Re: Humanitarian Intervention in Congo

[Chris Burford <cburford@xxxxxxxxxx>]

At 2003-05-31 21:43 -0400, Hari wrote:
> Hi Chris:
> 1) I did not mean to cut your quote - but it just gets very unwieldy
> quoting everything! I did give the by-line that your comments could be
> tracked on.
> In any case I appreciate your own - personal - humanitarian instincts
> here. I certainly do not mean to imply that your views advocate for your
> personal self anything else.

Thanks for your comments about this difficult issue. I agree that as soon
as anyone starts to criticise the imperialists for letting the Ruanda
massacre occur, they are half way to calling for imperialist interventions.

BTW I should probably have put "humanitarian" in inverted commas. I would
not want to be judged mainly on humanitarian instincts. After all some
20,000 humans die of preventable disorders in this imperialist world -
every day!

I think though that when deaths are the result of communal violence this
damages the unity of working people. If unity cannot be won, then bodies of
armed men are needed to stop it. The question then is which.

In Kirkuk at the moment the PKK is trying to stop Kurds taking property
back from Arabs and Turkomans violently, but in an emergency would it be
morally wrong to ask US soldiers to intervene, particularly since under
international law, they have a responsibility for the safety and welfare of
the occupied country?


> 2) My point is simply, that objectively, allowing the barbarians to come
> back in the front door, is to give the thief the key.

That's the problem isn't it? The trouble is they already have the key, or
have it for the taking. So it may come down to which compromises best
strengthen the longer term unity of working people and weaken the power of
finance capital.

Chris Burford

London