American Intransigence, Pakistani Complacency and the Killing of Osama bin Laden

Mahboob A. Khawaja, Ph.D.

Laughing stalk as is the world witnessed how the leaders of the United States, the world only remaining conscience-wise half dead-half living superpower tried to portray the mafia - style live staged killing performance of Osama bin Laden, the alleged perpetrator of the 9/11 events. If one were to ward-off the commonly ingrained American delusion of being powerful and responsive political actor in global affairs, the contradiction warrants notice that after investing in “fear” strategy and the first reported killing of Osama bin Laden in 2005 at the Bora Bora mountains (Afghanistan), and now according to Paul Craig Roberts “the Second death of Osama bin Laden”, it is predictable that the US Government’s hourly paid intellectuals could cite a third killing of Osama bin Laden somewhere close to the fast approaching Presidential Elections in 2012. It will show relevance and desired impact on the opinion stratagem and number games, so critical to the success of a given candidate in American news media articulated and institutionalized politics. “Fear” strategy appeals to the American public and their national emotions uprising. American politics and leaders survive on interchangeable obsessions of irrational issues and immature perceptions often generated by the mass media, a sort of self-inflicted psychological malaise, not valued in any other liberal democracy. The civilized global community is shockingly tormented for not seeing a mature response and direction from the US leaders in unusual situations of crisis and global entanglement.  President Obama and his colleagues miserably failed in that rational expectation of political values and human dignity.

The dramatized killing of Osama bin Laden represented a deep hidden “fear” in American mindset that bin Laden was the only threat to the US global hegemony, not realizing that the US leadership itself and its masochistic and sadistic super-ego is the real problem that could lead to irrational behavior in global affairs ultimately craving the ways for US self defeat and self-annihilation as it appear likely and as it happened to most of the powerful warmongering nations in human history. President Obama lacking political imagination appears convinced that the US has invincible armed forces and dreams of glory and triumph over the other people and nation of the world.  This is what Pharaoh thought, this is what Hitler dreamed and this is what the former USSR believed-in, but where do we find their artifacts now? Even though bin Laden was cited the epic centre of all the US political pains originating from the 9/11 and the Bush led “War on Terrorism”, the reported second killing of Osama bin Laden has not lessened the tormenting uneasiness from the US social and political minds. The wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan have not stopped as President Obama had promised for change “Yes we Can”, and the psychological neurosis is enriched with new adventures and engrossed perception of “fear” that American elite-RDF forces would enlarge the scope of operations into Pakistan and elsewhere to find food for thoughts for the White House and news media sponsored sensational acts of insane political cruelty. With global institutions at their lowest ebb in relevance and effectiveness, the world seems to be open and available to the US intransigence and conveniently bribed and bought Pakistani political-military-intelligence complacency in deaths and destructions of human life and habitats.

There are numerous rational questions which could challenge the American versions of narrations of war and peace in Afghanistan and Pakistan. There are serious problems of dichotomy entangled in American leadership thoughts and political behavior.

America claimed to be a nation enriched with history of legal system of justice, not political terrorism against the innocent and destitute. There is ample credible evidence available in the US to indicate that 9/11 was an insider job effectively planned and carried out by the official agents to wage new wars against the oil riched Arab-Muslim nations. The major thrust of the US legal system defines an accused person as “innocent” until proven guilty. There were no legal charges filed against Osama bin Laden in any US based Court of Law. If Osama bin Laden was responsible for the 9/11 tragedies, was it not appropriate for the US Government to charge him with crimes in a US court according to the US Constitution?  Were the US politicians afraid of Bin Laden that he might disclose the names of the real master minders of the 9/11 acts? Under political temptation to gain numbers and compulsion of evil and a clear failure of sense of rational judgment and foresight, America appears to have pursued vengeful and political killing of bin Laden as he was not charged with any crimes in the US or elsewhere.  There was no tangible evidence in the US to hold bin Laden responsible for the 9/11 events. Bin Laden was not indicted in any US or international court of Law. For all intents and purposes, it appears more understandable that killing of bin Laden was meant for political reasons. Noam Chomsky (“My Reaction to Osama bin Laden’s Death”, Information Clearing House, May 7, 2011), the distinguished American scholar reflects on the ordeal:

“In societies that profess some respect for law, suspects are apprehended and brought to fair trial. I stress “suspects.” In April 2002, the head of the FBI, Robert Mueller, informed the press that after the most intensive investigation in history, the FBI could say no more than that it “believed” that the plot was hatched in Afghanistan, though implemented in the UAE and Germany. What they only believed in April 2002, they obviously didn’t know 8 months earlier, when Washington dismissed tentative offers by the Taliban (how serious, we do not know, because they were instantly dismissed) to extradite bin Laden if they were presented with evidence—which, as we soon learned, Washington didn’t have. Thus Obama was simply lying when he said, in his White House statement, that “we quickly learned that the 9/11 attacks were carried out by al Qaeda.”

Obama’s popularity is declining below 42%, US is financially, morally and political a bankrupt nation, its superpower image and role is open to question and it is fearful of being replaced by other emerging nations of Asia such China, India or combination of small economically viable and productive nations. It is that FEAR of the unknown that alludes behind the sickening thinking and military actions against others across the globe. Don Williams writing in the OpEd News (“Obama at Ground Zero--How Executing Osama bin Laden Brutalized Us All”: May 6, 2011) takes the point home:

 “And if we've come to this, applauding like chimps for acts of barbaric bloodletting that took place in front of the slaughtered man's 12-year-old daughter and others, then we are at ground zero on the evolutionary scale……. Is this what we've come to? Is this what thousands of American soldiers gave their lives for? Is this why we fought (still fight) two wars? Is this what we dragged our country's good name through the slime of torture and lies for? …Is this why we wrecked two, possibly three, countries?”

These critical questions demand rational answers from the decision makers who should be held accountable in a public forum. America is fast getting darkened in thoughts and actions. Noam Chomsky (“My Reaction to Osama bin Laden’s Death”, May 7, 2011) puts the finger where the irony of panic is:

“We might ask ourselves how we would be reacting if Iraqi commandos landed at George W. Bush’s compound, assassinated him, and dumped his body in the Atlantic. Uncontroversially, his crimes vastly exceed bin Laden’s, and he is not a “suspect” but uncontroversially the “decider” who gave the orders to commit the “supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole” (quoting the Nuremberg Tribunal) for which Nazi criminals were hanged: the hundreds of thousands of deaths, millions of refugees, destruction of much of the country, the bitter sectarian conflict that has now spread to the rest of the region.”

Undoubtedly, the US is at the losing end and operationally a defeated party in Iraq and Afghanistan. These were bogus wars launched by the Bush administration against the Islamic people to grab and exploit their natural resources. Despite public overtures of reaching-out to the Muslim people and bridging the political gaps, Obama has continued the madness and cruelty of killing innocent people in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. An estimated three million people have been killed by the US led war in Iraq and countless human habitats destroyed and agriculture poisoned and polluted. Millions of people and habitats are continuously destroyed in Afghanistan. About 12,900 civilians are reported to have been killed by the US increased drone attacks in Pakistan. Who are the real terrorists waging wars against the helpless humanity?  War is killing others, not peace-building. Obama’s actions refute his own words and commitment to global outreach and peacemaking. President Obama wanted to normalize the relations with the Muslim world as he professed in his first presidential speech. His first legal act was to close down the infamous Guantanomo Bay terror prison, and then he wanted to stop the bogus wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and bring home the troops. He renegade all of his principal commitments to make the difference in American politics. There is NO CHANGE of policy and direction and NEW BEGINNING in American imperialism. This is the US politics. All contemporary politicians are stage actors pretending to be doing good for the interest of the people. Men who are universally hated and feared claim to have achieved success at the cost of wrong thinking, ruthlessness, and treason against humanity. Their so called fantasy of success can never flourish except leading to degeneration, viciousness and self-destruction. President Obama has discovered more gains in fictional killings than facing the facts on the ground of American led bogus wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The momentum is building-up for hiring top wage merceraneries, more secretive wars across the globe to strengthen the US economy. John Grant (“A Troubled Nation Feeds On bin Laden's Corpse” OpEd News, May 6, 2011) explains the rationale:

“It looks more likely that the propaganda boost of the bin Laden killing will be used to justify greater funding of super-secret JSOC hunter/killer teams, and the waste and tragedy of the past ten years will be compounded, although maybe re-directed into more effective secret war compartments. It seems clear secret, unaccountable hunter/killer teams are the future of US warfare. Lethal raids like the high-profile one that killed bin Laden are occurring all the time -- secret to everyone except those who are the targets.”

Obama appears to have refuted his own mindset and undertaking offered for peace and normalization of the American aggressiveness and war-lord role in global affairs. Perhaps, the Norwegian Nobel Peace Committee should rebuke the Peace Prize given to Obama in anticipation of his so called visionary perception for “Yes We Can.” This turned out to be a political stunt aimed at to marshal the facilitation of favorable global people’s reaction to a new beginning that never materialized. Under President Obama, the US mentality has not changed a bit from political absurdity to insanity in global actions. Noam Chomsky (May 7, 2011) illustrates the true American landscape”

“The imperial mentality is so profound, throughout western society, that no one can perceive that they are glorifying bin Laden by identifying him with courageous resistance against genocidal invaders. It’s like naming our murder weapons after victims of our crimes: Apache, Tomahawk… It’s as if the Luftwaffe were to call its fighter planes “Jew” and “Gypsy.”

War is killing, and the US Obama administration has increased the volume of its global outreach to disrupt the global criticism of its hegemonic policies and practices. Pakistani rulers - the Generals as the practical lords controlling the governance, and the Zardari-Bhutto clan are easily bought and being used as mercenaries for the US proxy wars as they have a history of crimes and treason against the very nation that has invested in their brought-up and fed them well despite poverty and captivity under the neo-colonialism, They dealt a blow to the nation’s trust and dignity in safeguarding human lives and habitats. To undo the tormenting uncertainty overshadowing the social, economic and politics lifelines of the people of Pakistan, the conscientious Pakistani masses believe that these egomaniac rulers deserve a jolt and a place in front of firing squads to clean up the decade old accumulated stinking mess of complacency and treason to the nation. Pakistan NEEDS urgent change in its policies, practices and strategic direction by disconnecting its allegiance to US imperialism and a new government of educated and accountable people from the young generation to serve the interests of the people with HOPE and optimism and rebuild the unity and strength of Pakistani nation based on Islamic values and its freedom and dignity as sustainable independent nation for the future.

The Quranic injunction is crystal clear:

“Allah does not change the condition of people unless first they change themselves.”