City Newspaper Archives - 10/2007
POLITICS: Our history of atrocities
Published on Oct 02, 2007
Since 1890, US military interventions have numbered over 125. Since World War II, we have bombed 21 countries (some several times), often destroying their social, political, and economic fabric. We are the only country to have used the atomic bomb.
We assassinate leaders and overthrow the democratically elected governments of countries that dare to defend their nations' interests. Former CIA chief John Stockwell recently estimated that over 6 million people died in covert CIA actions from 1961 until the late 1980's.
We maintain military bases in at least 130 countries. Our trade policies exploit the poor of the world for the benefit of our corporations.
The present administration openly defies international law, uses weapons of mass destruction, tortures, ignores civilian casualties - without impunity. Fear and hatred are their weapons. Only American lives count; only our capitalistic interests matter; it is "terrorism" only if used against us.
We need to refute the idea that our nation is morally superior to the other imperial bullies of world history. We need to assert our allegiance to the human race, and not to any one nation. In reality, the US is, as Martin Luther King said many years ago, "the greatest purveyor of violence in the world." Our citizenry's denial of our real history and motives makes us all complicit in the atrocities committed in our name.
Lynda Howland, Pittsford
