"On 14 November, Bridget Ash wrote to the BBC's Today programme asking why the invasion of Iraq was described merely as "a conflict". She could not recall other bloody invasions reduced to "a conflict". She received this reply:
Dear Bridget
You may well disagree, but I think there's a big difference between the aggressive "invasions" of dictators like Hitler and Saddam and the "occupation", however badly planned and executed, of a country for positive ends, as in the Coalition effort in Iraq.
Yours faithfully,
Roger Hermiston
Assistant Editor, Today
In demonstrating how censorship works in free societies and the double standard that props up the façade of "objectivity" and "impartiality", Roger Hermiston's polite profanity offers a valuable exhibit. An invasion is not an invasion if "we" do it, regardless of the lies that justified it and the contempt shown for international law. An occupation is not an occupation if "we" run it, no matter that the means to our "positive ends" require the violent deaths of hundreds of thousands of men, women and children, and an unnecessary sectarian tragedy. Those who euphemise these crimes are those Arthur Miller had in mind when he wrote: "The thought that the state . . . is punishing so many innocent people is intolerable. And so the evidence has to be internally denied." Miller might have been less charitable had he referred directly to those whose job it was to keep the record straight."
So writes well-known journalist, documentary film-maker and writer John Pilger, here, in the New Statesman. As always Pigler is right on the money!
Dear Bridget
You may well disagree, but I think there's a big difference between the aggressive "invasions" of dictators like Hitler and Saddam and the "occupation", however badly planned and executed, of a country for positive ends, as in the Coalition effort in Iraq.
Yours faithfully,
Roger Hermiston
Assistant Editor, Today
In demonstrating how censorship works in free societies and the double standard that props up the façade of "objectivity" and "impartiality", Roger Hermiston's polite profanity offers a valuable exhibit. An invasion is not an invasion if "we" do it, regardless of the lies that justified it and the contempt shown for international law. An occupation is not an occupation if "we" run it, no matter that the means to our "positive ends" require the violent deaths of hundreds of thousands of men, women and children, and an unnecessary sectarian tragedy. Those who euphemise these crimes are those Arthur Miller had in mind when he wrote: "The thought that the state . . . is punishing so many innocent people is intolerable. And so the evidence has to be internally denied." Miller might have been less charitable had he referred directly to those whose job it was to keep the record straight."
So writes well-known journalist, documentary film-maker and writer John Pilger, here, in the New Statesman. As always Pigler is right on the money!
Comments