Multiple parties perpetuate cycle of violence

I have often been asked to defend my beliefs against the "War on Terrorism" and other militaristic aspects of U.S. foreign policy. I have been told many times that using violence to stop terrorism will prevent future American deaths and that failing to act decisively puts the country at risk for future attacks. I have been told that I am un-American when I have mentioned the ways in which American foreign policy contributes to global anti-Americanism, and I have recently been accused of belonging to a movement that would have been eager to blow up the World Trade Center because we disagree with the policies of the World Trade Organization. Yet it is because I don't want to see violence destroy the lives of any innocent people that I am forced to oppose foreign policy arguments that call for war, and I believe that this is the motivation of many others who feel the same. People who argue for a widespread military solution to the problem of terrorism believe that violence is a force that can be controlled, but history has shown us many times that a single violent action easily sparks others and quickly deteriorates into endless cycles of retaliation that threaten the stability of entire regions and the lives of millions of civilians.

It's easy to see the evidence. Armed conflicts between Israelis and Palestinians, as well as military acts against either community, are generally seen as morally unjustified on both sides. Though people differ on which side holds the greater responsibility, as we read the now daily toll of civilian casualties, we share a hope for a just peace for both communities. Closer to home, we also agree that gang wars and street violence create deadly cycles of retaliation and allow hate to rip through communities. We can clearly see that violence gets us nowhere when gang wars make urban neighborhoods unlivable. Whatever the social and historical contexts that complicate these issues, and there are many, the patterns are the same, and they reflect this fundamental flaw in the "logic" of violence as a political strategy.

The cycles of retaliatory violence that are escalating in Israeli and Palestinian areas, have created war zones out of our cities and are now also threatening to further destabilize the India-Pakistan border are clearly perpetuated by irrational behavior, for however noble or necessary a cause. We may sympathize with Palestinian families whose homes are bulldozed by the Israeli government, Jewish families who are victims of suicide bombings or working-class American kids who are forced to raise themselves, but we still recognize that all the violence needs to stop.

Yet when we turn our eyes to our own foreign policies and the escalating militarism of our own government, we have trouble seeing ourselves as part of a world system. Sept. 11 was not an isolated attack on U.S. interests but part of a global cycle of both physical and economic violence that is imposed by Western countries on the developing world. It was retaliation for American arms sales to Israel, economic sanctions on Iraq and the stationing of U.S. troops near holy sites in the Middle East--a political grievance that terrorists have emphasized. I don't argue that terrorism is a morally justified response to economic imperialism, but neither is imperialism a responsible and moral use of a global position of power. Both actions create only suffering for the world's innocent people.

Violence is an inherently irrational force because of the instability it creates. It carves its own chaotic path through history and destroys the lives of innocents indiscriminately. We can expect that a foreign policy based on violence will cause retaliation and resentment. Fighting violence with violence achieves only death: not safety, not security and not justice. It is obvious to us that the innocent Americans who died Sept. 11 should not have been killed because others opposed the actions of our government, so why is it not also obvious that the deaths of Afghans who were killed by Americans because of the actions of the Taliban government cannot be justified as "collateral damage?"

It may be true that "we can't negotiate with terrorists" because of the inherently irrational nature of their actions. What is left but to demand moral actions from our own government and communities? How many more people will die because of our own inability to find sustainable solutions to global problems? Walking through the Gothic Wonderland, you would never suspect that our government is involved in military actions in Afghanistan in which thousands of Afghan civilians have died or that the escalating violence in Israel has reached catastrophic levels over the last four months. The isolated, insulated bubble of Duke campus protects us from the world. We can remain utterly unaffected and uninformed about the actions of our own government and the ways in which those actions affect the world's people. Most people don't have the option of ignoring the fact that their country is at war. Maybe it's time we realized that we don't either.

Jillian Johnson is a Trinity junior.