From: "Dave Coull" <d.y.coull-AT-dundee.ac.uk>
Date: Thu, 1 Apr 1999 15:56:32 GMT
Subject: The Anarchist Attitude To War


Brian sent a message saying "arm the Kosovars" .
I accidentally deleted it, but I can remember the gist.

What would that mean in practice ? Is Brian asking 
the -AT--list subscribers to arm the Kosovars ?

No, of course he isn't. What it means is 
"please, o governments of the USA and
the United Kingdom and the other NATO
governments, will  _you_  arm the Kosovars?"

Brian said that he was talking about arming the whole population,
and not just the KLA.  But   -   let's face it   -   neither the USA
nor any other government is in the business of handing out
arms with no strings attached. Did the USA arm the whole 
population of Nicaragua ? No, they armed the Contras. 
Did the USA arm the whole population of Afghanistan ?
No, they armed the Mujahideen. In practice, what we are
talking about is a government handing over weapons 
to some local warlord and his organisation, strings attached.

And would this arming be instead of using bombs and Cruise
missiles ? No, apparently not. Brian still wants B52s and Cruise
missiles. He would just like them to be better aimed. Well ,
I'm sure there is nobody in the top brass of NATO who would 
disagree with that. By asking for the use of such weapons, 
Brian is supporting the existence of NATO, and the existence
of the governments which make up NATO. 

Brian is not the first person to get sucked into supporting 
the state war machine for what appeared (at the time)
to be good, humanitarian motives. Even anarchists can
make that mistake. But , of course , in doing so, they
abandon anarchism. The most famous example 
is Kropotkin, who supported the First World War
on humanitarian grounds. It was a mistake for
Kropotkin to abandon anarchist principles then,
and it's a mistake now.

I know that not everybody on the anarchy-list 
is an anarchist, but presumably everybody
on the anarchy-list is at least interested 
in what we anarchists think. So let's be
clear about this. Anarchism is not pacifist,
but it   _IS_   anti-war. If somebody wanted
to have a go at assassinating Milosevic, 
I doubt if anybody in anarchist circles would
shed a tear over that. In fact, I doubt if any tears
would be shed over the entire Yugoslav government
being assassinated. But anarchists do not ask
state war machines to do things. The  _only_
anarchist thing to say to a state war machine
is "STOP" .




Dave