Posted on 26-2-2003

War for Peace? It Worked in My Country
By JOSÉ RAMOS-HORTA*

Ed. intro: Not what I expected to read. After all, if the arguments by the
US hawks are accepted, then analysed, the `liberation' argument simply says
we're bombing and killing the Iraq people for their own good. Who asked
those people if they want "bombs falling"? Has anybody conducted a
referredum on that, the essence of democracy and liberation? It seems that
the PR spin on this war, so transparent to many, still has traction for
most - if so, after the war for people's minds comes the real thing, having
won minds, thousands will lose them, permanently.

.

I often find myself counting how many of us are left in this world. One
recent morning my two surviving brothers and I had coffee together. And I
found myself counting again. We were seven brothers and five sisters,
another large family in this tiny Catholic country.

One brother died when he was a baby. Antonio, our oldest brother, died in
1992 of lack of medical care. Three other siblings were murdered in our
country's long conflict with Indonesia. One, a younger sister, Maria
Ortencia, died on Dec. 19, 1978, killed by a rocket fired from a OV-10
Bronco aircraft, which the United States had sold to Indonesia. She was
buried on a majestic mountaintop and her grave was tended by the humble
people of the area for 20 years.

Early in September of last year, I went through the heart-wrenching process
of unearthing the improvised grave of our sister, whom I last saw when she
was 18. As her body was exhumed, I noticed that the back of her head and
one side of her face had been blown off. She must have died instantly. We
reburied our sister in the cemetery in the capital, Dili. Two other
siblings who were killed, our brothers Nuno and Guilherme, were executed by
Indonesian soldiers in 1977. With little information on the area where they
were killed and disposed of, we have no hope of recovering their bodies for
a dignified burial.

There is hardly a family in my country that has not lost a loved one. Many
families were entirely wiped out during the decades of occupation by
Indonesia and the war of resistance against it. The United States and other
Western nations contributed to this tragedy. Some bear a direct
responsibility because they helped Indonesia by providing military aid.
Others were accomplices through indifference and silence. But all redeemed
themselves. In 1999, a global peacekeeping force helped East Timor secure
its independence and protect its people. It is now a free nation.

But I still acutely remember the suffering and misery brought about by war.
It would certainly be a better world if war were not necessary. Yet I also
remember the desperation and anger I felt when the rest of the world chose
to ignore the tragedy that was drowning my people. We begged a foreign
power to free us from oppression, by force if necessary.

So I follow with some consternation the debate on Iraq in the United
Nations Security Council and in NATO. I am unimpressed by the grandstanding
of certain European leaders. Their actions undermine the only truly
effective means of pressure on the Iraqi dictator: the threat of the use of
force.

Critics of the United States give no credit to the Bush administration's
aggressive strategy, even though it is the real reason that Iraq has
allowed weapons inspectors to return and why Baghdad is cooperating a bit
more, if it indeed is at all.

The antiwar demonstrations are truly noble. I know that differences of
opinion and public debate over issues like war and peace are vital. We
enjoy the right to demonstrate and express opinions today because East
Timor is an independent democracy — something we didn't have during a
25-year reign of terror. Fortunately for all of us, the age of
globalization has meant that citizens have a greater say in almost every
major issue.

But if the antiwar movement dissuades the United States and its allies from
going to war with Iraq, it will have contributed to the peace of the dead.
Saddam Hussein will emerge victorious and ever more defiant. What has been
accomplished so far will unravel. Containment is doomed to fail. We cannot
forget that despots protected by their own elaborate security apparatus are
still able to make decisions.

Saddam Hussein has dragged his people into at least two wars. He has used
chemical weapons on them. He has killed hundreds of thousands of people and
tortured and oppressed countless others. So why, in all of these
demonstrations, did I not see one single banner or hear one speech calling
for the end of human rights abuses in Iraq, the removal of the dictator and
freedom for the Iraqis and the Kurdish people? If we are going to
demonstrate and exert pressure, shouldn't it be focused on the real
villain, with the goal of getting him to surrender his weapons of mass
destruction and resign from power? To neglect this reality, in favor of
simplistic and irrational anti-Americanism, is obfuscating the true debate
on war and peace.

I agree that the Bush administration must give more time to the weapons
inspectors to fulfill their mandate. The United States is an unchallenged
world power and will survive its enemies. It can afford to be a little more
patient. Kofi Annan, the secretary general of the United Nations, has
proved himself to be a strong mediator and no friend of dictators. He and a
group of world leaders should use this time to persuade Saddam Hussein to
resign and go into exile. In turn, Saddam Hussein could be credited with
preventing another war and sparing his people. But even this approach will
not work without the continued threat of force.

Abandoning such a threat would be perilous. Yes, the antiwar movement would
be able to claim its own victory in preventing a war. But it would have to
accept that it also helped keep a ruthless dictator in power and explain
itself to the tens of thousands of his victims.

History has shown that the use of force is often the necessary price of
liberation. A respected Kosovar intellectual once told me how he felt when
the world finally interceded in his country: "I am a pacifist. But I was
happy, I felt liberated, when I saw NATO bombs falling."

José Ramos-Horta, East Timor's minister of foreign affairs and cooperation,
shared the Nobel Peace Prize in 1996.