2003 - Noam Chomsky - Conversation with Charlie Rose

gnorm Tomsk is here he is a political activist he's a writer and his professor at MIT he is written exclusively and lectured around the world on linguistics philosophy and politics he is widely credited with having revolutionized modern linguistics he is the author of numerous books including American power in the new mandarins and also 9/11 here is hegemony our survival his newest book I am pleased to have him on this program for many reasons including the fact that I get more emails about please have mr. Chomsky on this program than anyone can ever imagine how do you explain this phenomenal connection between you and certainly an audience of people who are user-friendly with the internet it well I think people who are there's an enormous number of people who are involved in a informal disorganized activists dissident culture and they tend to make their own connections outside the major institutional channels which are not not hospitable to them and the internet has been has become a major form of interconnection organizing not just in the United States everywhere I mean in South Korea for example they recently elected a president using the internet for organizing and communication and getting around the strong opposition of the media and the concentrated power to the popular candidates we happen to be very wired up society abroad and I think as a higher penetration in South Korea perhaps more than any other country except Singapore it's happening every one that takes a Indonesia when the support the dictatorship was overthrown in 1998 a lot of the organizing but a lot of it was student activism and they it was a very harsh brutal society but they did succeed through internet interconnections to organize political actions demonstrations other activities and it was a major factor leaving the leading to the overthrow the dictatorship well Howard Dean I suspect would say that one of the primary reasons he's been able to get to this commanding position in the Democratic race for the presidency is the internet lobbying both to communicate and to raise money yeah it's um it's a sort of a can also be a lethal instrument but lethal in what way well I'm sure you get I don't want to guess how many emails that one of the problems with the internet I mean it's the good part of it is it's free and open right exactly of course that has a downside that means that things go up that have no review and their you know support any caucuses they clog the system and so it's a mixture but it's it certainly has been an extremely effective way of allowing people to participate actively in in even in everything from industrial societies very repressive society so take say the world Social Forum which is a huge enterprise hundred hundred thousand people last year it's mostly internet organized there's just no other meanings of inter communication among highly diverse people most of them Oh somewhat you know out of the power centers in their own societies and this provides them the means of organizing exchanging information interaction that gives an access to a far wider range of sources of information and analysis than they would get by you know picking up the newspapers at the newsstand and major if they do you think regimes around there were a lot to be frightened of the possibilities of the internet I'm sure they are including your own government since the the internet was like most modern technology it came out of the state system right they have a very a lot of the economy relies on a dynamic state sector the internet was developed in the Pentagon or somewhere well it was places like MIT it came yes it came out of Pentagon funding and that the Advanced Research Project agency the Pentagon about their early 60s and remained inside the state system until the mid 90s I think 1995 it was privatized and since then it's changed I mean that before that it was considered would affect was called usually an information Highway after that it's mostly called the e-commerce right and the character of it changed but there has been a lot of concern in power centers all over the world that it's just too free and open and the question is how can you shape it and modify it so as to lead people in preferred directions no away from say organizing the forum yeah exactly what for example the Chinese doing about it do you know in China I think internet access is quite restricted is what I thought and highly censored I don't know how much even limited access there is but it's a very hard medium to control exactly no one people have access they can do all sorts of things so the the means of controlling it I that are being considered as far as I understand are mostly trying to lean people in particular directions so when you enter an internet portal you know you'll be sort of drawn off disability here about that ring opening up it'll take you somewhere and the idea is you'll have to use you know energy and initiative and commitment and know what you're looking for or if you want to go and the in the directions less preferred by powers nedar's which is it's a terrain of struggle right now there's a lot of pressure from popular and activist groups to make it leave it entirely open not control if you were this would be your last day on earth not that far from well you're 475 yeah yeah would would your would you like what said about you to be your political arguments or your contribution to the theory of linguistics be honest truth I really don't care you know I mean I'd like to see people follow up on the things that are interesting and important and productive and forget about the things that were byways in mistakes and so on but if I my name is attached to it or not what would you characterize as most important in your judgment if you are well I mean I played a certain role and reshaping the fields concerned with the human intellectual faculties cognitive sciences in particular linguistics some of it has been extremely productive not me it's cooperative enterprise and that's often running on its own right in the political domain and you know I would like to see people energized participating thinking for themselves not subordinating themselves to systems of discipline and propaganda either in the structure of life and there's plenty of that or in the doctrinal domains so if people can be can come to use the capacities that they in fact have and the opportunities that in fact have to overcome systems of authority illegitimate Authority domination hierarchy freed themselves think through issues for themselves not the way they're taught to conform and do something about it that's the best legacy and as I said you and you said that I know nothing about linguistics one of many subjects I know nothing about but especially linguistics if there is there one question in the air in that whole realm though that you would like most to know the answer to like everyone I have own personal quirks yes there are some questions which are big mega questions there are megatons which are on the border of research you can't really they're a little beyond what you can study very much you can take a pick away at them but well one kind of question which is a sort of a personal obsession is that if you look at any by a lot of language is a biological system as part of error it's like our immune system or visual systems just something humans have it's highly specific to humans they don't seem to be any counterparts elsewhere in nature you're in New York because of our mutual friend Edward syeda passed away several month or so ago correct yeah and you tell me what you tell me just because you're here your sense of what would you most want to say an appreciation of him well it was an old friend we're very close friends for years we had a lot of mutual interests we would there be culture music politics culture politics mainly mainly political interests including his prime concern also a major concern of mine at least for my much broader questions of justice freedom oppression which he was much involved in me too and our paths often crossed and then it was just a close personal friendship actually he had arranged never talked about this much but back in the year I guess it must have been around 20 years ago or 25 years ago he began arranging with meetings between high officials in the Palestine Liberation Organization when they were visiting New York meeting us with friends of his who were sympathetic to the Palestinians critical of PLO to see if there could be some constructive discussion to suggest ways in which they could change what they're doing to achieve results which would make more sense for the people involved and I was involved in some of those meeting anything come out of no have to say you know what do you think of the Geneva Accord that they've been current Geneva course yes exactly well it offers it's it's a great improvement over the Camp David proposals which were completely unacceptable Palestine yeah they made no sense you know Jakarta said that today on a recent appearance on his program oh really well he's quite right and as soon as you look at a map of what was proposed you see that was absolutely unacceptable and it broke up the others ought to talk about percentages and so on have didn't mean a thing if you looked at the actual maps that were discussed which unfortunately we're not easily available in the United States that should have been but they weren't as soon as you look at the maps you see that what it effect it did was break the West Bank into three pretty separate ten tons so this one I take it was territories well they were technically contiguous but only way around the edges she wanted to go from Bethlem to Ramallah you were going to go way to the east and the so the three effectively separated territories all again effectively separated from a little part of East Jerusalem which is the center of traditional center of Palestinian cultural educational commercial existence and it was a kind of a bantha Stan situation as was discussed in Israel at the time and that and of course it was all separated from Gaza well you know that's actually the meaning of that was described by the president barak chief negotiator enemy yeah and he was the negotiator at Camp David and he had he was an academic and shortly before he entered the government he wrote a book about it in Hebrew in which he said the goal of the whole Oslo process and leading to this that would be what he called a permanent neo-colonial dependency the Palestinians would be a neo-colonial effectively modern colonial dependency permanently and in fact that's what the proposal was and it couldn't work however after the Camp David proposals broke down this is September 2000 Boggess September 2000 that's when the current EDA father started but negotiations continued and the made some progress in January 2001 there were meetings in Taba which led to informal meetings but with fairly high-level people on both sides and they've made considerable progress towards a more acceptable to state settlement but it was too late then because the Israelis were into their election they were into the election campaign and prime minister Barak cancelled the meetings and after Sharon was elected and the violence began to escalate they were never picked up everyone soon dies him to that they were never continued however it turns out now we've learned that contacts did continue and the Geneva Accords that you mentioned are the results of these continuing contacts and they are they make considerable progress beyond the Taba of course hammered out by Yoshi Belen and other Israelis in over two years with potential and who I'm not sure in part may have been part of may have been members of the Palestinian Authority or not I don't know they some had been but all are close to it I mean there is close to the center of Palestinian Palestinian it's known that the state 11 informal authority but they were as close to the central part of it as the Israeli negotiators were to the Israeli go in effect probably closer know your friend the lady that was I didn't have much to say good about Yasser Arafat nor did I know - you know in fact we were very much in accord about this for a long time some of it a real disservice to the Palestinians well it's I don't think when you can say that exactly why is that because he's also a symbol it with without him as a statement American so look he remained a symbol of Palestinian nationality struggle or refusal to submit that's important right I mean whatever you may think of him personally just serving the role of enabling people to resist harsh oppression probable destruction which was the goal that's significant whatever you think about his particular decisions and choices and of those they're a mixture so I I wouldn't I mean I was always harshly critical you look at what I wrote was critical nevertheless there are there's a strain which was on the right track so in the mid 1970s Arafat did recognize that the settlement would have to be to state political settlement there was a Security Council resolution debated in January 1976 which was supported by the PLO they publicly supported it which called for a third state settlement on the international border with full recognition of Israel's rights to peace and security and so on and so forth that was a good resolution unfortunately the u.s. vetoed that and then there was a process for a number of years in which our effect in his complicated way of which there's much to criticize nevertheless one theme that ran through it was trying to press for such a settlement it the reason Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982 was to try to prevent these negotiate these efforts at diplomacy to continue in fact they said publicly it was an invasion to secure the winter the invasion of Lebanon yeah which is where the palace Mello restaurant is and they wanted to destroy the that it was called and by the high command in fact a war for the West Bank we have to stop the negotiations which and the diplomacy which was becoming an embarrassment and let's get back to terror that are happier with that and this continued for some years and it's a sort of a mixture of corruption terror violence bad judgment and a continuing drive towards what has to be what almost the entire world recognized must be some kind of political settlement along the roughly along the international border with two states along the sixty three borders subsea said roughly with some modifications how do you actually I should add and we should be willing to recognize this the main reason this has not taken place is that the US has blocked it for 30 years Helena laterally how so well as I said it vetoed the 1976 resolution vetoed another security council resolution in 1980 the Israelis are independent of it well you know we could argue about exactly why but did Israel didn't like it but they could never have luck that if the u.s. hadn't backed it meanwhile much more importantly the u.s. provided means the diplomatic military and economic support which enabled Israel to continue slowly integrating the territories effectively within Israel the big settlement programs the infrastructure programs and they can't do it without us support and that's true right this minute they could not they can't do it without us support and they know it your support in terms of in the international community or us support at the UN for example every level in other words you're suggesting there without the US the overloon looming possible veto at the Security Council or in some other way that there would be some kind of one of the economics and Ameri reaction militarily without the u.s. they can't stand the small country can stand alone against a unified international community it's just impossible there all kinds of ways of stopping them and they need the economic support in the military so that's a nice segue in Iraq but I want to come back to other things well you know and Israel has been as has become actually goes back before 1976 the in 1971 that's where the real split between the United States and the world begins on this in 1971 the president of Egypt the new president of Egypt that President Sadat offered Israel a full peace treaty in return for withdrawal from Egyptian territory said nothing about the West Bank nothing about the Palestinians at full peace treaty recognizing incorporating the main UN 2:42 so the right to live in peace and security and so on and so forth everything nothing about the refugees just in return for withdrawal from Egyptian territory Israel discussed it they knew that it was a possible we have internal records and others actually I see Baylin wrote his doctoral dissertation was in Hebrew about revealing a lot of the records and discs a Burnet records and other discussions about this but I was also in the public record now they had discussed the question should they accept it no they had a choice and it was a fateful choice the choice was to accept peace with Egypt it's the main military force which would essentially end the military conflict there were no other major Arab military forces so accept peace with Egypt have a still retain control of the occupied territories they have to do something about it because it was another table wasn't on the table and integrate themselves somehow into the region that was one choice the other choice was to insist on expansion and the crucial expansion at that time was not the West Bank it was northeastern China Egyptian territory they wanted to expand into northeastern Sinai and there were big developments there driving veterans out of their homes they were building city in fact an old Jewish City and northeastern Sinai that was a choice that if they made the second choice as they did that entailed dependency on the United States because there was going to be a situation of permanent conflict and that was the choice that was made I think was a very bad mistake but my impression was and I'm again my impression was that that in fact one week we had the agreement between Egypt 1978 yeah was it the others withdrew and there and in fact arrows Rome came in and cleaned up the settlements well no in in northeastern China right yeah the but that's only half the story by 1977 what the what happened in 71 is the offer was made Israel rejected it the crucial question is what would the United State well there was an internal debate in the United States and it was won by Henry Kissinger whose view was as he described that that we should keep to what he called stalemate meaning no negotiations just work she was opposed to an agreement in 1971 between Egypt and Israel yes he led to the withdrawal from the Sinai once again now the reason that the Sun and it be a diplomatic relation between the two countries yes and that decided the matter which you know the way the u.s. goes sort of determines what happens it's just well now when that led to a war so that can be three yes he kept saying look if you don't withdraw from the Sinai there's going to be a war nobody believed nobody took it seriously when the work it worth did comment 73 and it was a huge shot it was close thing for Israel I didn't us ended up earlier alert after at that point Kissinger recognized that you can't but Egypt isn't a basket case you can't just dismiss it then he began his shuttle diplomacy and it goes on up to Camp David finally semi 879 and at that point so that the US and Israel agreed to an offer that so that had presented in 1971 but the new one was harsher from the point of view of Israel in the United States than the original would have been better off they've accepted 71 rather than the one was dividual from their point of view Jimmy Carter can see but in 71 there was nothing about the Palestinians by 1977 the Palestinian issue was on the table and the US and Israel had to accept an order an offer which recognized in some fashion Palestinian national rights which they didn't want to do I mean I think they should have done it so I can't say it's worse but they didn't want it now it's interesting that this is described in the United States as a diplomatic triumph in fact it was a diplomatic attached Rafi if they'd had been accepted in 1971 with Jimmy Carter was here several days ago I mean he certainly thought it was the diplomatic trying he probably doesn't know the history I mean you should have asked him whether he knows what happened in the background well if I'd had this interview before I wouldn't well it's all on the public record yeah you know what I mean but but you know this is one of the many things we have to learn about and if we want to make to gain some understanding of what's really happening there so when you ask questions about say Arafat you know unfortunately all this has to come in okay fair enough looks interesting now let me let me make this point I spoke to someone about you today and he said the following to me someone who many his views you would recommend you would what agree with some not he said me that after compliment in your mind quality of the mind and contributions you'd made he said that what you had done is turned American exceptionalism on its back and that your for all those who believed in our conceptions you had believed in exactly the opposite whatever that is now let me stay with this question on the other hand there are people who have asked you look if you have such strong feelings about how wrongheaded American policy has been why don't you leave the country of frequent sort of things thrown at people look critical frequently and you always say I love this country right I mean it's a very interesting question let's just try it in some other country you know it's sometimes easier to think about things clearly if we let's go back to say our the big enemy Soviet Union right I mean the Russians would have been delighted to have the dissidents leave the country if soccer have been willing to come yes they would have applauded it what does it make sense to ask so why don't you leave it the Soviet Union I mean I'm not asking that question I'm asking that question the framing the point that you've always said the framework in which the country of any question should be understood right it's assuming that you can't have it then you stay and fight for values because you love the country you think that the country ought to live up to these values now they're cut you know you can't rank country is ABC the country's up all sorts of properties there's a culture there's a society there's modes of interaction and so on a lot of the things that are simply achievements now it takes a protection of free speech right it's unique in the United States there are a lot of great things that have been achieved there are a lot of rotten things that have been done if you if you have any concern about the country meaning its people its culture and so on you want to save and extend and amplify the achievements and modify the immanuel free speech high up on that list of area that's not the only one okay but tell me more and then we'll come to some of the criticisms because that you have made about American imperialism and the like see that's so we have to make a distinction between state power and a country the different things I understand the different but it's often not distinguished if you criticize state policy you're not criticizing it I understand that too I mean we first unfrequently when you're traveling around the world as I do you know people say I love you know I'm just happy with policy I hate the policy and if it's we're responsible for the policy it's a free country we can't say you know I don't have any responsibility for the policy because we do we may not know about it but then we should find out about it and if we decide we don't like it we should change it in fact take a look at the question we've just been discussing to state settlement about two-thirds of the American population supports the international consensus on this and long which is they ought to be a two-state solution not roughly the size d7 borders and it's kind of gently look the polls I mean polls will you find roughly two-thirds of the population saying yes I support that and roughly the same proportion says the US ought to become more involved in the diplomacy people don't know that that's contradiction the reason that that policy has that program has not been achieved is because of consistent US intervention to prevent it from being achieved and that continues at this very moment in fact okay it is a free country we've got a lot of freedom that means we had people have the opportunity to discover it's work you know it's not going to come easily that's where the internet is well they have the opportunity to discover the relevant facts in background which should show them that their position is contradictory they must come to understand what the US government role has been over the years in preventing the outcome that they want okay do you believe do you in the end and if in fact accept the premise that people get for the most part in a democracy people get the government they deserve no no you don't know and you because you're the law well let me finish because you believe the political process is corrupt and it's not it's it's what look see what everybody says look to me I know it's saying it's not it's not that simple right I mean it it's not that there's robbery and stealing of elections there is a distribution of power internal to the country enormous disparity of economic and other power and that influences everything that happens in dramatic ways so many issues simply don't come up in election to perhaps have more power than they have not sin therefore well material decide if you really look closely elections they restrict themselves to issues on which the population they eliminate issues where the mass of the population opposes a lead opinion systematically and the population is aware I'll say that again I'm sorry well let's take a concrete okay the year 2000 election saying among the issues that were highest in concern to the general population are things that roughly relate to the so-called trade agreements so deficits overseas investment that transfer of jobs you know lots of topics like that did the right at that time there was a plan for a an International Hemisphere conference Quebec hemispheric summit three months later which was intended to extend the NAFTA type agreement to the whole hemisphere now that's it these are issues of enormous concern did it come up in the election no now there's a reason why it didn't come up in the election that's consistent on those the public tends to oppose policies on which there is an elite consensus and therefore it doesn't come up in elections well that's the reflection I mean let me just make sure I'm saying well how do you stand yourself on the map to agreement I agree with the general population I think with your Lobby whose view is critical critical for the cause because it's the wrong agreement if you go back to 1990 10 years ago and the NAFTA agreement was coming along there were serious critical analyses of it which were in favor of a North American Free Trade Agreement but not this one the analyses came from the labor movement they came from Congress's Research Bureau the office of Technology Assessment pretty much the same analyses said yeah a North agreement the North American economic green be a good idea but this one is designed and as effectively an investor rights agreement it privileges rights of investors and lenders and it marginalizes the rights of people and where you've already done them were you worried about the loss of jobs and those kinds of issues that became a political football on unions essentially were opposed to us that's the story that's not true no words you're saying that then they they mislead us when they made that argument no that unions did not make they never made an argument that we're opposed because the jobs they mentioned that but the labor movement had an official position it was produced by the labor Advisory Council a long detailed analysis and it was a very sensible position it was never given it never entered the media discussion it was never given any publicity the labor market the labor movement was accused of crude nationalism this that the other thing that was not their position their actual position never made it to the public agenda and and the same is true of Congress's own Research Bureau which had a rather similar analysis yes in favor of NAFTA style agreement but not that one it's kind of interesting that a few days ago the Carnegie Endowment released an analysis of NAFTA saying fairly critical analysis it was reported in the press making some proposals how it should have been done and those proposals though they didn't say so happen to be very similar to those that were proposed by the labor movement and Congress has researched we were 10 years ago but didn't enter the political discussion was not mentioned in the media for example well this is only one example of which there are numerous ones anyway by saying that what you're arguing that people are not getting the information they need to make wise choices they aren't you nor in fact are they given the choice they aren't given the choice the choice between the two parties now made in an election know that they have but the two parties represent essentially the same concentration of interests of economic power the United States is essentially a one-party state it's has two factions of the business party in fact one of the leading one of the leading political science analyses of the nature of the u.s. party system by fine political sciences that you know receive Massachusetts Tom Ferguson is what he calls the investment theory of politics investors get together to invest the control well let me ask you this let's take two or three countries with you and I know okay we have two parties in the United Kingdom right mm-hmm the toy part of the Labor Party would you say the same thing about them essentially it depends when today it's today it's close to in France they're France you have you have a Socialist Party and a you know the Chirac garlis party essentially the same I mean they didn't no not up not a whole lot of differences there may 35 explain in Spain we have Socialist Party well I'd say I would suggest we take is any different in any of those countries in terms of how much difference there are because let me let me make this argue with you and just get to essentially in most countries the battle in politics is for the center is it not in most places you know it doesn't mean that that's simply not true there are countries that have a much more lively Democratic culture so let's take a country that has a really lively Democratic culture much more than we do like Brazil okay Brazil is a rich potentially rich important country in Brazil something just happened reasonably which should humiliate us big it's a real lesson in democracy in Brazil popular movements Matt large-scale popular movements which has been developing over 20 years reached the scale where they were able to elect a populist president over the opposition of highly-concentrated capital and media concentration we can't even dream about that well that's a functioning democratic culture let me let me stop you for a second let me just get a couple of questions in number one I ask that question recently of Garry wills was here you know why haven't we seen in the United States more success by a powerful coalition essentially coming from the left but but not necessarily defined by what the conception traditional condition was it might be of the left of Labor Inari's we have black and white Francine what was it the last time number of times we saw it with certain sixties that's where the Great Society programs come from we thought in the 30s that's where the New Deal comes from and in fact this is a battle that goes back to the origins of American history you know the the original constitutional framework the wave matters author the Great Society programs was Lyndon Johnson that's right and he read the programs are not initiated by leaders that's a serious misunderstanding those programs were initiated primarily about people who actually are many of them who'd served with FDR see that's a serious misinterpretation I believe of the way the political system works leaders may sign their names and they may push programs but they do it because a popular constituency is compelling them to do it that's the way changes take place I mean if there's a large-scale popular movement and their pressures there'll be somebody will say I'm your leader but you know since you've made what happened in this the programs that came out of the so-called Great Society were the result of popular ferment and activism and changes that were taking place significant changes that were taking place in the 1960s which very much democratize the society and it led to these programs since then there's been an enormous counter-attack from business sectors trying to beat it back and that's the course of history you know it's the same with the civil rights movement or the same with the but let me let me make this point balance gets a lot of other things and I want to say that we were 42 minutes in we're doing an hour with you and I want to invite you back because inevitably people are going to say to me you know you could have gone for two or three hours in minimum you know or they will say you interrupted too much or they say a lot of other things and and I do want to hear from you and I you know many people many people so Lyndon Johnson you know as a man who had was too beholden to economic interest in terms of how achieved his own wealth and in terms of a whole range of things whether it was brown rude in Texas whether his relationship with a whole lot of institution or you were saying that he responded the way he did to Great Society programs having to do with with medical care having to do with poverty having to a whole range of issues responded and civil rights because the public pressure was the same was true of John F Kennedy I'm willing to argue with you that Lyndon Johnson responded in part because that was where his heart was and his sense of legatee in terms of what it enclosed him and secondly he'd some of the things that John Kennedy responded to he saw his opportunity in history in a sense to show that he could get these things enacted because that was his principal skill see we're not disagreeing we're talking about different topics the topic that you're talking about it's individual personalities so the individual personality Lyndon Johnson what was going on in his mind the topic that I'm talking about is how popular movements develop create their own programs press for them finally often get somebody to initiate them there's a different question and I mean I mean it does only agree with you actually I mean I look with great interest in what's happening in Brazil and I know it's happened here that's that's why why do we have freedom of speech the freedom of speech is not in the Constitution it's not in the Bill of Rights in fact up until the 19th it's not up until the 1960s in fact the legal battles about freedom of speech are mostly in the 20th century and there was no real legal protection for substantial freedom of speech actually until the sixties in the 1960s the Supreme Court finally first in the course of the civil rights movement then later in the decade finally realized a level of legal protection of freedom of speech that to my knowledge doesn't exist in any other country and if a large part of it grew out of the activism just to understand you because I want to go to some things that are often attached to you and bring great controversy to you other than freedom of speech what else do you think it is is part of what America you know represents yes representative things I like that are great about American life for one thing we have compared to those societies there's very little in the way of a kind of a caste system so people would interact independently of social position is there autocracy there is in certainly in terms of policy formation that's overwhelming but we're talking in terms of personal interaction are you does it matter whether your this is your what you will do or that's what you do well these interactions among people informal interactions are in my view much healthier in the United States than other societies that I know now those are important facts about a culture high freedom speech is not just a matter of law it's a matter of being internalized you know realizing understanding that's my right and I'm gonna defend it that's important and the same is true of other rights actually the United States has become a much more civilized society since the nineteen sixties just in our recent lifetime cause do you think because of popular activism let's take women's rights was that an issue forty years ago no environmental issues do they exist forty years ago no let's take something like opposition to aggression and violence but that attitudes on that have changed enormously I mean when John F Kennedy attacked South Vietnam as he did in 1962 direct attack even with the assassination of Jim oh well no when the u.s. first set their support see I mean so little there was so little opposition to this that no one even knows what happened but if you look back at the record historical and documentary record it's not controversial in 1962 Kennedy sent the US Air Force to start bombing South Vietnam they did it in South Vietnamese planes with Vietnamese markings but it was US pilots and the u.s. equipment scene covered he authorized the use of napalm he started the crop destruction programs to keep food from the indigenous rebels women he started to look this is a war was very purpose no okay now that's changed but I mean maybe somebody wasn't significant look I can tell you because I was directly involved well you know you because of your position to be I couldn't get four people in a room to talk about I you argue about it was but this is important about the country it was four or five years before a significant popular movement developed opposing an aggressive war against another country let's fast forward to today right in this year there were a huge popular protest before the war was officially launched that's a tremendous change in conscious and why do you think I changed it because of the six is because we because as it breathes it gets wider and stronger and the change took place because a lot of people work very hard to make it change place the same is true of civil rights of women's rights of environmental issues and so on well that's the way changes happen I want to say something happened in Brazil the popular movements developed that way not by some leaders saying I agree I do agree with you and that I'm not arguing that but the interesting thing about Brazil now you know which is a worthy of a program here and he is somebody that I'd like to I've heard him speak and with lightness see him at the table is is he's running he is disappointing some of his followers there because of some positions he's taking having to do with the rainforest and other issues you know why why because there are you know so much about everything over the last 20 or 30 years in part as a reaction to the Democrat democratizing tendencies of the 60s which were worldwide right they were dramatic here but also elsewhere there's been a backlash part of the back it's taken many forms one of the forms it's taken is international economic Arrangements which are virtually designed to undermine democracy well these what's called in the rest of the world neoliberal arrangements here it's called free trade but it's not free trade the array of international arrangements that's sort of formalized in the World Trade Organization those measures if you look at them it is well understood that they undermine democracy one of the first measures that was taken in the early 70s initially here but then everywhere was the free up flow of financial capital I get you I need to move on because like a few minutes that's my point just once I won't try to explain anything but let me just say that if you look at these arrangements you'll find that they undermine democracy and they place countries in a stranglehold in which they cannot follow the policies of the overwhelming majority and that's what's happening in Brazil and that's why those disciplines okay fine I'll move on I talked to someone else knowing that you were coming and they said you know I was in each I was in Iraq recently recently and I met no irani who said the war was a mistake lots of them in the idea of overthrowing Saddam even now and and many of them wished the United States would leave many of them have a terribly disappointed upset opposed to the way things are going but this person didn't need anyone he tell me how you feel about the use of American power in overthrowing Saddam was it because it violated your own sense of international law was it because that we didn't have it wasn't a um an evil answered question because the assumptions are wrong okay go ahead the United States was not in favor of overthrowing Saddam Hussein in fact George Bush made that explicit said sorry a third summit a couple of days before the invasion started bush and Blair were there and they issued a declaration in which Bush said even if Saddam Hussein and his family leave the country we're going to evade anyway and in fact that's consistent with a long-standing US policy you're you're right that every I'm sure every sane person in Iraq one of you get rid of Saddam Hussein just like I had for twenty years just like we all have a murderous tyrant right why is he there all right why wasn't he overthrown or to ask another question why do the majority of Iraqis the Lord when Araki's are with the published polls Iraqis are asked who's your favorite foreign leader the favorite foreign leader of Iraqis according to US run polls is President Chirac of France who was the symbol of opposition to the invasion George Bush is far below layer even less below nevertheless the same polls show say yeah we're glad to get rid of Saddam Hussein well if we want to think about this we'll be able to figure out what's happening sure they would like to get rid of Saddam Hussein they were like they've gotten rid of him years ago I'm in 1991 they almost did you rid of him but the u.s. supported Saddam so that he could crush the rebellion which probably would have ever thrown him and we know why I'm not sure they support him so that he could they they effectively authorized him to crush the rebellion sure that many people but let me make one point is that I mean it clearly was a mistake in 1991 who was sure it was it allow him to a rebellious phase I do too did George Bush that goes in the state no dick Thomas Friedman of the New York Times think it was mistake I don't speak for George digit Thomas tree well did the New York did the press think it was a mistake let's take a look back and look at the allow him to the helicopters and be able to crush take a look at the analysis the analysis as to who had ads to rise up let's take as much as the analyses at the time that's what we should be looking at you know you can read it and say the New York Times the most important newspaper in the world their analysis was Alan Cowell their Middle East correspondent that much as we dislike the atrocities there's an overwhelming consensus that Saddam Hussein offers more hope for the stability of the country stability the kind of technical word stability the country then the people who are trying to overthrow it in other words we'd rather have him than the people are trying to overthrow him Thomas Friedman maybe they were Thomas Friedman who was a diplomatic cars chief diplomatic correspondent wrote the best possible solution for the United the best possible world for the United States would be an iron-fisted military hunter ruling Iraq the same way Saddam Hussein did much to the sure of this I'm sure he didn't mean using the torture in losing the technique yes then why did he say it well but he may very well have believed that was they made their way he must he made very well first of all I'm leery of speaking for anyone like this right George Bush or Tom Friedman but he may very well have meant that that Iraq because of whatever fears he had they would break up the balkanization of a robber and therefore he needed a toll array of men let's say up and then see that means that from the point of view of US policy makers and US commentators it wasn't a mistake I think it was a mistake you think but they didn't write the the analysts and the policymakers thought it was right well I preferred to the neocon so you find so much fall in their did not think it was a mistake we don't know the wits of the world probably don't know like it was a let's take a look at the not too overthrown suppose I mean they've been driven by overthrowing Saddam since 1991 you'll agree with that won't you no I don't buy the notion it's just too narrow a question let's take a look at the Wolfowitz is of the world okay he has a record right right his record is for example strong support of General Suharto who is exactly thirty Serbian Indonesia and afterwards up until 1997 a couple of months before so Hart that was over he was still praising him so hard there was a mass murderer probably worse than I was saying he came into power killing a couple hundred thousand people he ran a regime of vicious torture and oppression he invaded East Timor practically destroyed it his torture and massacres were going on right to the end of his rule Wolfowitz was praising him because of his contributions to the growth and development of Indonesia that's what served as ambassador to Indonesia this started when he was in the State Department with responsibility for Asia Southeast Asia in particular went on was he was in as ambassador to Indonesia and it continued through his post government service I think it was one example as in under his watch as State Department high official in the State Department with responsibility for Asia the Reagan administration under his watch supported a whole range of murderous dictators like Chun of South Korea I support him I'm not sure when he came in administration which is your point exactly Oh series of America administration's support a whole series of leaders in South Korea absolutely and Wolfowitz R is responsible is in charge almost in charge in a second in command in the State Department right up to the end Marcos back to the original record and see what happened this book noam chomsky hegemony or survival America's quest for global dominance we'll talk more about all these issues with him and others I thank you for coming thank you very much thank you for joining us we went the our more to be said tomorrow night Tony Morrison is here and others see you then [Music] [Music] [Music] funding for Charlie Rose has been provided by the following the coca-cola Mexico Foundation build school shelters where children from remote villages stay during the week cutting their commute to school from 6 hours to 60 seconds satisfying a thirst for education the coca-cola company additional funding for Charlie Rose was also provided by these funders and by Bloomberg a provider of multimedia news and information services worldwide we are PBS [Music]

Channel: pink0f

Views: 139,553

Keywords: Noam, Chomsky, Conversation, with, Charlie, Rose, 2003, linguistics, MIT, iraq, saddam, hussein, united, states, foreign, policy, new, york, times, thomas, friedman, wolfowitz, bush, terror, middle east, discussion, government, palestine, interview

Id: h6IBbViUzVU

Length: 54min 55sec (3295 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 26 2011