Why
the heavy armaments? Well, according to Immigration and
Naturalization chief, Doris Meissner, "We had information,
a great deal of information. Some of the information included
the possibility that there might be guns." Where have
we heard this before? The storming of Waco that led to over
80 deaths was justified on account of the supposed "child
abuse" that was taking place in the compound. There
existed, of course, no evidence of "child abuse."
The bombing of Yugoslavia was justified on account of the
"genocide" of the Kosovo Albanians supposedly
taking place. We know all about that crock. What remains
consistent is the image of the US Government as sadistic
bully: Massive force against unarmed people.
The
same media hacks who last year were cretinously baying for
the destruction of Belgrade, are today exultant at the firm
smack of authority. Look no further than the
New York Times’ Thomas L. Friedman, surely the
most repulsive figure in journalism today. "Yup, I
gotta confess," he drooled, "that now-famous picture
of a U.S. marshal in Miami pointing an automatic weapon
toward Donato Dalrymple and ordering him in the name of
the US government to turn over Elián González
warmed my heart. They should put that picture up in every
visa line in every US consulate around the world, with a
caption that reads: ‘America is a country where the rule
of law rules. This picture illustrates what happens to those
who defy the rule of law and how far our government and
people will go to preserve it. Come all ye who understand
that.’" Those who invoke the "rule of law"
are invariably the ones with the most contempt for it. The
Miami family had broken no law. It had looked after Elian
Gonzalez at the request of the Immigration and Naturalization
Service. The INS subsequently decided that Elian’s father
should have custody. Yet, rather than go to the trouble
of seeking a court order, it dispatched commandos to take
over a Miami bungalow. As Laurence H. Tribe pointed out,
"no judge or neutral magistrate had issued the type
of warrant or other authority needed for the executive branch
to break into the home to seize the child. The [INS] had
no more right to do so than any parent who has been awarded
custody would have a right to break and enter for such a
purpose. Indeed, the INS had not even secured a judicial
order…compelling the Miami relatives to turn Elián
over." Moreover, since Elian is not here illegally
– he has an application for asylum pending in the courts
– there is no legal basis for the INS to seize him.
Now
as it happens, I believe that Elian Gonzalez should be with
his father, whether in Cuba or anywhere else. I also believe
that the Miami family shamelessly exploited a young boy
for their own political ends. Juan Miguel Gonzalez does
not want to defect and that’s all there is to it. Who can
blame him after what he has witnessed? It does not even
matter if he secretly wishes he could defect but is too
afraid of Castro to do so. The US Government has no business
trying to "liberate" people from their tyrannical
rulers. However, there was never the slightest urgency about
having to fulfill Juan Miguel’s – perfectly understandable – desire
to be together with his son. A father wants his son returned
to him. So what? Every day throughout America, people with
grievances every bit as legitimate as Juan Miguel’s have
to wait their turn in Court. Gonzalez is not even citizen
of the United States. Indeed, he is citizen of a country
with which the United States does not have diplomatic relations.
And yet the US Government moves heaven and earth to accommodate
his wishes. The chief law enforcement officer of the United
States and the head of the INS apparently have no matters
more pressing to attend to than satisfying the demands of
Juan Miguel Gonzalez. As an incredulous Tribe argued, "it’s
hard to see any significant immigration-related or other
federal interest in whether Elián was reunited with
his father now or after asylum is denied (if that is the
outcome). And, should asylum be granted, Elián’s
father might still be granted custody and could then take
the boy to Cuba with him if he so chose; asylum only means
permission to stay in the United States and is not a requirement
to stay." In other words, there was not the slightest
reason for Clinton’s hysteria. Again, the parallels with
Kosovo are uncanny. The US Government wreaks havoc and destruction
on behalf of a people with whom it has never had any ties.
"We
are left wondering," Peggy Noonan asked in the Wall
Street Journal the other day, "if there was single
federal law-enforcement official who, ordered to go in,
and put guns at the heads of children, said no. Was there
a single agent or policeman who said, ‘I can’t be part of
this’? Are they all just following orders?" It is a
good question. Is there anything US officials will not do
as they are ordered to? This is the same United States that
continues to thrill at Steven Spielberg’s fights against
the Nazis. This is the same United States that has taken
upon itself to ensure that proper restitution is made to
"Holocaust survivors." This is the same United
States that champions international tribunals to try "war
criminals."
The
doctrine of humanitarian terrorism is Bill Clinton’s signal
contribution to the art of governance. Armed with weapons
of terror, an unshakable self-righteousness, and possessed
of media that are ready to lie and to demonize Uncle Sam’s
adversaries at the drop of a hat, the United States today
bombs and destroys for "fun and for profit." It
is fascinating to observe the response of the Left now that
we have a US Government that for years it pleaded for – one
loudly proclaiming its commitment to "humanitarianism,"
and to punishing the morally delinquent. A typical assortment
of views can be found in the current
special issue of The Nation. The contributors,
while all of course solemnly professing their abhorrence
at American global dominance, have difficulties outlining
an agenda that is all that different from that of the Clinton
Administration. Kai Bird starts off by lamenting the "anti-interventionist
instincts of citizens on the liberal-left." He wistfully
recalls "the designs Franklin Roosevelt’s New Dealers….Human
rights, self-determination and an end to European colonization
in the developing world, nuclear disarmament, international
law, the World Court, the United Nations – these were all
ideas of the progressive left. Even the World Bank and the
International Monetary Fund were initially conceived as
vehicles for internationalizing the New Deal." Hang
on a moment! Isn’t that what we have right now, along with
the usual disregard for the contradiction between "human
rights" – as defined by the United States – and "self-determination"?
Isn’t that what US hegemony is all about? Holly Burkhalter,
Advocacy Director for Physicians for Human Rights, gushes
about "UN Secretary General Kofi Annan’s magnificent
articulation of a new doctrine, wherein he placed suppression
of crimes against humanity above a country’s claims of sovereignty."
No one is as dangerous as the person who invokes a higher
law to justify his disregard for ordinary laws. International
law is the recognition of the sovereignty of nations – and
that’s all it is. "That doctrine," Burkhalter
drones on, "welcome as it is, will not save a single
life if the great nations of the world do not empower the
UN to prevent and punish genocide and crimes against humanity,
or, if the international institution is incapable, do it
themselves. We as citizens should demand that our President
declare the principle that prevention and suppression of
genocide and crimes against humanity, and punishment of
those responsible, are of vital interest to the United States."
So we are back with the Clinton-Albright mass murder project.
The United States will not subordinate itself to the United
Nations, and everyone knows it. But for some people waffling
on about the United Nations has a therapeutic purpose.
Mary
Kaldor, Director of Global Civil Society program at the
London School of Economics, argues that "conventional
war between states has become an anachronism. In contemporary
wars in places like Eastern Europe or Africa, most violence
is directed against civilians and involves an array of techniques,
including population displacement, especially ‘ethnic cleansing’;
atrocities like torture, systematic rape and massacres;
and destruction of infrastructure and historic buildings.
The aim is to control territory by sowing fear and hatred.
This method of warfare directly violates the laws of war
as well as the various postwar conventions and treaties
on human rights." This too is standard drivel of the
hideous harridan of Foggy Bottom variety. We are the cops
on the beat; they violate the "laws of war." We
are the bearers of justice; they sow "fear and hatred."
Hence the self-righteousness that enables our rulers to
murder and destroy and not lose a minute’s sleep while they
are doing it.
Sherle
R. Schwenninger, a fellow of the World Policy Institute,
outlines the following bold agenda: "Our objective
should not be to make every country a liberal democracy
but to create a structure of world order that would make
it easier for countries to move in that direction….We should
help set up the machinery and the rules for international
peacekeeping, but we should leave the work of peacekeeping
and nation-building to middle-level powers and to a UN-like
body…[W]e should leave the micromanagement of other countries’
reforms as well as democracy-building to nongovernmental
organizations and international development agencies…."
In other words, it is the same old interventionist doctrine.
The result is American global hegemony, which the Left pretends
to hate but in reality adores. What can be more thrilling
than to throw your weight around and to terrorize all those
unenlightened people? Look how much fun it was to bully
those wretched Cuban-Americans in Miami over the weekend!
