Averts Afghan Famine," was the headline in an article by staff writer Marc Kaufman. "There will be no famine in Afghanistan this winter," Catherine Bertini, executive director of the UN World Food Program, told the paper. Indeed, her own agency moved 90,000 tons of wheat into Afghanistan in December alone, "the largest monthly total in the history of the agency." Kaufman notes that this actual result was far different from that given when the U.S. bombing began, when a three-year drought (due to nature, not to any nation's policies) combined with the bombing "were said to have put 1.5 million Afghans at risk of starvation." This figure, of course, is itself far lower than the 3 or 4 million Chomsky said "we are trying to murder," or the 7 to 8 million he said were "on the verge of starvation." Indeed, the article points out that "food shipments into Afghanistan picked up in November and swelled" in December "after the Taliban was routed." While they were in power, it noted that the Taliban "banned communications" between the UN World Food Program offices inside Afghanistan and its agencies outside the country, leaving WFP officials unable to function "for three months."

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Jbrownil, Jbrownil at Sep 07, 2005 21:12 PM
Ding Ding Ding! We have a winner!

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Mjc7373, Mcorbin at Sep 07, 2005 20:31 PM
"So I'm still wondering what goals have really been met and at what cost?" If the White House's goals are to declare perpetual war with defenseless countries and rake in profits for defense contractors, to show the rest of the world that they mean what they say about striking any country, unilaterally, any time, regardless of international law, and to decide who gets to rule such countries, then I would say that many goals have been met, and the cost is grave, but only to those too poor or brainwashed to avoid joining the army, and the taxpayers of America, which includes everyone who doesn't avoid paying taxes.

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Jbrownil, Jbrownil at Sep 07, 2005 17:46 PM
...are not quite how you describe them. First, OK Karzai is probably much better than the Taliban but let's be honest, that's not a difficult task. Almost ANYTHING would be better than the Taliban at this point. Forgetting the fact that he is basically a US puppet he can be seen as an improvement. To your comment about Afghanistan being better off now than it was before, let's take a look at the facts. The Taliban is back on the rise, the warlords power is not waning, conditions outside of Kabul are basically the same. Very little safe drinking water, oppression of woman, Al Qaida is still operating there, refugees. The list of problems goes on and on and on. So sure, maybe it's better off to some extent than it was before but not much. According to most reports the county is now actually getting worse. So I'm still wondering what goals have really been met and at what cost?

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Jbrownil, Jbrownil at Sep 07, 2005 17:03 PM
When I say shithole it's not much different than saying the placed has been destroyed and is a complete mess. My choice of words has nothing to do with the Afghan people because it isn't their fault. As for the length of my post, I didn't intend it to be that long. In fact most of what was posted were quotes, but I am sorry either way. What "reality" are we talking about and who decides what it is when lives are at stake? I think the reality here is that killing people to acheived our narrow goals and basically lying about it doesn't qualify as legitimate or as "just war". You said I have "disdain for the reality that we don't get to choose pure good vs. pure evil". Well the world, of course, isn't black and white and this situation is no different. When we have a choice between potentially starving millions with civilian casualties from bombing to acheive close to nothing for anyone, I don't see it as a tough decision. The conditions in Afghanistan right now...

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Mjc7373, Mcorbin at Sep 07, 2005 09:05 AM
libertas47: According to The World Food Program Chomsky's figures are correct. http://www.wfp.org/country_brief/indexcountry.asp?region=6§ion=9&sub_section=6&country=004

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Erasmus472001, Libertas47 at Sep 07, 2005 08:00 AM
Whoa, 4 posts bombarding me after mine; is this any way to have a dialogue? First, calling Afg. a "shithole" betrays a certain contempt for the good and decent people of that land, which dovetails with your disdain for the reality that we don't get to choose pure good vs. pure evil. Your point is well taken that the warlords are horrific and egregious, but their political strength is on the wane, and conditions there, with a democratic political structure, are still better than those under fundamentalist theocracy of the Taliban, with its complete suppression of the rights of women. RAWA is right to continue their fight against the warlords and the resurgence of fundamentalist oppression of women, but only the purist and deluded can argue that Afg. is worse off today than it was from 1996 to 2001. Say what you want of the CIA affiliated Karzai, he represents a viable element of a more secular democratic Afghani civil society that is now growing. Bush has nearly botched the whole enterprise by not investing in "nation-building"; but despite this, the US effort there is far from the criminal enterprise you and Prof. C. see it as.26

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Jbrownil, Jbrownil at Sep 07, 2005 03:21 AM
“The U.S., Russia, and Iran have been aiding a rough coalition of armed groups called the Northern Alliance. The Northern Alliance's fighters are drawn mainly from ethnic minority groups in Afghanistan who have been persecuted by the Taliban. But their record is also a bloody one. Groups like the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan (RAWA), which have been fighting against fundamentalism and for democracy in Afghanistan for years, have publicly stated that the fundamentalist gangsters of the Northern Alliance are not an acceptable alternative to the fundamentalist gangsters of the Taliban. No wonder: Human Rights Watch implicates the Northern Alliance in "indiscriminate aerial bombardment and shelling, direct attacks on civilians, summary executions, rape, persecution on the basis of religion or ethnicity, the recruitment and use of children as soldiers, and the use of antipersonnel landmines." BTW after all that, what has it really achieved? Sorry if I'm coming off rude, it's just incredible that anyone could support such a thing.

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Jbrownil, Jbrownil at Sep 07, 2005 03:00 AM
Fast forward to the present, we don't know what has happened (I've never seen the numbers) but we do know some of the obvious results of another ”liberation" by the US and once again, they're not pretty. But go ahead and continue to be an apologist for state violence, that's your problem, not mine. So this is the basis for what you call a "just war" - excuses, lies, rationalization, murder and violence etc. Some more general info “the U.S. dropped 37,000 individually-wrapped packages of food from the sky. You do the math. That's enough to feed about 37,000 people for one day, in a country where seven and a half million are in danger of starvation."

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Jbrownil, Jbrownil at Sep 07, 2005 02:27 AM
... And just take a look at what was said "The bombing was undertaken to compel the Taliban to turn over to the US people the US suspected of involvement in 9-11, but without presenting the evidence that the Taliban requested—because Washington had no evidence. The head of the FBI conceded in Senate testimony 8 months later that after the most intensive international investigation in history, the FBI could only report that it “believed” the plot might have been hatched in Afghanistan but that it was implemented in Europe and the UAE, all US allies." So as you can see Bush was performing his cowboy act again. He demanded the Taliban turn over Bin Laden without proof or he would bomb them (aka the Taliban and its victims - the Afghan people). When the Taliban requested evidence, he refused, and we just let the bombs fly knowing the possible outcomes of doing so. With people like you in full support of the killing. But hey, why would you care, it's not your family or neighborhood.

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Jbrownil, Jbrownil at Sep 07, 2005 02:01 AM
Libertas: Yes - the obvious! This is the same lame argument you heard somewhere (I know because I've heard it in at least 3 different places) and are now recycling here. The fact is, as Chomsky has pointed out (when being accused of making an "error"), those were the numbers of the aid agencies and the NYT, not his. At the time, they were relevant because as was already addressed - you weigh the potential consequences of your actions. If those actions could possibly result in mass starvation and death it doesn't seem to outlandish to protest those actions or at the VERY LEAST consider them. That's just basic morality. So that begs the question - how does cutting off the life line for some 7.5 million people because you're going to BOMB THEM constitute helping them against "the vicious Taliban despotism". A despotism that we didn't care about prior to 9/11 and was spawned out of conditions we and the Russians left the country in last time we were there. Oh yeah, the country is still a shithole by the way.

Reply this comment

Person

Re: The Afghanistan Food Crisis

By Erasmus472001, Libertas47 at Sep 06, 2005 23:41 PM
Can misplaced or pathological guilt result in distorted political thinking? I don't see any other explanation for the unusual reasoning in this post. Despite Dr. Chomsky's dire prognostications, the mass starvation of millions of Afganis did not take place. The prediction that it would, even though voiced by many aid workers in the field in the early part of the war, was hugely wrong. Rather than admit an error, Dr. Chomsky convicts himself of a failure to protest the atrocity that didn't happen vigorously enough, and hints darkly that the mass starvation still happened, which is empirically quite improbable unless the international aid workers have either not noticed, ignored, or consciously covered it up. If any war qualifies under the guidelines of the just war, that against the vicious Taliban despotism - which harbored Al Qaeda training camps preparing for further attacks upon our shores - does. Or am I missing something?

Reply this comment

Comment On This Blog Post  See All Comments (23)

Loading_border