Glenn Greenwald once again finds that the United States defines its terms, in this case, “terrorism,” in strangely specialized ways:
Few things better illustrate the utter meaninglessness of the word Terrorism than applying it to a citizen of an invaded country for fighting back against the invading army and aiming at purely military targets (this is far from the first time that Iraqis and others who were accused of fighting back against the invading U.S. military have been formally deemed to be Terrorists for having done so). To the extent the word means anything operationally, it is: he who effectively opposes the will of the U.S. and its allies.
This topic is so vital because this meaningless, definition-free word — Terrorism — drives so many of our political debates and policies. Virtually every debate in which I ever participate quickly and prominently includes defenders of government policy invoking the word as some sort of debate-ending, magical elixir: of course President Obama has to assassinate U.S. citizens without due process: they’re Terrorists; of course we have to stay in Afghanistan: we have to stop The Terrorists; President Obama is not only right to kill people (including civilians) using drones, but is justified in boasting and even joking about it, because they’re Terrorists; of course some people should be held in prison without charges: they’re Terrorists, etc. etc. It’s a word that simultaneously means nothing and justifies everything.
Chris Hedges is suing Barack Obama regarding the National Defense Authorization Act. The act allows the indefinite detention of American Citizens for ill-defined actions and beliefs:
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/why_im_suing_barack_obama_20120116/
New Glenn Greenwald column shows that “terrorists” are people the U.S. deems to be bad, and we hand out death sentences like candy on Halloween.
But some State Department officials have complained to the White House that the criteria used by the C.I.A. for identifying a terrorist “signature” were too lax. The joke was that when the C.I.A. sees “three guys doing jumping jacks,” the agency thinks it is a terrorist training camp, said one senior official. Men loading a truck with fertilizer could be bombmakers — but they might also be farmers, skeptics argued.
and consider this:
“Earlier today, I wrote about one specific revelation from the article that I most wanted to highlight — the way in which Obama, in order to conceal the civilian casualties he causes and justify the raining down of death he orders, has re-defined “militant” to mean “all military-age males in a strike zone”
http://www.salon.com/writer/glenn_greenwald/
Erich, you have it right in this and other places where I’ve seen you write about terrorism. I am afraid that the ambiguity over the word, and how governments and individuals around the world apply it is going to lead to more disasters, not a solution.
Even here in Pakistan, where I live, we use the word as a filler. Anyone can be a terrorist depending on the narrative the speaker employs. To me any force political, religious, social, or military that targets civilians is a terrorist. Of course there are other variations, but this is the easiest definition I can employ broadly.
“An unnamed Pakistani official identically told Agence France-Presse that a second US drone “fired two missiles at the site of this morning’s attack, where militants were removing the wreckage of their two destroyed vehicles”. (Those killed by US drone attacks in Pakistan are more or less automatically deemed “militants” by unnamed “officials”, and then uncritically called such by most of the western press – a practice that inexcusably continues despite revelations that the Obama administration has redefined “militants” to mean “all military-age males in a strike zone”.)”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/aug/20/us-drones-strikes-target-rescuers-pakistan