12 years of US cowardice

by Tom Engelhardt

ITS true that, last week, few in Congress cared to

discuss, no less memorialise, the 10th anniversary
of the invasion of Iraq. Nonetheless, two
anniversaries of American disasters and crimes
abroad the mission accomplished debacle of
2003 and the 45th anniversary of the My Lai
massacre were at least noted in passing in our
world. In my hometown paper, the New York Times,
the Iraq anniversary was memorialised with a lead
op-ed by a former adviser to General David
Petraeus who, amid the rubble, went in search of
all-American
silver
linings.
Still, in our post-9/11 world, there are so many other
anniversaries from hell whose silver linings dont get
noticed. Take this April. It will be the ninth
anniversary of the widespread release of the now
infamous photos of torture, abuse, and humiliation
from Abu Ghraib. In case youve forgotten, that was
Saddam Husseins old prison where the US military
taught the fallen Iraqi dictator a trick or two about
the destruction of human beings. Shouldnt there be
an anniversary of some note there? I mean, how
many cultures have turned dog collars (and the
dogs that go with them), thumbs-up signs over dead
bodies, and a mockery of the crucified Christ into
screensavers?

Or to pick another not-to-be-missed anniversary

that, strangely enough, goes uncelebrated here,
consider the passage of the USA Patriot Act, that
ten-letter acronym for Uniting and Strengthening
America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to
Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism? This October
26th will be the 11th anniversary of the hurried
congressional vote on that 363-page (essentially
unread) document filled with right-wing hobbyhorses
and a range of provisions meant to curtail American
liberties in the name of keeping us safe from terror.
Small
government
Republicans
and
big
government Democrats rushed to support it back
then. It passed in the Senate in record time by 98-1,
with only Russ Feingold in opposition, and in the
House by 357-66 and so began the process of
taking the oppressive powers of the American state
into a new dimension. It would signal the launch of a
world of ever-expanding American surveillance and
secrecy (and it would be renewed by the Obama
administration
at
its
leisure
in
2011).
Or what about celebrating the 12th anniversary of
Congresss Authorisation for Use of Military Force,
the joint resolution that a panicked and cowed body
passed on September 14, 2001? It wasnt a
declaration of war there was no one to declare
war on but an open-ended grant to the president
of the unfettered power to use all necessary and

appropriate force in what would become a neverending (and still expanding) Global War on Terror.
Or how about the 11th anniversary on January 11th
like so many such moments, it passed un-noted
of the establishment of the Guantanamo Bay
detention camp, that jewel in the crown of George
W Bushs offshore Bermuda Triangle of injustice,
with its indefinite detention of the innocent and the
guilty without charges, its hunger strikes, and
abuses, and above all its remarkable ability to
embed itself in our world and never go away? Given
that, on much of the rest of the planet, Guantanamo
is now an icon of the post-9/11 American way of life,
on a par with Mickey Mouse and the Golden Arches,
shouldnt
its
anniversary
be
noted?
Or to look ahead, consider a date of genuine
consequence: the CIAs first known assassination by
drone, which took place in Yemen in 2002. This
November will be the 11th anniversary of that
momentous act, which would embed targeted
killing deep in the American way of war, and
transform the president into an assassin-in-chief. It,
too, will undoubtedly pass largely unnoticed, even if
the global drone assassination campaigns it initiated
may
never
rest
in
peace.
And then, of course, there are the little anniversaries
from hell that Americans could care less about
those that have to do with slaughter abroad. If you

wanted to, you could organise these by the military

services. As last year ended, for instance, no one
marked the 11th anniversary of the first Afghan
wedding party to be wiped out by the US Air Force.
(In late December 2001, a B-52 and two B-1B
bombers,
using
precision-guided
weapons,
eradicated a village of celebrants in eastern
Afghanistan; only two of 112 villagers reportedly
survived.) Nor in May will anyone here mark the
ninth anniversary of an American air strike that took
out wedding celebrants in the western Iraqi desert
near the Syrian border, killing more than 40 of them.
Nor, this July 12th, to switch to the US Army, should
we forget the sixth anniversary of the infamous
Apache helicopter attacks on civilians in the streets
of Baghdad in which at least 11 adults were killed
and two children wounded? All of this was
preserved in a military video kept secret until
released by WikiLeaks. Or how about the first
anniversary of the Kandahar massacre, which
passed on March 11th without any notice at all? As
you undoubtedly remember, Army Staff Sergeant
Robert Bales allegedly spent that night in 2012
slaughtering 16 civilians, including nine children, in
two Afghan villages and, on being taken into
custody,
showed
no
remorse.
When it comes to the Marines, heres a question:
Who, this November 19th, will mark the eighth

anniversary of the slaughter of 24 unarmed civilians,

including children and the elderly, in the Iraqi village
of Haditha for which, after a six-year investigation
and military trials, not a single Marine spent a single
day in prison? Or to focus for a moment on US
Special Forces: will anyone on August 21st
memorialise the 90 or so civilians, including perhaps
15 women and up to 60 children, killed in the Afghan
village of Azizabad while attending a memorial
service for a tribal leader who had reportedly been
anti-Taliban?
And not to leave out the rent-a-gun mercenaries
who have been such a fixture of the post-9/11 era of
American warfare, this September 16th will be the
sixth anniversary of the moment when Blackwater
guards for a convoy of US State Department
vehicles sprayed Baghdads Nisour Square with
bullets, evidently without provocation, killing 17 Iraqi
civilians
and
wounding
many
more.
All of the above only begins to suggest the plethora
of blood-soaked little anniversaries that Americans
could observe, if they cared to, from a decade-plus
of the former Global War on Terror that now has no
name, but goes on no less intensely. Consider them
just a few obvious examples of what former
secretary of defence Donald Rumsfeld once called
the known knowns of our American world.

Impossible
anniversaries
IN ANNIVERSARY terms, Rumsfelds second
category the known unknowns is no less
revealing of the universe we now inhabit; that is, our
post-9/11 lives have been filled with events or acts
whose anniversaries might be notable, if only we
knew the date when they occurred. Take, for
instance, the Bush administrations warrantless
wiretapping program. Sometime in the first part of
2002, President Bush granted the National Security
Agency the right to eavesdrop without court
approval on people in the United States in the
course of its terrorism investigations. This (illegal)
programmes existence was first revealed in 2005,
but it remains shrouded in mystery. We dont know
exactly when it began. So no anniversary
celebrations
there.
Nor for the setting up of the Salt Pit, the CIA black
site in Afghanistan where Khaled el-Masri, a
German car salesman kidnapped by the CIA in
Macedonia (due to a confusion of names with a
suspected terrorist) was held and mistreated, or
other similar secret prisons and torture centres in
places like Lithuania, Poland, Rumania, and
Thailand; nor for the creation of Camp Nama in Iraq,
with its ominously named Black Room, run as an
interrogation centre by the Joint Special Operations
Command, where the informal motto was: If you

dont make them bleed, they cant prosecute for it.

Or how about the anniversary of the date
possibly as early as 2006 when Washington
launched historys first known cyber war, a series of
unprovoked cyber attacks ordered by George W
Bush and later Barack Obama, against Irans
nuclear programme (and evidently some Middle
Eastern banks dealing with that country as well).
Given its potential future implications, that would
seem to be a moment significant enough to
memorialise, if only we knew when to do it.
Dont for a moment think, though, that any little
survey of known knowns and known unknowns
could
cover
the
totality
of
Americas
unacknowledged anniversaries from hell. After all,
theres Rumsfelds third category, the unknown
unknowns. In our advancing world of secrecy, with
the National Security Complex and parts of the US
military increasingly operating in a post-legal
America, shielded from whistleblowers and largely
unaccountable to the rest of us or the courts, you
can be guaranteed of one thing: theres a secret
history of the post-9/11 era that we simply dont
know about yet. Call this last category the
unknown anniversaries. We not only dont know
when they began, but even what they are.

A hidden history waiting to be written

WHEN I was a boy, I loved a CBS TV series called
You Are There, anchored by Walter Cronkite. It
took you into history whether of Joan of Arcs
burning at the stake, the fall of the Aztec ruler
Montezuma, or the end of the US Civil War and
reported it as if modern journalists had been on the
spot. (For years, I used to joke that the typical
moment went like this: General Lee, General Lee,
rumour has it youre about to surrender to Grant at
Appomattox! No comment.) The show had a
signature tagline delivered in one of those
authoritative male voices of the era that still rings in
my head. It went: What sort of day was it? A day
like all days, filled with those events that alter and
illuminate our times... all things are as they were
then,
and
you
were
there.
If such a show were made about the post-9/11
years, it might have to be called You Werent
There. Our days, instead of being filled with those
events that alter and illuminate our times, would be
enshrouded in a penumbra of secrecy that could
as with Bradley Manning, CIA agent John Kiriakou,
or other whistleblowers only be broken by those
ready to spend years, or even a lifetime in prison. If
the National Security Complex and the White House
had their way, we Americans would be left to
celebrate a heavily cleansed and censored version

of our own recent history in which the anniversaries

that should really matter would be squirreled away
in the files of the state apparatus. There can be no
question that a hidden history of our American
moment is still waiting to be uncovered and written.
And yet, despite the best efforts of the last two
administrations, secrecy has its limits. We should
already know more than enough to be horrified by
the state of our American world. It should disturb us
deeply that a government of, by, and for the warmakers, intelligence operatives, bureaucrats,
privatising mercenary corporations, surveillers,
torturers, and assassins is thriving in Washington.
As for the people thats us in these last years,
we largely werent there, even as the very idea of a
government of, by, and for us bit the dust, and our
leaders felt increasingly unconstrained when
committing acts of shame in our name.
So perhaps the last overlooked anniversary of these
years might be the 12th anniversary of American
cowardice. You can choose the exact date yourself;
anytime this fall will do. At that moment, Americans
should feel free to celebrate a time when, for our
safety, and in a state of anger and paralysing fear,
we
gave
up
the
democratic
ghost.
The brave thing, of course, would have been to
gamble just a little of our safety as we do any day
when we get into a car for the kind of world

whose anniversaries we would actually be proud to

mark
on
a
calendar
and
celebrate.
Among the many truths in that still-to-be-written
secret history of our American world would be this:
we the people have no idea just how, in these years,
weve
hurt
ourselves.
TomDispatch.com, March 28. Tom Engelhardt
runs the Nation Institutes TomDispatch.com.
GANGES BARRAGE
Site should be close to Gorai off-take
by M Inamul Haque

Figure 1: Four sites proposed so

far, Figure 2: Site 5 as proposed by the author
THE Ganges originates from the Himalayas, and
flows southeast through the plains of north India
towards Bangladesh. Before crossing the border, it
leaves a right hand branch named Bhagirathi, which
passes through India to fall in the Bay of Bengal.
The Farakka Barrage is located a few kilometres
upstream, from where a substantial quantity of
water is diverted to the Bhagirathi during dry
months. This reduction of flow in the Ganges has
led to catastrophic damage to the environment in its

dependant
areas
inside
Bangladesh.
Experts had anticipated adverse effects of the
Farakka Barrage before its commissioning in the
1950s. Several meetings between the officials of
Pakistan and Indian governments were held but
could not produce any solution. Demand for a
barrage inside Bangladesh has emerged since then.
Before completion of the Farakka Barrage, an
interim agreement was concluded on April 18, 1975
between the heads of governments of India and
Bangladesh. This agreement ensured a minimum of
44,000 cusecs of water to Bangladesh at the period
of diversions. The second agreement, known as the
first Ganges Water Sharing Treaty and signed on
November 5, 1977, ensured a minimum of 34,500
cusecs of water for five years. After its expiry, two
memorandums of understanding were signed in
1982 and 1985. There was no sharing agreement
from 1989 to 1996. In 1996, the second watersharing treaty was signed, which is valid for 30
years and provides a minimum of 27,633 cusecs of
water
to
Bangladesh
during
diversions.
The Ganges Barrage is planned to be placed
somewhere between the Hardinge Bridge and
Rajbari on the Ganges, and shall divert part of its
flow through the Gorai. Tippetts Abbett McCarthy
Stratton, a consultancy firm from New York,

proposed this barrage in 1963 at a location three

kilometres downstream of the Gorai off-take. The
barrage site was changed in 1981, at a location four
kilometres downstream of the Pakshey railway
(Hardinge) bridge, with the possibility to reduce its
river training cost. But later in 1986, considering
possible backwater effects up to Indian territory, the
site was again shifted, to a far downstream point
near Habashpur, Rajbari. In 2001, a study on the
Ganges dependant area did arrive for a fourth
location for the barrage site, near Thakurbari
(Shelidah)
of
Kushtia.
Bangladesh constructed the Teesta Barrage in the
1980s to irrigate a large part of the northern region.
With this experience we can construct the Ganges
Barrage from our own manpower, skill and
technology. Four sites have been proposed so far
but all the sites have weaknesses on the aspects of
construction, operation and maintenance, and
benefits to arrive. I shall discuss them below with a
proposal for a fifth site near the Gorai off-take. We
must know that the major aim of the barrage is 1) to
divert water to the Gorai to fight salinity in the southwestern region, and 2) to feed the GK project area
for gravity irrigation.
Site
1:
Hatash
Haripur
THIS site is about three kilometres downstream of

the Gorai off-take. The barrage location was to the

north on char land, as the Ganges was flowing
through a southern channel close to the mainland.
The Gorai diversion barrage site was also at the
same place. This site was good for construction
point of view. But for maintenance, the Gorai link
channel from the barrage point to original riverbed
downstream would be hazardous. Moreover, this
site would be too far away to supply irrigation water
to
the
GK
project
canals.
Site
2:
Bheramara
Bahirchar
THIS site was proposed in 1981, about four
kilometres downstream of the Pakshey railway
bridge. The barrage location was again on the
northern side on char land, as the Ganges was
flowing through the southern channel close to
Bahirchar. This site was good from the construction
point of view. But to divert water to the Gorai would
need a 15-kilometre long link canal from upstream
of the barrage to the Gorai off-take. Moreover, it
would need another barrage at the original off-take
of Gorai, like the Bhagirathi off-take at Jangipur.
However, this site would benefit the GK project by
providing irrigation water directly to its canals by
gravity.
This site was shifted in 1986 on the ground that,
backwater afflux of the barrage may reach the

Indian Territory. This was nonsense, as the location

of this site was 40 kilometres away from the
international border. This barrage would store water
only to the bank-full level maximum. In winter, this
would never make any afflux to affect the Indian
territories. The Teesta Barrage is only eight
kilometres away from the border, where no such
problem arises. At the time of monsoon and floods,
the barrage gates shall remain open, thus
backwater
effects
are
not
possible.
Site
3:
Habashpur,
Pangsa
THIS site proposed by Halcrow Consultants in 1986
(Development Design Consultants in 2012) is about
30 kilometres downstream of the Gorai off-take. The
barrage location was on the right side over the char
land, as the Ganges was flowing through a northern
channel close to the mainland at Satbaria. This site
is good for construction point of view, but for being
located far downstream, diversion to the Gorai shall
be difficult, as its off-take shall need de-silting every
year. Moreover, this site would be too far away to
supply irrigation to the GK project areas.
A nonsense argument is often used that if the
barrage is located further downstream, it can cover
furthermore areas to its upstream. Some people
argue for a barrage at Mawa on the Padma to cover
even much larger areas. One should realise that a

barrage is made for diversion of water, primarily. If

storing water to bank-full level is possible, it is a
secondary advantage. But the storage volume
cannot be huge, and changes a little by shifting the
location. At floods, the barrage gates should remain
open to allow the river to flow in full capacity, so no
question of storage. And from a barrage, power
generation is not possible because of its low fall; so
if planned, it shall be a waste of money. This site
shall neither be able to preserve river water during
monsoon, because a barrage is never built as a
high dam for storage, nor shall it be able to irrigate
greater Kushtia, Jessore, Khulna, Pabna and
Rajshahi, (only greater Faridpur), as it shall be
located
far
downstream
near
Rajbari.
Site
4:
Thakurbari,
Shelaidah
THIS site is from the study of Options for Ganges
Dependant Areas June, 2002. It is located about 10
kilometres downstream of the Gorai off-take. In the
borehole plan, the barrage location is over the mainflow riverbed. But it should be placed on the char
land, if traditional method for construction is
followed. The Gorai off-take barrage should be
placed at its mouth, not adjacent to the Ganges
main barrage. By the storage level, a regular
discharge from the Gorai barrage shall be possible,

and shall keep the riverbed free from silting.

A Ganges Barrage at this site shall need protection
work of 10 kilometres from the southern bank of the
barrage to the Gorai Barrage northern bank. More
protection works shall be needed for the northern
bank of the Ganges Barrage, and for the southern
bank of Gorai Barrage. If the Gorai Barrage is
placed adjacent to the Ganges Barrage, a new
riverbed has to be dug up to link the Gorai riverbed
downstream. As this site is located far from the GK
project areas, it would be difficult to supply irrigation
there.
Site
5:
Talbaria,
Kushtia
ANALYSING the pros and cons of the sites
proposed so far, this author proposes a site 5 for the
Ganges Barrage. This site is about six kilometres
downstream of Dadapur of Pabna and three
kilometres downstream of Talbaria, Kushtia on the
left bank char land of the Ganges. The Talbaria hard
point on the right and the Dadapur hard point on the
left become a nodal point of the Ganges. By fixing
the barrage site between them, it makes outflanking
not possible beyond those two points. It may be
mentioned that the Farakka Barrage is constructed
along the right bank of the Ganges, where
progressive erosion through the char lands on the
left bank is posing a threat of outflanking.

In OGDA study, the Ganges Barrage is designed for

1,850-metre total span, 78 spillways, each of 18m
width radial gates. The cost is estimated to be
Tk 39,000 million at Thakurbari, compared to
Tk 39,600 million at Pangsa. The Gorai off-take
structure shall cost an extra Tk 8,000 million. At the
proposed site 5, some structural measures shall
have to be redesigned. In my estimate the cost at
site 5 shall be less compared to others, as it shall
need less bank protection works. A major advantage
of site 5 is that the barrage shall be able to supply
water to the GK project and Faridpur areas easily by
gravity flow. The abandoned railway land from
Mirpur to Talbaria can be raised to become the offtake main canal to this project. After this, the pump
house at Bheramara can be used to supply irrigation
water to GK project phase-III in Daulatpur and
Meherpur.
M Inamul Haque is chairman of the Institute of
Water and Environment. minamul@gmail.com
Johnston and nuclear holocaust
by Nehal Adil
NORTH Korea has threatened that it could target
US nuclear bases in the Pacific, including Guam
and Hawaii. Many people may laugh at the North
Korean threat but it is serious nonetheless; North

Korea could very well have the location of the US

nuclear arms by the Swedish hacking. After all,
Julian Assange surprised the world by leaking US
State Department documents that exposed secret
contacts between Arab rulers and Washington.
Many thought that the WikiLeaks were orchestrated
by the US State Department to destabilise the Arab
world.
In the shadowy world of cat and mouse game
nothing is impossible. According to Swedish author
and Pacific specialist Anders Mathlein, half of US
nuclear and chemical weapons past and present are
stored around Johnston Atoll in the Pacific. Even a
conventional attack on Johnston could spark off a
nuclear holocaust between the eastern and western
hemisphere.
I remember passing over the islands across Hawaii
on my way to the United States from Seoul in a
Korean Airlines plane in the 1970s. The cold war
was at its peak. The war in Vietnam was raging.
Thailand had been turned into a US war base. But
the islands down Hawaii looked so peaceful and
beautiful. Why the US should base its arms in the
peaceful islands. The aim was that potential enemy
wouldnt strike US populated areas but devastate
the sparsely inhabited islands of the Pacific as it
was done in Bikini by the US and in Maurora by
France.

North Korea, which is called a hermit kingdom

because of its isolationist policy, has enormous
technological capability. Its launching of satellites
and nuclear weapons testing amply prove it. North
Korea has also, according to some reports, close reaction nuclear weapons that no other country
possesses. It is also reported to have underwater
rockets that no missile defence system could deter.
As such any sane human cannot ignore the North
Korean capability. Unlike South Korea, North Korea
is not an occupied country. No foreign troops are
stationed there. Its relations with China and Russia
are based on sovereign equality. The US cannot
pressure China and Russia to impose its will on the
Koreans.
It is a dangerous situation but the utmost question is
why the United States should push such a small
country against the wall that may lead to
catastrophic consequences. Could there not be
peaceful solution as the five plus one talks that have
taken
place
over
the
past
decade?
North Korea does not seem to feel secure. The
United States has used such talks as a camouflage
to attack Iraq and hang Saddam Hussein. It is using
the same tactics against Iran. They used the same
negotiation technique against the mighty Soviet
Union.
North Korea, according to observers, wants to find

its own answer to the present hegemonic global

order. It wants to achieve, according to these
observers, what the Soviet Union failed to do.
It does not have enough nuclear weapons to
destroy the US, although the US can destroy it
hundred
times
over.
An attack on Johnston Island and Guam could
cripple the US nuclear power in the Pacific and
smash Obamas dream of American Pacific century,
Despite provoking the so-called Arab Spring,
Obama could not land anywhere in the Middle East,
except Israel and its occupied territories Ramallah,
and Jordan, the old Anglo-Saxon crony whose
founder Sharif Hussein had provoked the great Arab
Revolt, a century ago and ousted Turkey. Obamas
greatest success was to make the Israeli prime
minister to apologise to the Turkish prime minister in
his
presence.
Many consider that Obama wants to rule the world
with the knowledge and simplicity of a secondary
school student. It is a dangerous situation.
His foreign secretary John Kerry appears to be
more nave. America destroyed Iraq, hurt its national
pride, and now wants it to join the war against Iran.
In the east, we see the same scenario. Americans
nuclear bombed Japan and, according to conspiracy
theorists, created Fukushima to destroy an
economic competitor. General Motors had taken

over
Toyota
again
after
Fukushima.
The realistic solution should be to stop pushing
North Korea against the wall. That realistic path was
taken by Obama regarding the Burmese junta when
he visited Yangon. That should be repeated in case
of PyongYang. That will help usher democracy in
that unfortunate country.
Europe and the Iraq War
Special relationship with America is rather like
being handcuffed in a car driven by a drunk. If I
had my way, we would choose neither
Washington nor Brussels. Since the main issue
in British politics is over that choice, I tend
increasingly to regard Brussels as the lesser of
two evils. The European Union has committed
no atrocities comparable to those of the AngloAmerican alliance, writes Sean Gabb
IT WAS the Iraq War that prompted me into public
dissent from the orthodox rightist line on the
European Union. I have never accepted that
membership of the EU is an attack by the foreigners
on our free institutions, and that leaving it would
give us a reasonably accountable government with
low taxes and the common law. The truth appears to
be that we are utterly corrupt as a nation, and British

membership is more a symptom of what we have

become than its cause. I dont see the hand of
Europe in the transformation of the police into
cowardly thugs, or the universal degradation of our
politics and culture. Even very bad things like the
European Arrest Warrant are not applied in other
European Union countries with the same wooden
stupidity as in Britain. In Germany, for instance, it is
still not legal for citizens or even residents to be
extradited
for
trial
elsewhere.
The main disadvantage of being in the European
Union is that it enables our own ruling class to
govern by decree. British ministers and civil
servants push for certain things behind closed doors
in Brussels, and then tell us, when we complain
about the resulting laws rammed through
parliament, that it is all the fault of those beastly
Europeans. As a prime example of this, see the
history of the rise and progress of the money
laundering
laws.
Of course, this is to be deplored, and a decent
government assuming we ever get one would
leave at once: its rules would prevent or delay
policies of radical reform. Until that day comes,
however, British membership gives us certain
offsetting
advantages.
These
are:
1. Oppression has to be co-ordinated between
several dozen governments, not all of them run by

certifiable lunatics. See, for example, the block so

far on minimum pricing for alcohol. Or see the
compelled harmonisation of our porn laws with
those of more sensible countries. Without that brake
on action, I have little doubt we would by now have
bar codes tattooed on our foreheads and on the
spot castration for suspected child molesters.
2. The supremacy of European Union law, and our
associated importation of the European Convention
on Human Rights into our domestic law, has
empowered our courts to stage a slow-motion coup
against the absolute legislative sovereignty of
parliament. This was just about acceptable when
the country was run by a committee of hereditary
landlords. It became an unmitigated evil once
parliament was filled up with scoundrels. I was one
of the very few people on the right to welcome the
judgement in Thoburn v Sunderland City Council. I
thoroughly approve of the transformation of judicial
review from a yapping at parliaments heels into an
increasingly powerful weapon of control over
legislation. It would be nice to go back to something
like the 18th century constitution. Since that is not
possible, the new constitution emerging round us is
an improvement on what we had until recently.
The connection between this and the Iraq War is
that the second of these forced me to think more
clearly about the nature of our special relationship

with America. No advantages come from this. It is,

indeed, rather like being handcuffed in a car driven
by a drunk. If I had my way, we would choose
neither Washington nor Brussels. Since the main
issue in British politics is over that choice, I tend
increasingly to regard Brussels as the lesser of two
evils. The European Union has committed no
atrocities comparable to those of the AngloAmerican alliance. On the contrary, left to
themselves, the European elites seem to be mostly
interested in making regulations on things like the
size of vacuum cleaner bags. Doubtless, these tend
to privilege big French or German companies. But
they never result in blowing the arms and legs off
brown children. Even after ten years, what was
done in Iraq continues to fill me with outrage and
shame.
Dr Sean Gabb is the director of the Libertarian
Alliance