"Everything that flies on anything that moves"
Oliver Kamm's latest post is about remarks made by Noam Chomsky that compare actions by Nixon and Kissinger with those of Hitler (and Eichmann).It's worth reading for many reasons, so off you go...
...ok welcome back. There's a few relatively minor points I would make.
First, not knowing much about Nixon and Kissinger's time in office I have to say I was quite shocked by the excerpts from their conversations. It is ludicrous, as Chomsky does, to compare them with those held by senior members of the Third Reich, but having failed to reach those levels of depravity, they are pretty bad. I wonder if Schwarzenegger is aware of them?
Second, I don't quite follow Oliver's argument in parts. Noting this conversation, which Chomsky believes is direct evidence of Nixon's (and Kissinger's) complicity in genocide,
It's a disgraceful performance," Nixon went on. "I want gunships in there. That means armed helicopters, DC-3s, anything else that will destroy personnel that can fly. I want it done!! Get them off their ass." "We will get it done immediately, Mr. President," Kissinger replied. After talking to Nixon, Kissinger got on the phone with Haig to pass on the president's orders for "a massive bombing campaign in Cambodia," using "anything that flies on anything that moves." The transcript then records an unintelligible comment that "sounded like Haig laughing."
Oliver says that;
The "anything that flies on anything that moves" remark, in context, is not a literal instruction; it is an ironic rendition by his national security adviser of a Presidential outburst that invites, deserves and receives derision
But is it really? I don't know what happened next. But on this basis there's nothing to say that the instruction wasn't followed literally. That Al Haig laughed is hardly conclusive, I imagine -- if I may be allowed the comparision -- that certain orders in Nazi Germany were given sardonically, or made with humour at Hitler's expense. But they were still acted upon. Surely what matters is whether or not anything the USAF had was used to fire at anything on the ground moving?
posted by Matthew @ 9/03/2004 03:34:00 PM
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