Bloody Hungry Century

The last year of the last millennium ended like it started. Senseless armed conflicts, many of them fought by children. More than 300,000 children – some as young as seven – were fighting in 41 countries at the dawn of the 21st century, according to a report published by the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers. Children are recruited because of “their very qualities as children – they can be cheap, expendable and easier to condition into fearless killing and unthinkable obedience," the report said.

The U.S. and British military recruit 17-year-olds voluntarily into their armies. Many child soldiers are recruited unwittingly and die unnecessarily. Not just as soldiers, but innocent victims of heartless regimes that sacrifice their young innocent lives in the name of “the cause”.

Mohammed al Durra, the 12-year-old Palestinian boy killed in the arms of his father while cowering behind a cement block in 2000, is one such vivid example that was beamed globally. A commercial on Palestinian television shows an actor playing Mohammed in heaven flying a kite in a lush meadow, frolicking on a beach and riding a Ferris wheel in an amusement park. He then calls on the Palestinian children, saying: “I am not waving goodbye, I am waving to tell you to follow in my footsteps.”

The inscription on Mohammed’s grave calls him a martyr – the term the Palestinian Authority used to describe the other 192 children killed in one year during the Intifada in the opening year of the 21st century.

Mahmoud Masleh is a principal at a Hamas-funded school that teaches children to become martyrs. “What do you want to be when you grow up?” Masleh asked Mohmen Din, 5, whose father, a Hamas member, had been killed. “I want to be just like him,” the child answered. That earned him a hug and a kiss from the principal.

The use of child suicide bombers by the Palestinians was highlighted when an unwitting 10-year old boy was stopped at an Israeli checkpoint laden with a bomb. The boy’s life had been saved only because a booby-trapped cell phone inside his bag failed to explode.

The chief of security in the West Bank, Jibril Rajoub, described these teachings and practices as “dangerous things about Islam”. He added, “No one has a right to dictate their crazy vision to our children.”

Children wanting to follow in the footsteps of their fathers are not limited to Palestine. Children in Afghanistan know no other way of life. The United Nations estimates that half of the 23 million Afghans are under 18. Almost all of the children are living in poverty. Some are psychologically scarred and most have few role models other than soldiers. “This is a problem of the center of the Afghan situation,” said Olara Otunnu, the U.N. special representative for children and armed conflict. “You are talking about two generations of children and youth who have been exposed to war nonstop.”

The closing century of the millennium was the bloodiest in history. More than 160 million human beings were killed in various conflicts. It is a dark history, but unless We The Maids look carefully into the dark corners of the White House that create war and shine the bright light of peace in the 21st century, it will only get darker in the 21st century.

David Reiff in his book A Bed for the Night; Humanitarianism in Crisis, with disconsolate satisfaction quotes Alberto Navarro, former director of the European Commission Humanitarian Aid Office, as correctly saying, “Mankind is slowly but in a very determined way going back to barbarism.”

China the “Peer Competitor”

China will emerge as what Pentagon planners call a “peer competitor” to the United States in East Asia – the economic pivot of the 21st century. Rather than fighting the rise of China, America should recognize the significant benefits that can result. There is no reason the Sino-America relationship is not correctly calibrated to avoid war.

America and China must find equilibrium for the Pacific Century to be a peaceful one. America cannot be allowed to launch a second Cold War merely to preserve its position as the sole military power.

The bombing of Cambodia and the national anguish over Vietnam spurred Congress to override President Nixon’s veto and enact a law that it hoped would prevent future presidents from waging an undeclared war. The War Powers Resolution of 1973 was a masterpiece of deadlines and trip wires, all carefully constructed to keep a president in check.

Debate over how the president and Congress should share power in matters of war is as old as the republic. Presidents have sent forces abroad more than 100 times; Congress has declared war only five times: the War of 1812, the Mexican War, the Spanish-American War, World War I and World War II.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee held hearings in 1966 on the Vietnam War that resulted in America’s eventual withdrawal. Why isn’t it holding hearings today on the Iraq War? The constitutional checks and balances are out of balance with bouncing expensive checks being covered by We the Apathetic taxpayers.

Article II of the Constitution makes the president commander in chief. But Article I puts responsibility for declaring war solely in congressional hands, and Congress, most notably in 1973, has spasmodically tried to keep it there. But in practice, it has long been content to cede most of the authority to the White House. We saw that most graphically with the White House declaration of war on terrorism in the wake of September 11.

Why do We the Apathetic People accept this? Shouldn’t this power to declare war be in the firm grip of We the People in the New World Cyber Order? Isn’t it time We the Maids take this power back into our hands where it belongs?

So why is it that Congress, the branch with the constitutional right to declare war, has allowed the White House to again usurp that power and again create an insecure America in the 21st century?

The Iraq War has caused the U.S. to become the world’s most reckless and careless borrower. It is consuming over 75 percent of the world’s surplus savings – most of it coming from Asia. The cost of America being the primary underwriter of the Iraq War and reconstruction has stretched U.S. military and financial capacity to the limit. The record U.S. current account and budget deficit being financed by the treasuries China, Hong Kong and other Asian countries are buying is allowing America to live dangerously beyond its means.

A sudden plunge in the dollar – the world’s reserve currency – could devastate the world financial markets and U.S. economy, all because of a senseless war waged without a sensible coalition. The U.S. budget deficit is a greater short-term risk to America than terrorism.

Arabia

The Wahhabis of Saudi Arabia are detested by both the Shiites and Hijazis, the two largest groupings in Arabia, because they have been treated as second class citizens by the Wahhabis ever since the Al Saud family made their pact with the Wahhabi clan that enshrined its extreme fundamentalism as both the religion and law of the land.

Other tribes, especially those from the border region with Yemen, also have little tolerance for the Saudi royals and their extreme Wahhabbism. Many in Saudi Arabia, especially the Hijazis still regard the Hashemites – including the Jordanian royal family – as the legitimate rulers of the region. The Saudi royals forced the Hashemites out of Arabia with the support of Britain that enthroned them in Iraq and Jordan.

The borders of Arabia have to be re-drawn to include the Shiites in Southern Iraq, present day Jordan and the proposed Palestinian State. Interlocalism will allow them to interlocalize as one country of Arabs with different religious beliefs as they have done going back to biblical times.

Let’s not forget that successive U.S. administrations built up Iraq to protect Saudi Arabia from Iran. When that didn’t work America went to war twice with Iraq – again to protect the Saudi kingdom. The Saudi royals and their Wahhabi hard-line fundamentalism have been described in open congressional hearings as the epicenter of terrorism. Is this a grouping We the Apathetic People want to continue to keep in power in the 21st century so they can continue to forment terror? Isn’t it time We the Maids sweep them out and sweep in interlocal borders that allow all the tribes in the region to prosper in peace from their oil resources instead of just one family?