[Peace-discuss] Obama embraces a fraud: Brits

[C. G. Estabrook]

[Obama has said that Afghanistan and Pakistan are now the front-line in the "war 
on terror" as his justification for sending 30,000 more US troops to 
Afghanistan, doubling the current US military there.  Here he's given the lie by 
the British Foreign Secretary.  --CGE]

     'War on terror' was wrong
     * David Miliband
     * The Guardian, Thursday 15 January 2009

The terrorist attacks in Mumbai seven weeks ago sent shock waves around the 
world. Now all eyes are fixed on the Middle East, where Israel's response to 
Hamas's rockets, a ferocious military campaign, has already left a thousand 
Gazans dead.

Seven years on from 9/11 it is clear that we need to take a fundamental look at 
our efforts to prevent extremism and its terrible offspring, terrorist violence. 
Since 9/11, the notion of a "war on terror" has defined the terrain. The phrase 
had some merit: it captured the gravity of the threats, the need for solidarity, 
and the need to respond urgently - where necessary, with force. But ultimately, 
the notion is misleading and mistaken. The issue is not whether we need to 
attack the use of terror at its roots, with all the tools available. We must. 
The question is how.

The idea of a "war on terror" gave the impression of a unified, transnational 
enemy, embodied in the figure of Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida. The reality is 
that the motivations and identities of terrorist groups are disparate. 
Lashkar-e-Taiba has roots in Pakistan and says its cause is Kashmir. Hezbollah 
says it stands for resistance to occupation of the Golan Heights. The Shia and 
Sunni insurgent groups in Iraq have myriad demands. They are as diverse as the 
1970s European movements of the IRA, Baader-Meinhof, and Eta. All used terrorism 
and sometimes they supported each other, but their causes were not unified and 
their cooperation was opportunistic. So it is today.

The more we lump terrorist groups together and draw the battle lines as a simple 
binary struggle between moderates and extremists, or good and evil, the more we 
play into the hands of those seeking to unify groups with little in common. 
Terrorist groups need to be tackled at root, interdicting flows of weapons and 
finance, exposing the shallowness of their claims, channelling their followers 
into democratic politics.

The "war on terror" also implied that the correct response was primarily 
military. But as General Petraeus said to me and others in Iraq, the coalition 
there could not kill its way out of the problems of insurgency and civil strife.

This is what divides supporters and opponents of the military action in Gaza. 
Similar issues are raised by the debate about the response to the Mumbai 
attacks. Those who were responsible must be brought to justice and the 
government of Pakistan must take urgent and effective action to break up terror 
networks on its soil. But on my visit to south Asia this week, I am arguing that 
the best antidote to the terrorist threat in the long term is cooperation. 
Although I understand the current difficulties, resolution of the dispute over 
Kashmir would help deny extremists in the region one of their main calls to 
arms, and allow Pakistani authorities to focus more effectively on tackling the 
threat on their western borders.

We must respond to terrorism by championing the rule of law, not subordinating 
it, for it is the cornerstone of the democratic society. We must uphold our 
commitments to human rights and civil liberties at home and abroad. That is 
surely the lesson of Guantánamo and it is why we welcome President-elect Obama's 
commitment to close it.

The call for a "war on terror" was a call to arms, an attempt to build 
solidarity for a fight against a single shared enemy. But the foundation for 
solidarity between peoples and nations should be based not on who we are 
against, but on the idea of who we are and the values we share. Terrorists 
succeed when they render countries fearful and vindictive; when they sow 
division and animosity; when they force countries to respond with violence and 
repression. The best response is to refuse to be cowed.

• David Miliband is the foreign secretary milibandd at parliament.uk