intended use.
Do you think the estimate of 8,100 Muslim men and boys murdered in Srebrenica given by the International Commission for Missing Persons is correct, or do you think there are alternative estimates out there that are more reliable?
I’ve never had any position on the number of people killed, and simply take the standard estimates as plausible. I’m perfectly willing to leave the appealing task of intensive inquiry into the crimes of others (which we can do little or nothing about) to the great mass of intellectuals and would rather devote finite time to the vastly more significant topic of trying to learn something about our own crimes, which we can do something about. And even in these far more significant endeavors, I haven’t paid much attention to trying to assess the exact numbers.
Did any of the critiques raised by Diana Johnstone in her book Fool’s Crusade make you doubt the overall theme of mass rapes, mass executions and torture provided by refugees about the Serb-run concentration camps in Omarska, Keraterm and Trnpologe?
Johnstone discussed the way fragments of evidence were radically distorted and given extraordinary publicity as proof of horrendous crimes of enemies. That is the kind of work that is constantly done by intelligence services, human rights organizations and researchers who have concern for the victims and seek to unearth the truth. No valid questions have been raised, to my knowledge, about her discussion, which, as a matter of logic, has no bearing on the veracity of the refugee reports about the camps, including of course those she did not investigate.
Some critics interpreted your comments about Living Marxism (LM) as implying that the picture filmed by ITN television crews and featured on the front page of Time magazine of an emaciated man named Fikret Alic behind a barbed-wire fence was staged. Do you believe Doctor Merdzanic’s accounts of the nature of the camp, specifically that, while some people could come and go, others were prevented from leaving by armed guards?
Then ‘some critics’ should be more careful. There were reports that the photograph was misinterpreted, not staged – notably a cautious and judicious account, which I cited, by Phillip Knightley, one of the most highly respected analysts of photojournalism. Knowing nothing about Dr Merdzanic, I have no reason to question his account, or to comment on it. But it has no bearing on the LM affair and the shameful way a tiny journal was put out of business by a huge corporation that exploited Britain’s scandalous libel laws – also condemned by Knightley.
You have criticized Samantha Power’s widely acclaimed book about genocide. What is your main criticism of the book and why do you think it was so highly regarded by the mainstream media?
I didn’t actually criticize the book but rather its reception across virtually the entire spectrum of intellectual opinion. If someone wants to write a book about the crimes of enemies and how we should react to them more forcefully (without explaining how in any credible form), that’s fine, but it is pretty much more of the norm, of no particular interest. True, it was a little different in this case, and more welcome to liberal opinion, because the condemnations of the crimes of others were framed as a criticism of the West, and hence seem courageous and adversarial instead of merely conforming to the doctrinal norm.
What is of no slight interest is the enthusiastic reaction to a book that keeps scrupulously to crimes of enemies, ignoring crimes for which we are responsible, crimes that not only are sometimes comparable or even more severe than those on which attention is focused here but that are dramatically more significant for us in moral significance for a simple and obvious reason: we can do something about them, in many cases by simply terminating them.
Take one example, a particularly striking one. The book was written in the 1990s, during the final phase of what is arguably the most extreme slaughter relative to population since World War Two, by 1999 reaching new paroxysms of horror: the US-backed Indonesian invasion of East Timor. Power does not entirely ignore it. In passing, she criticizes the US for ‘looking away’ from the crime. In fact, Washington looked right there, intensely, from the first moment, providing crucial arms and diplomatic support and continuing to do so until the last moment in September 1999, even welcoming the mass murderer in charge (Suharto) as ‘our kind of guy’ (1995). Power’s predecessor as UN Ambassador, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, took special pride in his memoirs for having rendered the UN ‘utterly ineffective’ in reacting to the invasion and crimes (which he recognized), following State Department directives. So matters continued, with ample support from other Western powers as well, right into the huge new atrocities of September 1999, until finally, under substantial international and domestic pressure, Clinton quietly informed the Indonesian generals that the game was over and they pulled out, permitting a peace-keeping force to enter something the US could have done at any time. And to magnify the obscenity, that is now hailed as humanitarian intervention.
It may be comforting to become immersed in the other fellow’s crimes, joining in the general anguish, winning accolades and prizes. And serious investigation of these matters can be a valuable contribution. But it is immensely more significant – on moral grounds, in terms of human consequences – to unearth the truth about our own actions, to bring crimes to an end, and to internalize the lessons that will inhibit them in the future. ■
JUAN COLE
Juan Cole is Richard P Mitchell Collegiate Professor of History at the University of Michigan. He has tried to place the relationship between the West and the Muslim world in a historical context, not least via the website he founded, Informed Comment. He is a regular guest on PBS’s Lehrer News Hour and is a regular columnist for Truthdig and The Nation. He is the author of The New Arabs, Engaging the Muslim World and Napoleon’s Egypt.
Could you talk about the differences in the way the press covers Saudi Arabia compared to Iran?
The coverage of the Middle East in the American mass media is shameful and really hews very closely to the government line. Negative adjectives are used for regimes like that of Iran that are at odds with the United States, whereas positive adjectives are used for a regime like Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia is a major abuser of human rights and an absolute monarchy. It’s engaged in a brutal aerial bombing campaign in Yemen that clearly involves war crimes. Without expressing any support for Iran or its policies, I would say the press certainly doesn’t treat the two countries fairly or in a dispassionate way.
Can you discuss the CIA’s role in the 1953 coup in Iran?
The US media and public complain about the negative statements made by Iranian leaders toward the United States today. But those leaders were involved in a revolutionary struggle in the 1960s and 1970s against a dictator, the Shah of Iran, who was imposed on the Iranian people by a CIA coup. So, if you understand that history, while you would hope for more maturity on the part of the Iranian leadership, you can certainly have a better idea of why there are strong resentments towards US policy in Tehran.
Do you think the word terrorism has been politicized?
The words ‘terrorism’ and ‘terrorists’ are frankly without any meaning any more. In the Federal Code back in the 1990s there was a definition of terrorism which I thought was maybe useful for social scientists: ‘The use of violence by non-state actors against civilians for the purpose of political gain.’ In other words, violence being directed against civilians. So, you have a small group of people whom nobody elected who exercise violence against the civilian population to get what they want put in place: that’s terrorism. That was a pretty good definition but it’s not generally the one being deployed by politicians or the press when they talk about terrorism. And, yes, the US has supported a large number of such groups. The Contras in Nicaragua in the 1980s are an example. There isn’t any doubt that, where there was a government in Nicaragua the US didn’t like, its intelligence security apparatus had no compunctions about supporting violent insurgencies against that government. This included groups that were engaging in what