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LONDON – Since the early 1970s- the time of India’s first nuclear explosion- India and Pakistan have been walking along the unmarked, mountainous, path that leads to nuclear holocaust. The struggle for the possession of Kashmir, a searingly beautiful piece of Himalayan real estate, has taken both countries, on such a circuitous, diplomatic road that one is tempted to recall what Palmerston said of the Schleswig-Holstein dispute that brought Prussia and Denmark twice to war, “only three people have understood it, and of these one was dead, one was in an insane asylum, and he himself had forgotten it.” A new government is in power in New Delhi. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh hates roundabout talk and cheese-paring diplomacy. He is by nature the most conciliatory of men and his friends cannot imagine that he could ever press the nuclear button. Neither, I think, could Congress president, Sonia Gandhi, judging from the...

Foreword to THE NEW PEARL HARBOR: Disturbing Questions about the Bush Administration and 9/11 by David Ray Griffin. David Ray Griffin has written an extraordinary book. If carefully read with only a 30% open mind, it is almost certain to alter negatively the way we understand the workings of constitutional democracy in the United States at the highest levels of government. As such, this is a disturbing book, depicting a profound crisis of political legitimacy for the most powerful sovereign state in the history of the world, and furthermore, a country embarked on the first ever borderless war with no markers of victory and defeat. If The New Pearl Harbor receives the sort of public and media attention that it abundantly deserves, it should alter the public debate, and exert a positive influence on how the future unfolds. It is rare, indeed, that any book has this potentiality to become a...

Former Yugoslavia entered a process of dissolution many years ago, which may be far from completed yet. It took violent forms from 1991; events in 2004 in Macedonia and Kosovo indicate that we did hardly see the end here either. Was the dissolution unavoidable? Was war an inescapable consequence? I shall attempt to translate these issues into manageable research questions, trying to make various postdictions concerning FY around 1990. There are no natural laws in social science, so the questions will deal with probabilities, asking what were the prognoses with highest likelihood at that time point. No empirical facts are drawn on that were not available at that time; confirmed general propositions are used even if they have only found empirical support later than 1990. WAS A DISSOLUTION INESCAPABLE? The first question is then: how probable was a dissolution, given the characteristics of FY and the circumstances prevailing some fifteen...

In his speech, “New Strategies to Meet New Threats,” delivered in West Palm Beach, Florida on June 1, 2004, John Kerry, the presumptive Democratic Party nominee for President, referred to the possibility of nuclear terrorism as “the greatest threat we face today,” and offered a program to eliminate this threat based on US leadership.  Kerry promised to prevent nuclear weapons or materials to create them from falling into the hands of al Qaeda or other extremist organizations. “As President,” he pledged, “my number one security goal will be to prevent the terrorists from gaining weapons of mass murder, and ensure that hostile states disarm.” Kerry recognizes that the US cannot accomplish this task by itself and pledged to build and repair coalitions. “We can’t eliminate this threat on our own,” he stated. “We must fight this enemy in the same way we fought in World War I, World War II,...

LONDON – At the height of Indira Gandhi’s “emergency” when democracy, India’s most precious asset, was suspended, India’s great intellectual, the late Minoo Misani, used the pages of Encounter magazine, the Cold War’s “journal de combat”, to sound an eloquent clarion call against her misrule. Where else at that time in the English speaking world  was there a better place to sound off against authoritariansm, didacticism and  the paronoia of rulers who, by their petty acts of repression, clearly thought that the pen was indeed mightier than the sword? Encounter has been dead a dozen years or more, a victim of the end of the Cold War, the resurgence of democracy and liberty and the urge of today’s younger readers to forget the old intellectual battles of the past. Two weeks ago, just as the Indian electorate had demonstrated once again its democratic maturity,  the long time editor of Encounter,...

The vast majority of people around the world are much better off in peacetime than in war.  Only a few arms merchants and power-hungry politicians benefit from war, at the expense of soldiers who are sent into battle, and the ever growing number of civilian victims of war. Iceland is in a unique position to promote a new agenda for world peace, based on its history of the Althing, the world’s oldest democratic legislative assembly, established in 930.  It is a forum where differences can be aired and mutually acceptable solutions explored.  In the year 1000, Norwegian missionaries wanted to impose Christianity in Iceland.  A religious war threatened.  But at the Althing, it was decided to adopt Christianity, without outlawing traditional rituals if done in private, and this helped avoid a war.  While people talk, they don’t shoot. In addition, Icelanders have never served in military forces. This may well...

On the 20th of May, US forces raided the Baghdad home of the head of the Iraqi National Congress (INC) Ahmed Chalabi. The media in chorus, without further investigation, described the raid as an effort to silence Chalabi’s condemnation of the US-led occupation: “My house was attacked… We avoided by a hair’s breadth a clash with my guards. I am America’s best friend in Iraq. If the CPA finds it necessary to direct an armed attack against my home, you can see the state of relations between the CPA and the Iraqi people.” ( Press Conference in Baghdad quoted in the Independent, 20 May 2004) The reports pointed to “a changed relationship” between Chalabi and the Coalition. “It’s a stunning reversal!.” Washington has decided  “to drop its backing for Mr Chalabi and to distance itself from him”. Chalabi is said to have been plotting against the US by putting together...

In June 2004 elections will be held in 25 countries to renew the European Parliament. We invite support for this call to challenge patriarchal power structures in Europe. The European Union today is characterized by a strongly hierarchical organisation. Its system of political representation is lacking in legitimacy since so few participate in elections. The gap between those elected and their voters is manifest. A predominantly male political elite currently rules the Union. Economic policies that enjoy close to constitutional status advocate privatisation and the selling &endash;off of social rights and welfare, policies which make it more difficult for women to combine paid work with parenthood and exclude men from sharing care responsibilities in society and in bringing up children. When cut backs reduce public responsibility for welfare, women are the ones who step in to do the job. The explicit demand for increased military investments will steal money from...

5 juni, 2004 Forsvarspolitikken stilles over for helt nye udfordinger. Claus Kold, der for nylig slog igennem vore medier med sin analyse af danske soldaters adfærd i Kosovo, skriver hér om hvor vigtigt det er at forstå at traditionel krig mod terrorismen er er intellektuel fejltagelse. Forsvar mod terrorisme Det høres alt oftere: Forsvaret skal kæmpe, og gå i krig mod terrorismen, denne kamp kan endog udvides til et opsøgende og forebyggende angreb. Disse udsagn er pro-blematiske. For det første kan de føre til undermineringen af FN, menneskerettighederne og folkeretten, og føre det globale sam-fund ud yderligere retsløshed. For det andet er en krig kende-tegnet ved flere for-hold: to eller flere aktører, som kan starte og af-slutte krigshandlingerne, et territorium som kan erobres eller pas-siv-is-eres, kampmidler som kan uskade-liggøres så krigs-hand-lingerne kan bringes til ophør og fjenden tvinges til overgivelse. I forhold til terrorisme er disse faktorer radikalt forandrede. Krig-ens...

Fredsforskeren Jan Øberg, der er direktør for Den Transnationale Stiftelse for Freds- og Fremtidsforskning, TFF, i Lund havde små 200 samtaler med mennesker på alle niveauer i Irak før krigen. Den 3. juni udgiver han “Forudsigelig fiasko. Konflikten med Irak og Danmark som besættelsesmagt” (Tiderne Skifter), der drøfter hele forløbet og opstiller et 19-punkts program for hvorledes det – måske – kan blive bedre i Irak. Hvis vi kan erkende vore egne fejl så blir der bedre muligheder for at redde situationen, mener han. Besættelsen af Irak vil aldrig lede til fred, demokrati eller noget andet godt for irakerne. Jo længere den varer, jo værre konsekvenser vil denne forudsigelige fiasko få for Irak, for USA, for Danmark og for resten af verden. Set i sammenhæng med Israel-Palæstina-konflikten er Irak den mest konsekvensrige enkeltkonflikt i verden; desværre er den blevet håndteret med lige dele konfliktanalfabetisme og selvretfærdighed parret med en kulturforagt,...

Inkompetente Bush-folk men ingen suverænitet Når det går så skidt for den amerikansk-ledede besættelse af Irak har det først og fremmest at gøre med at hele projektet var urealistisk. Samtlige antagelser, det byggede på, var fejlagtige. Et alvorligt storhedsvanvid og en beruselse i våbnenes magt parret med yderst begrænset intellektuel og moralsk magt har bidraget til denne tragedie. Og ingen synes at kunne få et alternativ til USA op at stå. Det er dét jeg blandt andet forsøger at sige i Forudsigelig Fiasko. Konflikten med Irak og Danmark som besættelsesmagt, der udkom for nogle uger siden. Men der er også en overset grund. Hvis man forestiller sig at USA gerne ville gøre noget rigtigt godt for Irak, ville man så ikke forvente at de havde udvalgt deres bedste diplomater, områdeeksperter og administratorer? Jo, men sådan er det ikke. De amerikanere, der det sidste års tid har kørt Irak kommer fra...

George Bush may be averse to reading up on the Vietnam war, which he managed to duck, but how about recalling the famous “rumble in the jungle” in the Congo, the heavy weight fight between the unbeatable George Foreman, none of whose opponents had lasted more than three minutes in the ring, and the up and coming, always boasting, Muhammad Ali? The fight was at 4.a.m so that the air was cooler and the American TV audience could watch it in prime time. In round two, the weaker Ali appeared to cower against the ropes and Foreman pounded him again and again, whilst Ali whispered taunts in his ear, “George, you’re not hittin'” and “George, you disappoint me”. Foreman lost his temper and his punches began to flow wild, while Ali let the spring in the ropes help him absorb those he landed. By the fifth round Foreman was exhausted...