The Genocidal Imagination of Christopher Hitchens

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

by Richard Seymour

Picture a necrotic, sinister, burned-out wasteland -- a vast, dull mound of rubble punctuated by moments of bleak emptiness and, occasionally, smoking. Those of you whose imaginations alighted instantly on the Late Christopher Hitchens have only yourselves to blame, for I was referring to Fallujah.  The "city of mosques" was sacrificed in November 2004 during an all-American war movie: the MacGuffin, an obscure yet deadly figure known as Abu Musab al-Zarqawi who, predictably, "escaped" with his wily confederates into the deserts.  Before the operation, the city was bombed to "encourage" its evacuation, and shortly thereafter sealed off -- any male of fighting age (ten years old and upwards by present occupation standards) was prevented from leaving.  During that operation, white phosphorus was used against civilians since, as one US soldier explained, anything that walked or breathed was considered an enemy combatant.  It is reasonable to suppose that some of the melted bodies discovered had suffered agonizing deaths as the material sizzled their flesh to the bone.  Others may have been more lucky -- if they inhaled the substance, it will have blistered their mouths, throats, and lungs, suffocating them to death before they had to suffer the pain of flesh melting away both inside and outside. It is indeed hard to overstate what was pitilessly inflicted on Fallujah: a hospital deliberately bombed; another occupied; more than half of the houses damaged or destroyed; 150,000 people obliged to flee to live in rough tents on the outskirts of the city as they were bombed and their water and electricity cut off; those returning to the devastated city were to be subjected to forced labor. While the US military only admitted to having killed 1,200 insurgents, initial civilian tolls were as high as 800.  Lately, Iraqi NGOs and medical workers have estimated as many as 6,000 deaths, mostly civilians.  In the face of all these facts, Christopher Hitchens remarked: "the death toll is not nearly high enough . . . too many have escaped."

You may have noticed this supererogatory relish in Hitchens' rhetoric before.  Here is another sample, regarding cluster bombs:

If you're actually certain that you're hitting only a concentration of enemy troops . . . then it's pretty good because those steel pellets will go straight through somebody and out the other side and through somebody else. And if they're bearing a Koran over their heart, it'll go straight through that, too. So they won't be able to say, "Ah, I was bearing a Koran over my heart and guess what, the missile stopped halfway through." No way, 'cause it'll go straight through that as well. They'll be dead, in other words.

There is much more of this merriment.  Here he is again: "Cluster bombs are perhaps not good in themselves, but when they are dropped on identifiable concentrations of Taliban troops, they do have a heartening effect."

(...)

http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/seymour261105.html

Lengthy, but worth it.

[McCamy Taylor]

1. Summary: Hitchens has sold out.

He is not the first leftie to discover that the Right has more to offer when it comes to money/publishing opportunities/TV appearances.

The author of this essay has some good points to make, but for Christ's sake, cant he say them in plain English? It was like wading through a swimming pool full of....Hitchens prose. I need a bath.