Organised Crime
As the US and Britain continue to march their armies as to war, clearly intent on launching a devastating attack on Iraq as soon as they feel they can get away with it, it is surely a time to pause and reflect on the acclaimed "war on terrorism", and exactly what that contradiction in terms actually means. Whilst journalists and commentators faithfully report with a blank-faced "objectivity" the words of the powerful regarding the deadly threat Saddam poses to our very existence, it is easy to become convinced that attacking Iraq must be justified - widespread and uniform opinions do a great job at persuading us that "the truth is out there", and that it falls easily from the mouths of our elected leaders. Foreign Affairs experts queue up to tell us the likely geopolitical fallout and Economics Editors the likely effects on the price of oil. Defence Correspondents produce maps and detailed information about what kind of weapons each side has at its disposal, such as BBC Online's recent article analyzing "America's 'rolling start'", a reference to the tactics the US could potentially use to start an invasion. (One wonders if journalists wrote similar articles explaining "Germany's 'Blitzkrieg'" with the same emotion-free concentration on the technical aspects of Hitler's future rampage across Western Europe and beyond...). Little, if any, interest is paid to the obvious mendacity of the Bush and Blair camps as they desperately struggle to convince a highly sceptical public that we yet again need to confront a deadly evil, another "new Hitler" before it's too late. But if we allow ourselves to be fooled by the argument that we must attack others before they, perhaps, one day, in theory, might possibly have the potential to plan to attack us, we are descending to the level of gangsters, of organised crime.
It is surely no coincidence that, like playground bullies, we only ever stand up to +defenceless+ enemies to our existence - any suggestion that they might fight back is clearly unacceptable, as perfectly depicted by the juxtaposition between two current international crises, Iraq and North Korea. The latter is clearly breaching international conventions on nuclear weapons development, yet we must try to negotiate with their government. In Iraq, the UN inspectors have so far found a few missiles with a range of a couple of miles that could once have contained banned substances. There is no room for negotiation here. Saddam is "playing hide and seek", which is causing President Bush's patience to "quickly run out". If the consequences for thousands and thousands of innocent people weren't so dreadful, the whole thing could be described as low farce. As Noam Chomsky has pointed out, it's only Bush (with faithful gun-dog Blair sitting obediently at his feet waiting to spring enthusiastically into action), that's convinced that Saddam is out to get us, which begs the question why not Saudi Arabia? Why not Kuwait? Why not other neighbouring countries? They may hate Saddam, but they aren't scared of him. A glance at the evidence furnished by ex-UN Weapons Inspector to Iraq Scott Ritter would go a long way towards explaining this anomaly, if anyone chose to report it in context. Ritter has asserted that the whole idea that Saddam could produce the necessary substances to secretly develop Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) is flatly absurd - Iraq is under the closest surveillance of any country in history, and sensitive satellite technology would pick up any attempts to reconstitute his WMD program, pronounced by 1998 as 90%-95% dismantled, a crucial fact all but ignored by our skilled media professionals.
The true depth of Bush's desperation to push on with his colonial adventure is illustrated by his recent pronouncement that any attack on Iraq would be launched "to free the Iraqi people and bring democracy to Iraq." (Incidentally, you can bet your bottom dollar that such a democratic regime would nevertheless be sympathetic to US interests, whatever the devastation wrought on their country by the US-led assault). Indeed, such devastation could be truly awesome. A leaked UN report has predicted at least 500,000 Iraqi casualties in the event of an attack, but clearly those lucky enough to survive to search through the rubble of their devastated homes to find the charred bodies of their relatives and neighbours will sleep easily under starlit skies knowing that the Western powers were "freeing" them. For when politicians talk of gaining "freedom" through "measured" and "proportional" military action, they are blinding us with words - a bomb is a bomb, a missile a missile, and, once deployed, it is impossible to be "measured" about how it explodes and destroys life and property.
The view from this corner of the Third World is in stark contrast to that of the West. Among average citizens, it is difficult to find anyone who supports a war against Iraq, and people discuss openly the clear desperation of the Bush administration to get some killing under its belt, and forcibly take control of the region's oil resources. A short time ago I was giving English classes to a group of executives from the state bank Banco do Brasil - hardly a hotbed of radical dissent, one would imagine - but amongst the group there was widespread disgust and anger towards Bush's bellicose posturing. As one student put it simply, "I wish the United States of America would keep out of other countries' business - Mr Bush is worrying about things that are of no concern to anyone." Whilst few in Britain know about the decisive involvement of many post-war US administrations in the overthrow of democratic regimes throughout Latin America, ordinary people here are very well aware of their northern neighbour's dominant role in the tragic history of military dictatorship and the concomitant imprisonment, exile and / or murder of its intellectual classes and dissident voices - all aided and abetted by its mighty northern neighbour, the self-styled "leader of the free world", now, ironically, intent on "freeing another Third World country from dictatorship".
Terrorism here has a different face, and manifests itself daily in the grinding poverty and accompanying violence that permeates society at ever-increasing levels. In the Greater São Paulo area alone there were 4,444 murders in 2002, including 65 multiple killings resulting in 217 deaths. Most occurred in the slums, or favelas, where a combination of spiralling unemployment, government neglect over many years and the rise of absolutely ruthless drugs gangs has contributed towards making these places truly a hell on earth. The largest favela in São Paulo has a population of 95,000 people, all crammed into any tiny piece of spare land, all desperate, all barely earning enough money to eat and feed their children. Most of the inhabitants are from the North East of Brazil, and have travelled to the great metropolis in search of work and some kind of future, away from the drought and hunger that plagues their homeland. Many are illiterate and lack any skills to offer the modern, technology-based economy, and therefore don't have the necessary means to rent a home, let alone buy one. They are forced build shacks from scrap wood, corrugated iron, anything they can lay their hands on, and try to survive amid the chaos and danger that lurks at every turn. Whole families often live in one room, with no personal privacy, no proper sanitation and no real protection from the elements. As many of these favelas are built on hillsides, every year the torrential tropical rains cause countless deaths from landslips and flooding, many victims buried alive in the thick red mud that used to be the "roads" outside their "houses". Recently in Belo Horizonte, the capital of Minas Gerais state, 37 people died in just such a tragedy, including six children from the same family. State engineers had hours before declared the area safe, despite residents' concerns. The father of the six children worked washing cars, a job whose salary would be considered inhuman in Europe. Faced with this low-wage struggle for existence, the drugs trade becomes a glamorous alternative for many young men, who gain a purpose for their miserable lives, however perverted, and a measure of respect from their peers, when inducted into highly-organised gangs with militaristic names such as Comando Vermelho (Red Command). Rio de Janeiro now has more armed juveniles than anywhere in the entire world, including such areas of conflict as the Occupied Territories, and, in a bizarre display of mass fear, shops and schools in Rio are forcibly closed on a regular basis by school-age children passing on the orders of their superiors.
Whilst mainstream journalism in the West often seems to consist of attending news conferences and reporting the statements of various powerful people, often without analysis of any kind, the work of newsmen and women here is a deadly serious matter. Last year a case highlighted this when investigative reporter Tim Lopes from the Brazilian TV station Rede Globo (roughly equivalent to the BBC) went undercover in a favela in Rio to make a film about organised crime. Specifically, he was investigating the activities of drugs gangs, who it had been reported were holding parties where cocaine was freely on sale, heavily armed men were openly patrolling neighbouring streets, and under-age girls were being forced into performing live sex shows for the party-goers. Driven to expose these illegal and appalling practices, Lopes managed to film three reports on three separate occasions, but being a perfectionist, he decided to return a fourth time to try to get better, clearer footage. It was to prove a fatal error of judgement. Rumours were already circulating, and clearly shaken by the idea of being identified on national TV, the criminals exposed Lopes during this last visit to the area, captured him, bound him and shot him in both feet to ensure he couldn't run away. They then took him to an area high in the favela that was later found to be a macabre unofficial graveyard containing the remains of hundreds of victims of gang murders and reprisal killings. There then followed a truly horrific episode in which he was subjected to some of the most sickening torture imaginable, before his body was dismembered and burnt in an old tyre. A colleague of Lopes', who bravely later returned, also undercover, to investigate the circumstances surrounding his murder, was told by witnesses of how even members of the gang were so revolted they tried to leave the scene, only to be dragged back by their leader and forced to watch, in some perverse display of bravado, presumably designed to harden their hearts sufficiently to make such medieval practices possible. When Police eventually combed the area, only the serial number on a fragment of his camera identified the remains there as Lopes'. In a moving and dignified comment after his death, his widow said that she liked to think that, in cutting up his body, the killers had only managed to spread his courage and integrity. In an illustration of the corruption and impunity that ensures that, amongst other things, 90% of murders in Rio go unsolved, a shameful report produced by judicial officials later laid the blame for his death squarely on Lopes' own shoulders, claiming that he took unnecessary risks in visiting the favela where he met his tragic end. In a gesture inconceivable in TV studios in the West, news anchor William Bonner, on behalf of Rede Globo, led a scathing and supremely dignified on-air attack on the findings of the report and the corruption of the authorities that lay behind it. It was an exhilarating moment, and one that illustrated perfectly just how we should demand honest journalists behave in the face of lies and hypocrisy. The contrast with coverage of Iraq in the mainstream Western media could not be greater.
It could be argued that the situation the West finds itself in has great similarities with the problems that plague Third World countries. Here in Brazil, the breadth of poverty and social exclusion is truly shocking, used as we are to societies with high levels of organisation, and relative public safety. It is a lose-lose situation - the poor clearly lose because they have nothing and face a desperate struggle just to survive, but the wealthy also lose, as they are terrified of being attacked, kidnapped or murdered just going about their daily lives. By the same token, in ignoring the plight of poor countries, or seeing them as simply a means to an economic end, the West is generating resentment and hatred directly proportional to their lack of compassion towards Third World problems. As Gandhi once said, "the worst form of violence is poverty." Why don't we then declare a new "war on terrorism", one which we could all support, which would at a stroke greatly undermine terrorists' support by denying them the widespread sentiments of hatred towards the West that feed their murderous fervour?
Matt Ward, 29/01/03