Tag: Afghanistan

Russian war fever: Will it spread? (Part 1)

Posted on by kathiemm

By guest author Alfred L. McAlister, Ph.D.

The chapter on “War Fever” in the forthcoming International Handbook of Negotiation and Mediation (M. Gallucio, Ed., Berlin: Springer) analyzes the psychology behind ploys used to gain popular support for military aggression. These include:

Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Putin. Photo by Cherie A. Thurlby in public domain; from Wikimedia Commons.
  • Invocation of a moral obligation
  • Advantageous comparisons with worse actions by other nations
  • The demonization of enemies

Usama Bin Laden described his followers’ attacks on the U.S. as a defense of threatened Palestinian people and children dying because of economic sanctions against Iraq, contrasted it with the U.S. atomic bombing of Japan at the end of World War II, and labeled the people of the U.S. and other Western nations as godless infidels.

In the U.S. attack on Iraq, the action was portrayed as a morally imperative act of self-defense, much less reprehensible than Saddam Hussein’s use of chemical warfare against his own people, while Hussein was depicted as a snake in political cartoons.

Following this pattern, Russian President Vladimir Putin and his followers justify the invasion of Crimea as a humanitarian act to protect threatened compatriots, contrast it with the certainly less defensible U.S. invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, and describe the new leaders of Ukraine as terrorists and Nazis.

These patterns are predictable and, unless people learn to anticipate and reject them, will continue to be effective ways to stir up popular national support and make international excuses for military aggression.

Dr. Alfred McAlister’s essay “War Fever: How Can We Resist?” will be published this spring in the International Handbook of Negotiation and Mediation, edited by Mauro Gallucio (Berlin: Springer).

Abuse of ethical standards? Experts in support of war

Posted on by kathiemm

By guest contributor Michael D. Knox, Ph.D.

Since the end of World War II, the United States has bombed more than 25 countries. In these 68 years, no other nation has killed and injured more people living outside its borders. We have more nuclear weapons, more chemical weapons, and more soldiers than all other nations combined.

Nazi physician Karl Brandt sentenced at International Military Tribunal.
Nazi physician Karl Brandt is sentenced at International Military Tribunal. Image in public domain, from Wikimedia Commons.

In 2014, the U.S. continues drone and missile attacks on residential neighborhoods in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Somalia, Libya, and Yemen. We use concentration camps, torture, assassination, threats of war, and spying on our own people.

The invasions, the killing of thousands of children, the suffering of the wounded, the torture, the environmental impact, and so on, occur only because of support provided by professionals, educators, and scientists whose ethical standards should preclude any involvement with war.

These specialized experts include university professors, scientists, healthcare providers, journalists, engineers, teachers, and the clergy. Modern U.S. wars could not be fought without the complicity of these respected groups. Such groups were also part of the German war machine.

If you are a member of a group with ethical standards, be aware of what contributions your colleagues may be making to the U.S. war efforts. Consider how ethical standards apply, hold violators accountable, and do what you can to get your profession out of the war business.

All Americans, regardless of occupation, should consider what they are doing to sustain war. Without citizen support there would be no U.S. warfare.  Please consider what you might do to show your opposition to the bloodshed. Examples of what other Americans have done are recorded in the US Peace Registry.

Michael D. Knox, Ph.D., is distinguished professor emeritus at the University of South Florida, Tampa, and chair of the US Peace Memorial Foundation. He is also editor of the US Peace Registry. Dr. Knox’s work is now focused on recognizing Americans who have had the courage to publicly oppose one or more U.S. wars www.uspeacememorial.org/WorldPeace.htm.

How wars destroy cultures: The forgotten recent history of Afghanistan

Posted on by kathiemm

By guest author Dr. Majed Ashy

Biology class, Kabul University, 1960s
Biology class, Kabul University, 1950s or ’60s. Image in public domain; from Wikimedia Commons

Many people will be surprised at images of Afghanistan from the 1960s and ‘70s. These images do not fit the stereotypes and narratives about Afghanistan with which they have been bombarded.

Those stereotypes and narratives emphasize the extreme “otherness” of certain other nations, portraying them as dramatically different and backward.

This shaping of views cannot be achieved without selling cultural stereotypes and ignoring facts of history and the present that might challenge the stereotypes.

Alfred Adler, in his theory of individual psychology, discussed how we organize our behavior, thoughts, and emotions, and our thinking about the past, present, and the future, to achieve a goal of what he termed “the ego ideal.” Sometimes we do this at the cost of truth.

The situation of Afghanistan is an example of how wars and foreign interventions can interfere with and interrupt the natural development of nations. Defeated and invaded nations do not just lose their land, peace, and treasures; they also lose their history and their progress along a path of natural development.

In times of peace, there is a natural cultural discourse between forces for progress and forces desiring to preserve cultural traditions and identity. However, when nations experience armed intervention from outside forces who might be completely ignorant about the realities of the internal situation or want to favor one side against another, wars and other forms of violence erupt and this discourse and development are interrupted.

Wars and violence can disturb the balance between the feminine and the masculine, progress and cultural identity, and hope and fear. The conditions of invasions and wars allow and encourage the expression of the most primitive and dark forces in human nature, and shift the human imagination from beauty, development, and harmony to destruction and death, and a preoccupation with basic survival.

Star Wars off their rockers

Posted on by kathiemm

In the world of Hollywood, R2-D2 is an appealing robot who comes to the rescue in every Star Wars movie. In the real world, robots are being created to kill on their own—that is, without human direction and oversight.

Big dog military robots
Big dog military robots. Image in public domain.

Although proponents of killing without risk to one’s own side use terms like “lethal autonomous robotics” or “autonomous military robots” to describe the latest product of deadly technology, the term “killer robots” captures better what these machines are programmed to do.

The Campaign to Stop Killer Robots makes a very compelling case for why it is so risky to program robots to kill and then to turn them loose.

Concerns about killer robots are strong enough and widespread enough that the Human Rights Council of the United Nations is urging a moratorium on their development “before it is too late.”

A U.N. ban on the development of killer robots is a good idea, as was the U.N. 1997 Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on their Destruction–the international agreement banning antipersonnel landmines. The U.S. is among the small number of nations that have not signed that treaty.

UNICEF estimates that in the world today there are 110 million landmines in 64 countries; many of those (e.g., in Vietnam and Afghanistan) were planted by the U.S.  Every month about 800 people–mostly innocent children and other civilians–die from landmines, and thousands more are seriously injured.

Do we really need to add killer robots to our arsenal of deadly weapons?

So many Americans cloak themselves in hatred and search for an evil empire to destroy with the latest Star Wars weaponry. They may succeed. And the empire they find and destroy may be our own.

Kathie Malley-Morrison, Professor of Psychology