Anouar Abdel-Malek examines the connections between, and alternatives to After a long, hot summer I could have resumed my discussion on the dimensions of the current war, the significance of the crisis and ways to overcome, or at least minimise, the bleak effects of both. Now, however, I feel it is urgent to plumb root causes and explore the origins of the mentality that has brought the world to the brink of a new, highly destructive world war, the prelude to which lies in the mass graves in Afghanistan, Palestine and Iraq. The focus is on the philosophy of civilisation that motivates the key theorists, instigators and drivers of the world war policy. The news we receive day after day confirms the growing bankruptcy of the policy embraced by the leaders of the monopolar superpower in the era of George W. Bush who tenaciously maintain that violence is the key to achieving universal domination. The daily deaths of Iraqi civilians in the course of inspections, the daily casualties among US and British forces in steadily escalating clashes with the Iraqi resistance, the impotence of the Iraqi Governing Council which has yet to win the support of the Iraqi public, rapidly deteriorating standards of living, not to mention public security -- these and other factors have convinced global public opinion that violence and the perpetuation of violence can never pave the way to a return to normality and decent living conditions for the Iraqi people, let alone to the establishment of a democratic system of government and a legitimately elected national leadership. In "Washington's utopians: The philosophers of chaos reap a whirlwind," (Herald Tribune, 23 August 2003) William Pfaff offers a concise portrait of the ideological cornerstones, implications, objectives and ultimate fate of the "philosophy of chaos". He writes: "The intensification of violence in Iraq is the logical outcome of the Bush administration's choice in 2001 to treat terrorism as a military problem with a military solution -- a catastrophic oversimplification." It was this logic that led Washington to invade two Islamic states, Afghanistan and Iraq, neither of which was responsible for the attacks of 11 September 2001. Rather than solving the problem, these campaigns "inflated the crisis, in the eyes of millions of Muslims, into a clash between the US and Islamic society". In addition "the two wars did not destroy Al-Qaeda. They won it new supporters. The US is no more secure than it was before. The wars opened killing fields in two countries that no one knows how to shut down, with American forces themselves increasingly the victims. This was not supposed to happen." Pfaff goes on to explain why the administration was so bent on the use of violence: "The neoconservatives believe that destruction produces creation. They believe that to smash and conquer is to be victorious. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of Israel is an influence, although one would think they might have seen that a policy of smash and conquer has given him no victories in Lebanon or the Palestinian territories." Where did this faith in constructive destruction -- if one may use that expression -- come from? The neoconservatives, Pfaff writes, "believe that the US has a real mission: to destroy the forces of unrighteousness. They also believe -- and this is their great illusion -- that such destruction will free the natural forces of freedom and democracy." This faith was shaped by two factors, both products of World War I. The first was "the Trotskyist version of Marxist millenarianism that was the seedbed of the neoconservative movement". The second influence Pfaff describes as "very American". The neoconservatives, he writes, "are credulous followers of Woodrow Wilson, a sentimental utopian who really believed that the he had been sent by God to lead mankind to a better world". The philosophy of chaos was translated into a programme of action by Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle and their neoconservative colleagues in Washington, with disastrous consequences. As Pfaff observes: "They assumed that destroying Saddam's regime would automatically establish a liberal democracy in Iraq. But wrecking a society's structure produces wreckage, not utopian change. To believe otherwise leads one to conduct a foreign policy of global destabilisation and disruption that creates political anarchy, human suffering and new foyers of violence and terrorism..." I have cited the commentary of this eminent American journalist extensively because it represents an important effort at understanding the mentality that prevails in the capital that is, for the moment, dominating the world stage. It is my belief that we must probe deeper, not simply accuse and condemn. I further believe that this process compels us to pool ideas so as to better enable global forces, including rational and democratic forces in the US and the UK, to work together to steer the world away from a policy of comprehensive violence and, thereby, safeguard our planet and the future of all peoples and nations. As certain sectors of US society begin to feel the dread that has taken hold of global official and grass- roots opinion, the programme of mass destruction proceeds apace. I will not dwell on the details of the project to create a new generation of tactical nuclear weapons inaugurated by US Congress in May 2003, as these details have been treated exhaustively by experts in Egypt and elsewhere. Suffice it to say that the new weapons are intended to penetrate hundreds of metres below the ground in order to destroy underground shelters girded by reinforced cement walls. Experts say that more than 70 nations use deeply buried shelters for a variety of purposes. According to the New Scientist, the new gamma-ray bomb has already been included on the US Department of Defense's Militarily Critical Technologies List -- those technologies which the Pentagon believes are essential in maintaining US superiority. The threatened deployment of this weapon, currently being developed at the US Air Force Research Laboratory in Kirland, New Mexico, is guaranteed to intimidate friend and foe alike. The magazine reports that a single gramme of the hafnium isomer used in the bomb stores more energy than 50 kilogrammes of TNT. An explosion of this nuclear- isomer would "release high-energy gamma rays capable of killing any living thing in the immediate area". Undetonated material would remain dispersed in the air as small radioactive particles which "could cause long-term health problems to anyone who breathed it in". What are the implications of Washington's determination to produce this new generation of WMD? Above all, it means that the US is seeking to develop an offensive arsenal that would make anyone contemplating resistance stop in their tracks. At the heart of Washington's policy of global warfare is the notion that preemptive terror, or deterrent power, resides in technological superiority. The concept of technology has changed over the ages. Technological advances in construction, for example, made possible the immense architectural monuments in ancient civilisations in Egypt, Persia, China, Mesopotamia, Mexico and Peru. At various periods throughout history technological advances were put to other uses, most notably for the purpose of destruction and conquest, albeit on a relatively limited scale. The weapons technology and associated infrastructure developed under the Roman Empire are but one example. It was the European Renaissance, however, that lent the greatest impetus to the scientific and industrial revolutions that had the most profound impact on the concept of technology. The guiding idea was that man was the centre of the universe, its sole ruler. Man had the power to use technology acquired through scientific discoveries to produce infinitely, consume infinitely and satisfy his pleasures without limit, within which belief resides the origins of free market economics. The age of traditional faith ended with the feudal era in Europe. André Gide, at the beginning of the 20th century, eloquently summed up the attitude: "I stand tall, naked on the virgin earth ready to remake the heavens." To remake the heavens -- after remaking the earth, reconstituting all its political, social and economic systems and reordering all aspects of mankind's daily affairs: is this not precisely the neoconservatives' project for total supremacy? Total supremacy differs from colonialist or imperialist ventures. It is all pervasive and aims to stifle not just competition but all other attempts to participate in the decisions that shape our collective fate. And the tool to realise this unprecedented project is found in an advanced technology that can produce armaments systems that carry maximum preemptive terror power. What do others have to say about this insanity? Illumination comes from the pages of Joseph Needham's Science and Civilization in China. A biologist by training, Needham dedicated much his life to the writing and compilation of this monumental work which he began in 1942. Among his other publications are collections of essays on philosophy, politics, religion and the social sciences. The first of these, Time: The Refreshing River, appeared in 1943 and was updated and reissued under the same title several years ago. In his introduction Needham observes the extraordinary impact of contemporary technology on mankind, pointing in particular to the enormous destructive power of the atomic bomb used to defeat the forces of fascism in World War II. He then poses an important conundrum. If it is desirable that the know- how derived from modern science be universalised so that all peoples benefit, should the same apply to nuclear technology? In his opinion, in this far from perfect world, the answer should be no. "Mankind, today, desperately needs to learn a fundamental lesson," Needham writes. This lesson can be derived from the book of Chuang Tzu, a ninth century Taoist text that treats mankind's relationship with various phenomena in nature and the arts. Needham points in particular to an allegory about a king who mounted a search for a craftsman to manufacture the sharpest, deadliest swords for his army. The moral, he writes, is that people are capable of performing such feats and more, but are also capable of taking the decision not to do so. "The continued existence of mankind will remain in the balance as long as we do not learn that even if we know a truth we do not necessarily have to apply it. Knowledge is not harmful in itself; however man must avoid acting on everything of which he is capable." He concludes: "The technological imperative that has it that we must do everything we can possibly do, whether or not it is in people's interests, must be resisted. This, and only this, will make it possible to create a world worthy for people to live in in the future." When, one might wonder, will mankind ever learn this lesson? Certainly this eminent scholar whose work and writings bridge the east and west offers one of the clearest and hopeful philosophical missives of the 20th century. Taking this missive as a platform, I would like now to explore a number of practicable approaches to countering the philosophy of chaos. To begin with we must address the prevalent, and contradictory, concepts of the nature of man and his world. Is man a rational creature as we have come to believe? Is he the master of the universe, with free title to everything in it? The first question requires an examination of the nature of the relationship between the intellect and faith. Is not the unlimited exercise of the intellect available to all, and is it not our duty to exercise it? And if so, how can we put bounds on man's use of his intellect towards the advancement of the sciences and their technological applications? Man is the master of the universe, or so the ideologies prevalent in the West since the 16th century have it. How, then, might he grope his way to intellectual maturity and self-discipline while still retaining a single-minded focus on securing unlimited control over the universe? These questions bring us to another, tangential set of questions regarding the practical affairs of man. How is man to interact with his society, and his society with the world around him? What are the potentials, challenges and limits in terms of cooperation, uniformity and harmony, and, conversely, in terms of conflict, disparity and variety, within the contexts of his society and the world at large? There are no magic answers though we can make some inroads towards a satisfactory one. The survival of the human race, in all its national and cultural diversity, demands we strive towards constructive cooperation between the self and the other. Such cooperation can only be effectively achieved when man makes a fundamental moral choice to opt for life instead of ruin, peace instead of war, coexistence instead of confrontation, construction instead of destruction. Although this premise seems axiomatic and incontrovertible, people everywhere cannot help but notice the banners violence, war and destruction -- in a word, chaos -- have raised across the globe. They also note the persistent denial with which this phenomenon is shamelessly incorporated into contemporary arts and media technology, notably in the cinema and in the violence, gore and corruption displayed on our television screens. All this in the name of liberty and modernity, in spite of the fact that the morals and values embodied are an atavistic throwback to a more barbarous past. Stemming this grim current, which takes its cue from the philosophy of chaos and nihilism, will only be achieved when we begin to act with an awareness of the meanings and prerequisites of human life and human societies in all their diversity. In particular, we must address four basic cornerstones: furnishing the means to sustain daily human life (economics); the perpetuation of the human race (reproduction); the realisation of a just social order (politics); and the conformity of daily human affairs with mankind's spiritual and religious, or civilisational and moral conceptions and aspirations. In adhering to this general agenda in the battle against chaos and nihilism we make it possible for social and political forces and all ideological schools to contribute to answering one of the most pressing questions of our age: how can we ensure that mankind exercises its full sovereignty and right to broaden its knowledge, enhance the sciences and develop the technologies that benefit mankind while safeguarding the human race from destruction? The quest for an answer to this question confirms that the duty to strive for life involves the drive to realise the spiritual, moral and ideological visions made available to mankind through the world's religions, civilisations and philosophies.
