A chilling subject title but one that has been stated this weekend by General Lord Guthrie, former Chief of the Defence Staff who has "criticised the Government for not putting the country onto a war footing."
It is indeed a worrying factor when viewing the underlying reasons for that statement. In short, and as we have seen this weekend with yet another four soldiers killed in action, that we are most certainly at war.
For those who seek to draw a comparison with the former Northern Ireland Troubles - stop there. There is no comparison. In the Province we dealt with sectarian violence. In Afghanistan we are dealing with all out war.
Any of our troops will be only too well aware that they are engaged in a war. It is only the people back at home that seem to be unaware.
Nevertheless, there is a stirring amongst sections of the population.
On the one hand, we yearn to bring our troops back, but on the other hand, to do so would be extreme folly.
We have to defeat the Teleban. There is no negotiation with such people.
For those who seek to find a reason to negotiate, I would say this. Go ahead and negotiate all you like. But do not expect me to back a regime and religion that sees its Parliament pass a law this week permitting men to starve their wives should their wives refuse to allow them to have sex with them.
We are of course dealing with different cultures, different approaches to life and different moral standards, and none of us can claim the moral high ground, especially with this evening's BBC Radio 4 news reports of our own direct involvement in acts of rendition, the new buzz word for what my generation calls physical and mental torture.
Regardless of the circumstances, there is no justification for rendition.
I am very concerned but at least the matter is being publicly debated.
That of course is one of the great advantages of the democratic freedom that we, in the UK, take for granted.
Let us therefore persist in our determination to overcome tyranny and to quietly go about reforming Parliament but without any more witch hunts.
Kenneth T Webb
The Editor
Liverpool CityLife
18.8.2009
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Well Written my friend. You convey the injustice with empathy and poignancy!! Have you read "a 1000 splendid suns" by Khaled Hosseini? Very good writer. I too despair at the amount of people that have died in the name of "religion". I cannot help but think that from day one religion has been a simple, splendid way of controlling, scaring, extorting from people!! You know.... do this, act this way, pay this amount or you are going to hell my son. Well it has brought hell to many people, but not down below, right here on this wonderful planet of ours.
ReplyDelete