September 12, 1996
The Wisdom Fund

Values You May NOT Want To Teach Children

WASHINGTON, DC, September 12 -- U.S. foreign affairs offer a lesson in American values. However, these may not be the values you want to teach your children.

Take the lessons learned from the September 3 U.S. cruise missile attack on Southern Iraq "to make Saddam pay a price for the latest act of brutality," said President Clinton. The U.S. may have prevented the Iraqi brutality with a stern warning. A British newspaper, The Independent, said the KDP of Kurdish chieftain Massoud Barzani warned the United States before its missile attacks that Iran was already supporting the PUK, and that his faction would turn to Baghdad for support if Washington did nothing. The paper said the KDP sent a memo to U.S. officials before the attack on Arbil saying: "Our options are limited...Since the U.S. is not responding even politically... the only option left is the Iraqis."

So when the Iraqi government goes to the aid of the KDP, which is under attack by the PUK supported by Iran, the U.S. attacks Iraq! Turkey is given the green light by the U.S. to set up a "security zone" in Northern Iraq, attack villages and refugee camps within Iraq, and create many thousands more refugees! And then a CIA operation to topple the Iraqi government is exposed in Iraq.

Or take the lessons learned from the Russian bombardment of the Chechens which left 40,000 dead and many more wounded. The U.S. continued to give billions in aid to Russia, interfered in the Russian elections to assure the reelection of Russian President Yeltsin, and possibly had a hand in the killing of the Chechen leader and war hero General Dudayev. It is believed that only the U.S. possesses the technology used to target and bomb General Dudayev while using a cellular phone.

Or take the lessons learned from U.S. efforts to impose sanctions on Sudan for slavery which the government of Sudan claims is hostage taking among rival tribes, and has outlawed. But the U.S. remains silent about U.N. reports of 25,000 to 30,000 Nepali women, many of them minor, who have been sold into prostitution in India by women traffickers. And what of the thousands who turn to prostitution, and develop AIDS, lured by the fortunes to be made at U.S. bases overseas?

Or take the lessons learned from Bosnia where a U.N. member country is dismembered, and massive genocide is committed. The U.S. prevents the Bosnians from defending themselves by imposing an arms embargo, replaces the Bosnian constitution with the Dayton peace accords, forces the Bosnians into an election schedule which may assure that the gains of Serbian aggression are perpetuated, and makes no serious effort to apprehend the war criminals.

Or take the lessons learned from the U.S. threats of a nuclear attack on Libya last April. The alleged Libyan chemical warfare plant in a tunnel at Tarhunah was inaugurated September 1. The "CW plant," it seems, is a man-made river bringing water from desert aquifers to Libya's coastal population.

Or take the lessons learned from the muted U.S. response to the Israeli bombing of the U.N. post at Qana in Lebanon, the lack of U.S. enthusiasm for enforcing U.N. resolutions against Israel, and U.S. efforts to deny weapons to mainly Muslim countries, while Israel stockpiles 200 to 300 nuclear warheads and 1500 kilometer range missiles, and receives over three billion dollars in U.S. aid annually.

Try explaining these lessons to your children. And the next time one of them blows away an innocent American with a handgun or Uzi, you'll know where the child learned his values.

Tweet
Follow @wisdomfund

Peter C. Whybrow, "American Mania: When More Is Not Enough," W. W. Norton & Company (January 30, 2005)

Owen Bowcott, "Afghanistan worst place in the world for women, but India in top five," Guardian, June 15, 2011