A reply from Linguapress to a letter received                     click here for the vocabulary guide:

Dear American friend,
Thank you for your contribution to the current debate.
I'm not quite sure why you ask whether I can spell "Kuwait".... but just to reassure you; not only can I spell Kuwait, I have lived in Kuwait, at a time when the United States embassy there was a small set of buildings on the beach, guarded by a single friendly Kuwaiti policeman - an embassy where one could come and go, as I often did, with no hassle, no bother.
      I have also travelled extensively in the Islamic world, and in my life have visited many Islamic countries from Morocco to Pakistan. I have travelled by bus, with ordinary people, through Pakistan and Afghanistan, I have slept on straw mattresses in remote villages in the Yemen, I have sat and eaten with ordinary people in their homes, or in local cafés, or in their tents, in many of the countries I have visited....
      I have also eaten with Mormons in Salt Lake City, I have talked in their homes with Amish in upstate New York, I have found myself the only white face eating in a McDonalds in suburban Memphis, I have chatted round the campfire with steelworkers from Pennsylvania, I have stayed with friends in an affluent suburb of Los Angeles, I have even once played the slots in Reno Nevada; I have sat through rodeos and roller coasters - as well as publishing articles about the USA in books in Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands and France (and possibly elsewhere too, given the amount of "author untraceable" pirating that goes on.)
      On the other hand, I have never visited a country in the "business-class/luxury hotels/taxis/tourist traps/ airport and home again" manner, that is the norm for so many American travelers. I have on occasions slept in four-star hotels, dined in the best restaurants and even travelled business class......
      Finally, I have a particular interest in events in Iraq, as it is another country in which I lived for a few months.
      I hope therefore that I can see events not from a single standpoint, but from a variety of perspectives.
      Yes, dear American, we are certainly agreed on the end; it is on the means to achieve that end that we have a sharp difference of opinion. Like the majority of people in Europe (95% of the Spanish population, for example, in direct opposition to that of the Spanish government), I do not believe that aggression against Iraq, unless proved essential, is either the best, the most certain, or the most rapid way to solve the problem of Middle East instability. Quite the reverse, it is a path fraught with immense dangers that is more likely than any other to plunge the world backwards half a century.
      To imagine that aggression is the best or only means to achieve peace and stability, or even dominance for that matter, is a view that has been totally disproved by history. Look at Napoleon, at the first world war, at the second world war, at Vietnam. Nowhere did the aggressor win, neither the battle nor the minds of the people.

     You rightly evoke the debt that the world owes to the USA for participation in two world wars; but you forget that the highest tribute paid in the second world war was by the people of Russia; 20 million Russians died in the conflict between 1941 and 1945, as Régis Debray noted in his article in the New York Times on 23rd February.
      You also forget to note that the US entered both world wars with considerable reluctance, and only once it was clear in both cases that American interests were at stake. The US did not enter the first world war until 1917 - a year before it ended - , nor the second world war until Pearl Harbor : and though US intervention on both occasions helped save Europe, America did not save Europe single handed in the manner that recent articles in the US media, notably the New York Post, would like Americans to believe.
      Nor, incidentally, should one forget that the USA hedged its bets in Europe until the middle of the second world war, maintaining an ambassador to Vichy France until 1942. The fact is that for over a century and a half, US foreign policy was directed by the isolationism of the Monroe Doctrine and inspired by the quasi-religious tenets of "Manifest Destiny". Both of these, and in particular the latter, continue to influence the US world view even to this day.
      Donald Rumsfeld recently castigated Europe as "old Europe", a continent mired in the past. But it is not Europe that is "old" in its perception of international relations, it is the USA. Paradoxically, nostalgia for the past (and here I am refering to the ways and ideas of ordinary Americans) is far stronger in the USA than in Europe. Every small town has its "historical society" and vaunts its "historic buildings", even if they are no more than a fire station and a post office built in 1933. And why not? There is nothing wrong with this.
      But in geopolitical terms, the stakes are higher. Europe has learned the lessons of war, to its own cost. It knows the horrors, even recently, of wars on its own doorstep and even, technically speaking, within its own limits. It accepts that force is necessary to stop an aggressor - which is why Europe gave its support to the Gulf War and to intervention in the Balkans conflict; it does not go along with preemptive aggression, particularly when the stakes are as high as they are at this moment.
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      Europe has also learned that nations and factions that use religion, demagogy or concepts of "right and wrong" to justify their actions are extremely dangerous and destabilising. In the history of humankind, wars and persecutions led in the name of "right", political dogma, or "religion" have probably been the leading cause of unnatural mortality and the greatest nursery of fanaticism and obscurantism.  No nation has the monopoly of right, nor even the authority to suggest that its way of life is superior to that of other nations. For the USA to do so is not only to adopt the type of policy that "old Europe" has now moved beyond; it is also extremely dangerous, as it can only serve to sow the seeds of envy and resentment in the hearts and minds of millions of people elsewhere on this planet. This, unfortunately, is one of the points that so many Americans seem to misunderstand.
      Bear in mind, dear American, that even in the USA, millions of citizens do not share in the American dream (the US having the greatest inequality in wealth distribution of any western nation and a prison population rate that is almost three times higher than that of any "old" European nation). Also remember that there is absolutely no way in which the rest of the world could become like America, even if they wanted to (which many do not), given the total inability of planet Earth to support even 25% of its population living at American standards of consumption and use of natural resources. Don't forget that with 5% of the world's population, the USA uses 25% of its energy resources, and (barring the US-emulating mini-states of Kuwait, Singapore and the UAE,) has by far the world's highest level of carbon dioxide production per capita. This is a bandwaggon where there are no spare seats available for the rest of the world.
     Flaunting one's consumerism, or one's military superiority, even one's version of democracy, in the face of people who are never ever going to be able to enjoy the American dream, cannot answer the world's problems of rogue states, oppressive regimes, and dictatorships. It may solve some problems in the short term, but it will only serve to fuel the fires of resentment and anti-Americanism in others. The fact that the hawks in the current administration seem unable to understand this is alarming.
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     There is no justification for using force against today's Iraq other than as a last resort, once all the alternatives have been given a chance to work; and even then, given the situation of today's Iraq, the benefits of such a course of action belong to the realm of surmise and speculation. The risks are enormous.
      The Iraq of 2003 is very different to that of 1990.
      The Saddam Hussein that is being portrayed by the US media is the Saddam who existed in the 1980's, not the weakened strongman of today. He is not even remotely the same type of risk as Hitler was in 1939, as some would like to suggest. Ruthless and oppressive dictator, yes; a world-threatinging power, no!
      Missiles that can fly 30 miles further than intended are not a threat to world peace.... and even if Saddam had nuclear missiles or biological warheads that could reach Israel, Saddam knows as well as anyone else that given the map of the area, any attack would be liable to kill as many Palestinians, Lebanese, Syrians or Jordanians as Israelis. Besides, UN inspections have not come up with any evidence that these supposed weapons of mass destruction even exist.
      If Saddam is the cunning psychopath that Bush would have everyone believe (which is quite likely the case), if he has these weapons of mass destruction that no-one has yet found, then one sure way to encourage him to use them will be to launch an attack on him. It is the cornered animal that is the most vicious in its reaction to attack, for it knows that it has nothing to lose. Besides, of course, if Saddam has these weapons, Blix and his team are likelky never to find them, as they may well be looking in the wrong country altogether. For all we know Saddam's supposed weapons of mass destruction, if they exist, are already sitting quietly in some apartments in the Bronx, LA, Detroit or some other US city, just like the ricin laboratory that was recently uncovered in London. Remember, the FBI couldn't even find the Unabomber. One sure way to have such hypothetical weapons detonated - if they exist - (whether by Saddam's henchmen, Al Quaeda fanatics, or anyone else with a grudge against the USA - and there are many, even Americans themselves)  is to launch an attack.

     As further cause for reflection, don't forget, dear American, that by deliberately bundling together Al Quaeda (an islamist movement largely engineered and financed by traditionalists from Saudi Arabia, America's great friend) and Saddam Hussein (a "socialist" and secular leader with opposing views on many a subject), the United States is already running the risk of forcing the two - or at least their supporters - into a very dangerous anti-western alliance. The great principle that enabled the British to ensure their power in the age of the Empire was "divide and rule"; it was certainly not "unite your foes" - another lesson from history that seems to be lost on the current US administration.

      Finally, dear American, your nation has an immense amount of things about which it can be justifiably proud; your human liberties, the friendliness and openness of much of your society, your entrepreneurial spirit, your constitution (which, don't forget, was inspired by the best in the European tradition), your technological advance, your wealth, and many more.
      But do not, as many Americans seem to do, let these things blind you to the many great failings of your country: your crime rate, your unsafe city streets, the lack of participation by your citizens in the processes of democracy, your profligate use of energy and of natural resources, your justice system in which the winner is so often the one who can pay for the best lawyer, your electoral system in which the winner is so often the one who has the biggest bankroll, your lack - alone among developed nations - of a proper social security and health system providing acceptable cover for all.... and many more.
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      Then of course there is the little question of America's massive current account deficit, over ten times larger than that of any other nation on earth (331,480 million dollars in 1999). In case you do not understand what this is, it is the difference in value between what the US takes from the rest of the world, and what it exports to it. In other words, although it is the world's richest nation, the US is continually taking far more from the rest of the world than it is giving back - a situation which, in other countries, particularly developing ones (like Argentina) , would long ago have had drastic economic consequences. If, one day, the US dollar is no longer used as the world's reserve currency, the consequences of such a current account deficit on the US and the world's economy could be on a scale beyond even Bin Laden's wildest dreams. Apart from the Clinton administration, no recent US government has even started to tackle this huge threat to US and world stability - a home-made threat whose potential to wreak economic disaster is probably far greater than a few hypothetical weapons of mass destruction. Where is US leadership on this issue? Absolutely nowhere to be seen. The problem might as well be on another planet.

      Still, naturally, as you say, in spite of its shortcomings, the USA (like Europe) acts as a magnet for the victims of poverty and oppression in other countries around the world. Of course it does. Given the choice between labouring for a few pesos a day in some Latin American sweat shop, and earning a few dollars an hour in the USA, what man or woman with the possibility of reaching the USA would hesitate to try? I know I wouldn't wait! That is absolutely and fundamentally human nature. It does not, however, mean that the United States is a model that the world either wants to or can follow.
      Not for one moment however am I suggesting that Europe is perfect. We have many big problems. Our governments and our corporations are subject to corruption just like any others, we have had Barings, Total-Fina and Ahold; we have had cash-for-questions, frigates for Taiwan, corporate greed, environmental catastrophes and cover-ups, mafiosi and organised crime. Our TV is not perfect, but it is far better than US TV on the whole, and far more independent of commercial and politico-commercial pressure. We have our crime, our drugs problems, our fraud, and the rest. We also have health and social security systems for all, unemployment benefits, and considerably better employee protection, ... and much more.
      But that is not really the point. The point, dear American, is that you believe that by attacking Iraq, with or without UN backing, the USA will be ensuring world peace and stability, and the eventual elimination of rogue states and world terrorism. It's certainly a great ideal.
      I would maintain - possibly now even if the US were to invade Iraq with UN support -  that the results risk being precisely the opposite, and that George W Bush and his team are playing with fire, not to say high explosive. I hope that this letter has demonstrated why.
      

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