Support for U.S. Bombing of Aghanistan Wanes as Campaign Continues, Injuries Mount

By Lucy Jones

When U.S. and British air strikes against Taliban-held areas of Afghanistan commenced Oct. 7, most European newspapers backed the attacks. The bombing is a “legitimate” act of defense, said Spain’s El Pais the following day. “After weeks of uncertainty, the first strikes…signal a shift from an almost unrealistic phase of animated suspense to concrete action,” noted Germany’s Frankfurter Allgemeine on the same day. The United States and its allies should not be motivated by revenge, said France’s Liberation of Oct. 8, but admitted it was “completely unrealistic to exclude the use of force against a ‘tentacular’ organization dedicated to violence.”

By the end of October, however, as photographs of bleeding Afghan children began appearing on front pages, newspapers struck a different tone. “Majority want bombing pause,” said a front-page headline in London’s Guardian on Oct. 30, above a picture of a maimed Afghan boy. The previous day, Paris’s Le Monde had urged the U.S. government to halt the use of cluster bombs in Afghanistan, describing their use in a country still littered with millions of antipersonnel mines as “morally odious and extremely counterproductive.” Each cluster bomb, the paper said, contains up to 200 smaller bomblets which, if they fail to hit their target, can remain in the ground and kill or injure any civilians who so much as touch them.

“Over a period of a few days, the U.S. and British were guilty of badly targeted bombings and massacring civilians without enabling their local allies on the ground to make any significant advances,” complained Geneva’s Le Temps on Oct. 29.

Meanwhile, some pundits questioned whether the bombing ever would achieve the results the West is seeking, including the fall of the Taliban and capture of Osama bin Laden. “The Afghans are now falling in behind the Taliban,” wrote Jason Burke in London’s Observer on Oct. 21. “That is not only tragic but also dangerous. The strikes are swiftly radicalizing what was essentially a moderate country,” Burke claimed. “Two years ago, few Afghan fighters I spoke to could point to their own country on a globe, let alone discuss the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Now they can all talk about the ‘Ameriki’ and its ‘tyranny’ against Muslims.”

France’s Le Monde of Oct. 25 issued a warning: “If you look at comments made anywhere from Jakarta to Cairo, Casablanca to Jeddah there is unanimous condemnation of the military operation against Afghanistan—even if there is no support for Osama bin Laden…It would be dangerous to ignore this. And the civilian casualties are making the rift deeper.”

Bin Laden Should Appear on TV, Say European Papers

The question of whether the unexpurgated versions of Osama bin Laden’s TV appearances should be allowed into American homes received a resounding “yes” from European editorial writers. An Oct. 11 editorial in the French Liberation thought it unwise of Washington to impose domestic restrictions on the relaying of the footage taken by the Qatar-based Al-Jazeera TV station. The present conflict, the paper noted, “was born on live television,” referring to the horrific TV footage of Sept. 11. “It is not so much a confrontation of two powers but of two world views, and its true battlefield is first and foremost that of public opinion,” the newspaper continued. “Instead of berating Al-Jazeera,” it stressed, “we should ponder why mutations like the Taliban are precisely the fruit of state censorship of the media in the Arab world.”

Spain’s Avui of the same day was confident that such freedoms are safe in American hands. “There have been attempts during grave situations in the short history of the United States to curtail rights and freedoms guaranteed by the constitution,” the paper said. “But in most cases they have failed to prosper, because the Americans defend such rights and freedoms as a part of their make-up as a nation.”

Madrid’s El Mundo of Oct. 11 agreed, pointing out that the free flow of information is a key element in enabling citizens to form an honest opinion.

Al-Jazeera TV “Loudly” Interrupted Proceedings

The Qatar-located Al-Jazeera television network, which until now has been the only broadcasting company to have permanent correspondents inside Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, has scooped the world’s media outlets in its coverage of the war. While the U.S. may be the superior military power, it should not underestimate its opponents when it comes to the propaganda war, Germany’s Frankfurter Allgemeine noted Oct. 22. The new Radio Free Afghanistan, which is broadcasting in the Pashtun and Dari languages, is an attempt by the Americans to deal with the fact that complete control of the Afghan media lies with the Taliban, continued the newspaper. Yet the Americans will have a hard time beating Al-Jazeera, the Arab broadcaster which has been bringing videos of Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda network to the Muslim world. “The battle for the hearts and minds of the people will not be won by ground troops,” the paper concluded, “but instead by camera teams and media strategists.”

Austria’s Der Standard of the same day saw the Al-Jazeera TV station as ensuring what it calls “a near equality of arms in the battle of the air waves” between the United States and its adversaries. “While during the Gulf War the whole world was served news brewed by CNN for Western-Northern palates,” the paper continued, “this time around another voice has loudly interrupted the proceedings.” Western leaders should accept Al-Jazeera’s power, it suggested, and follow in the British prime minister’s footsteps in granting the network an interview.

Blair Supports “Viable Palestinian State”

The Oct. 15 meeting in London between Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and British Prime Minister Tony Blair was widely heralded as a diplomatic coup for the Palestinians. Arafat “got from the British prime minister the words he was hoping to hear,” France’s Le Monde said Oct. 17. These words, the newspaper explained, were Blair’s support for “a viable Palestinian state” and assurances that Britain would “help re-invigorate the Middle East peace process.” Arafat’s “return to a state of grace with the United States” has been helped by what the paper called “the verbal excesses and tactlessness of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.” Twice in the space of 10 days, Le Monde pointed out, President George W. Bush “publicly supported the creation of a Palestinian state.” The wind in Washington suddenly has turned in Arafat’s favor, the paper concluded.

After a somewhat passive start, President Bush is now showing that he is prepared to play a more active role in the Middle East and willing to put more pressure on Israel to bring about peace, said Sweden’s Dagens Nyheter on Oct. 29. That is going to be necessary to solve the situation in Afghanistan, commented France’s Le Nouvel Observateur of Oct. 12. “The crisis in the Middle East is feeding the stores of resentment of millions and millions of Muslims. The United States and its allies will not succeed if they fail to make progress... toward an agreement between Israelis and Palestinians,” said the newspaper. “Such an agreement,” it added, “could be achieved if [Israeli Prime Minister] Ariel Sharon stopped putting up resistance to it. Now that Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat is being openly attacked by the Islamists, Mr. Sharon can no longer say that ‘Arafat is another Bin Laden,’” it pointed out. If there is one gesture that the Israelis must make without delay, the paper said, it is to withdraw their forces from certain settlements which are acting as outposts for provocation. “This is the way, the only way,” the French publication concluded, “that the Israelis can show solidarity with the United States.”

London’s Independent, in an Oct. 25 editorial, claimed that, even if it succeeds in the current war, the United States will still face hatred abroad: “For as long as there is no Palestinian state and the U.S. continues to be partisan in the conflict, so long will the U.S. continue to be hated in the developing world.”

Pakistan’s Dilemma

Rioting in Pakistan, sparked by the support its government afforded the U.S. and Britain, kept the country’s plight in the pages of the European press throughout October. London’s Guardian on Oct. 29described Pakistan as the weakest link, as its government is under threat because of a “forced alliance with Washington.” “The rapid fall of the Taliban would perhaps have prevented the temperature from rising too high in the Pakistani cauldron,” the newspaper continued, “but the Taliban could still be in power in the spring.”

Spain’s El Pais voiced the same sentiment on Oct. 10,saying President Musharraf faced an “extremely complicated and delicate situation” at home. For the time being, the paper said, Musharraf has managed to control demonstrations against his support for the Anglo-American operation, and has removed pro-Taliban figures from key posts in the army. Noting, however, that Pakistan’s biggest Islamist party “threatened to bring its millions of supporters out on to the streets,” it suggested that the longer the strikes continue, “the greater the risk of destabilization.”

German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder’s visit to Pakistan at the end of October gave little in return, said Germany’s Frankfurter Rundschau on Oct. 30. “The criticism [by Pakistan] of the U.S. campaign in Afghanistan continues,” argued an editorial, “the refusal to open the borders to refugees still stands and the threatening noises toward India have not ceased.”

The Kashmir Threat

Given the fragility of peace in Pakistan, Kashmir could become the catalyst for the spread of conflict between India and Pakistan, said a number of European papers in October. U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell’s efforts to placate Pakistan and India are crucial in view of the enormous threat Kashmir represents to global peace, warned Austria’s Die Presse on Oct. 17. “The collapse of the current government in Pakistan and a fundamentalist take-over in Islamabad could unleash a conflagration which could not be extinguished by any alliance, no matter how skillfully forged,” the newspaper gloomily noted. “The two nuclear powers, Pakistan and India, would confront each other in a war over Kashmir.”

Germany’s Berliner Zeitung said on the same day that the “most dangerous border in the world since the fall of the Berlin Wall” runs through the disputed region. “It is hardly surprising that Mr. Powell has raised the issue on his current visit,” the paper continued, “since it was above all because of Kashmir that India and Pakistan acquired nuclear weapons. Both have stated that they would deploy them ‘if necessary.’” Kashmir is closely linked to the Afghan crisis, the newspaper pointed out, because in the early 1990s, Pakistan helped the Taliban gain power in order to secure allies on its eastern Kashmiri front.

Pro-Peace Lobby Welcomed

Germany’s Frankfurter Rundschau on Oct. 15 welcomed the first anti-war protests following the start of the bombing raids on Afghanistan, seeing them as a much-needed critical voice. “In all great questions of politics, it is good to have people participate actively,” the paper said, “regardless of how accurate their arguments might be.”

An editorial the same day in Austria’s Die Presse, however, put forward the view that although the sincerity of the anti-war protests now spreading in Europe cannot be doubted, the people involved are not offering any constructive alternatives. “One would take the peace movement protests more seriously if they were able to present viable alternatives,” it said. The paper also asked, rhetorically, where all the protesters were in the weeks immediately after the attacks on the U.S.

Lucy Jones is a free-lance journalist based in London.