Blindness to Blowback

[marmar]

Blindness to Blowback
May 4, 2013

After a terrorist attack, if anyone dares suggest that the killings represent blowback from U.S. military violence abroad, that person can expect furious denunciations even though the point is almost surely true, a paradox that William Blum confronts in this article from Anti-Empire Report.

By William Blum


What is it that makes young men, reasonably well educated, in good health and nice looking, with long lives ahead of them, use powerful explosives to murder complete strangers because of political beliefs? I’m speaking about American military personnel of course, on the ground, in the air, or directing drones from an office in Nevada.

Do not the survivors of U.S. attacks in Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Pakistan, Somalia, Libya and elsewhere, and their loved ones, ask such a question? The survivors and loved ones in Boston have their answer – America’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

That’s what Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the surviving Boston bomber has said in custody, and there’s no reason to doubt that he means it, nor the dozens of others in the past two decades who have carried out terrorist attacks against American targets and expressed anger toward U.S. foreign policy.

Both Tsarnaev brothers had expressed such opinions before the attack as well. (Huffington Post, April 20, 2013; Washington Post, April 21.) The Marathon bombing took place just days after a deadly U.S. attack in Afghanistan killed 17 civilians, including 12 children, as but one example of countless similar horrors from recent years.

“Oh”, an American says, “but those are accidents. What terrorists do is on purpose. It’s cold-blooded murder.” ...................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://consortiumnews.com/2013/05/04/blindness-to-blowback/

[RC]

1. Just how what we did in Iraq not terrorism?

When others blow up women and children in this country is terrorism. When we blow up women and children in other countries, it is not?
What is the difference, except one is sanctioned by our government?

[OnyxCollie]

3. "What is the difference, except one is sanctioned by our government?"

You got it.

When we blow people up, it's done by a legitimate authority.

[ReRe]

2. Blowback Blindness

Marking to come back to. I've been reading William Blum for a lonnnnnng time (since the 80s or 90s?)

[LeftInTX]

4. My concern has been about terrorists as blowback from our military action

I don't know if I believe that in the case of the Tsarnaevs. I think Tamerlan had other issues and more or less acted alone. (A lot like Major Hassan) I think that is why the FBI did not think Tamerlan was a terror risk.

I'm much more concerned about true blowback. These would be Al Qaeda
type cells which are actively plotting against the US.

[JayhawkSD]

5. Let's think constructively here, as the writer does

Accusing this country of terrorism may or may not be accurate, but it is not constructive. It is merely inflammatory, and meets one insult with a counter insult.

The writer, without going into the moral rights and wrongs of what we are doing overseas, argues that it is having negative consequenses for us and that we are not paying attention to that. He points out that every person who has been caught attacking or planning to attack us in a terrorist manner has given the same reason for doing so: "I'm doing this because you are in my country killing my people with drones."

Even if it is in our best interest to do what we are doing, if we are killing bad guys who need and deserve to be killed, (big if!) we need to accept that those acts are going to make people pissed off at us. Having them attack us is the consequence of what we are doing. They are not doing it because they are intrinsically evil. They are not doing it because their religion tells them to arbitrarily kill non-Muslims. They are doing it because our own actions have pissed them off.

Our actions overseas and act of terror against us are not isolated, unrelated events. They are cause and effect. "Terrorists" are engaging in payback, which viewed from our side is called "blowback."