Message from discussion Chomsky and Afghanistan (was Re: Chomsky's accuracy)

From: Charles P. Kalina <ckal...@capaccess.org>
Subject: Chomsky and Afghanistan (was Re: Chomsky's accuracy)
Date: 2000/07/24
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In article <8l4oqo$c...@nnrp1.deja.com>,
  jvin...@yahoo.com wrote:
> I find Chomsky interesting not for the details he provides but for the
> things he makes you think about.  Several of my favourite examples...

[Iraq addressed at length separately]

> Similarities between Vietnam and Afganistan.  That is install puppet
> regime, be invited in, ... ;)

Yes, there are superficial similarities between the US in Vietnam and
the Soviets in Afghanistan.  By fixating on these superficial
similarities, Chomsky insinuated that the US was no different that the
Soviet Union (at least in its foreign policy), except perhaps that it
was more hypocritical.

But does the analogy have substance?  If not, then Chomsky is
not "making us think";  he's manipulating the reader into accepting a
falsehood.

Someone (John O'Sullivan?) once pointed out that when an oncoming bus
looks like it's about to hit an old lady, it's OK to shove her to
safety, but it isn't OK to shove her in front of the bus.  Clearly we
wouldn't say that both must be equally bad because they both involve
shoving an old lady.

By the same argument:  it's one thing to send troops to a foreign
country to save it from Stalinist totalitarianism (the US in Vietnam).
It's something very different to send troops to a foreign country to
establish or preserve Stalinist totalitarianism (the Soviets in
Afghanistan).  It's obvious nonsense to demand that we, or the media,
should ignore this distinction.

In any case, Chomsky's point about the American news media isn't
correct.  They did not ignore the alleged similarity;  on the contrary,
they frequently spoke of Afghanistan as the Soviets' Vietnam.

Nor do the media generally eschew the term "invasion" when discussing
US military action.  The press apparently use the term "invasion" to
describe the sudden introduction of large numbers of troops.  Our
Vietnam build-up was too gradual to be so described, but our actions in
Grenada and Panama were routinely described as "invasions".

In other words, Chomsky did what he usually does, as we saw in his
comparison of Cambodia and East Timor:  he picked two isolated data
points that did not provide an adequate test of his hypothesis, but
which pointed to the conclusion he wanted.

As an aside, we may also note that Chomsky gave credence to Soviet
propaganda rationales for the invasion of Afghanistan, something he
certainly never did with the thinking behind US policy in Vietnam.

(Granted, he qualified this endorsement with the usual doublespeak and
equivocation.  He repeated them uncritically, and gratuitously repeated
after each one that they were all "true", which plants in the reader's
mind the idea that these should be relevant to our judgment of Soviet
policy.  Then he casually declares that none of these facts should be
relevant to our judgment of Soviet policy.)


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