[NYTr] Washington's Holocaust Deniers

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

Counterpunch - Oct 12, 2007
http://www.counterpunch.org/cooney10122007.html


Washington's Holocaust Deniers

Should Armenian Allies Bomb the United States?

By BRENDAN COONEY

In light of President Bush's opposition to a resolution that would
acknowledge the Armenian genocide, the question must be considered as
to whether he is a madman who cannot be trusted with nuclear weapons.

Should Armenian allies adopt a preemptive approach and bomb strategic
North American sites?

U.S. press reports of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad denying the
Nazi genocide have been a flashpoint of the popular perception here
that he is either insane or a beast. In either case, he is someone who
must be attacked before he can obtain nuclear weapons.

When Ahmadinejad is asked these days whether the Nazi holocaust
occurred, he says historians need to conduct more research. It is an
answer that bears an uncanny resemblance to that of U.S. Secretary of
State Condoleezza Rice when asked about the Armenian holocaust.

In this clip, when Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) asks Rice if there is
any doubt in her mind that the murder of 1.5 million Armenians between
1915 and 1923 constitutes a genocide, she says, "I think that the
historical circumstances require a very detailed and sober look from
historians, and what we've encouraged the Turks and the Armenians to do
is to have joint historical commissions that can look at this, to have
efforts to examine their past, and in examining their past to get over
their past."

This is akin to saying the Jews and Germans should get together and
study this question of atrocities, and then for them both to get over
it. "Lots of people are coming to terms with their history," Rice adds.

She goes on to say that she doesn't think the United States weighing in
would help the process of reconciliation between Turkey and Armenia.
Well, there's an answer Ahmadinejad might wish to consider next time a
goofy "60 Minutes" guy asks him for his Holocaust position: "I don't
think me giving an answer would help the Jewish healing process."

Why is there such a runaway-mad perception in the United States that
Ahmadinejad is a runaway madman? It's because Vice President Dick
Cheney and others in the Administration want to attack Iran, and they
are flailing around for a casus belli.

The propaganda campaign against Ahmadinejad is working on two layers,
like the trompe l'oeil of an improbable masterpiece. In the background
we see hues of a kook with violent intent. Logic fades as we're
beguiled by the colors; we forget that there are probably plenty of
leaders around the world whose views would affront us, and that we
normally don't bomb for beliefs. In the foreground are strokes
outlining purported actions. These are things he hasn't just thought
but done, such as the supplying of weapons that are killing our boys
and girls in uniform. There's blood on his hands! We're already at war
with him! The painting becomes vivid, and all sense is lost, as are
recollections of the original crime of invading and occupying a
sovereign nation.

In simple terms, the propaganda war seeks to prove two things: This is
a bad person, and this is a person who has done bad things. One attacks
a mode of thought, the other a mode of action. On the mode-of-thought
level, Ahmadinejad is portrayed as guilty of two things: he wants to
wipe Israel off the map, and he denies that the Holocaust occurred.
Ahmadinejad's defenders dispute both, and they point to issues of
context and translation. On the mode-of-action level, he is charged
with supporting "terrorism" in Iraq with money and weapons.

It is hard to watch all the documentaries showing how we were duped
five years ago and think that it could ever happen again, let alone so
soon afterward. The pretext for invading Iraq was seen as a flimsy lie
by nearly everyone in the world except the ideologically tiny island of
people living in the United States. The propaganda washed like a
tsunami over the minds of everyone on that island. And don't blame the
hoi polloi. Journalists and "intellectuals" were the first to be swept
away.

Now the Administration is seeking to disprove that infamous Texas
slogan: "You can fool me, but you can't get fooled again."

Already the "intellectuals" have been suckered. Columbia University
President Lee Bollinger called Ahmadinejad a "petty and cruel dictator"
to his face and suggested he was "astonishingly ignorant." This from a
man astonishingly ignorant of the fact that Iran's unelected
commander-in-chief, the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, holds more power
than its elected president, Ahmadinejad.

In Iraq, it was the supposed existence of weapons that might or might
not be used against the United States that caused our leaders and
citizens to support an invasion. A mighty thin veil for naked
aggression. Now we're sifting through Ahmadinejad's speeches for
attitudes that might predispose him to act in a certain way if he
obtains weapons in a few years and is re-elected in 2009 though he's
not even the commander-in-chief? How thin can the veil get?

What about Turkey's denial of the Armenian holocaust? Do we even know
who the leader of Turkey is, let alone if his eyes are too close
together? No, no. We need Turkey right now to keep our occupation
well-fed, as Defense Secretary Robert Gates reminded us yesterday. We
can talk history another day.

But just like the Jews protesting Ahmadinejad's speech at Columbia
University last month, the Armenians see the relevance of discussing
history now. And if Bush and his crew continue to deny their genocide,
they could take a page from Cheney's playbook and say that here is a
lunatic country that must be stopped. It is a holocaust-denying nation
that is considerably further along in its development of nuclear
weapons than even Iran and more than anyone else has demonstrated a
willingness to use them.

Could the friends of Armenia paint this into a picture that makes
bombing the United States seem like the only sane solution? Nah, the
only ones who would buy a painting like that are living all alone on a
little island.

[Brendan Cooney is an anthropologist living in New York City. He can be
reached at: itmighthavehappened at yahoo.com ]