April 9, 2004
WHEN HISTORY GETS WRITTEN BY LOSERS:
Display Says U.S. Has Worst Genocide (AP, 4/8/2004)
A display ... that cited the killing of native North Americans as the world's worst genocide shouldn't be considered a jab at the United States, Belgian defense officials said Thursday....The display ... included a panel listing North America as the continent of the world's worst genocide with a death toll of 15 million, starting with Christopher Columbus' 1492 arrival in the New World but giving no end date.
Defense Minister Andre Flahaut, who has tangled with U.S. officials in recent months, effectively blamed the United States for killing 15 million people "in a genocide that continues to this day."
The newspaper [De Standaard] complained about a "curious" list of genocides that mentioned Nazi Germany, Rwanda, Cambodia, Armenia and other countries - but ignored killings in the Soviet Union under Josef Stalin and Europe's colonial past in Africa, including Belgium's role in the Congo.
King Leopold II's reign over the Congo Free State resulted in half the population dying in twenty-three years -- a total of 10 million dead. Yet, the genocide is little remembered in Belgium.
Which reminds me of Mark Twain's fine screed, "King Leopold's Soliloquy":
[Takes up a pamphlet. Reads a passage from Report of a "Journey made in July, August and September, 1903, by Rev. A. E. Scrivener, a British missionary"]"On the Sunday some of the boys had told me of some bones which they had seen, so on the Monday I asked to be shown these bones. Lying about on the grass, within a few yards of the house I was occupying, were numbers of human skulls, bones, in some cases complete skeletons. I counted thirty-six skulls, and saw many sets of bones from which the skulls were missing. I called one of the men and asked the meaning of it. 'When the rubber palaver began,' said he, 'the soldiers shot so many we grew tired of burying, and very often were not allowed to bury; and so just dragged the bodies out into the grass and left them. There are hundreds all around if you would like to see them.'"...
And the British consul, Mr. Casement, ... [got] hold of a diary which had been kept by one of my government officers ...
[Reads a passage from the diary]
"Each time the corporal goes out to get rubber, cartridges are given him. He must bring back all not used, and for every one used he must bring back a right hand. M. P. told me that sometimes they shot a cartridge at an animal in hunting; they then cut off a hand from a living man. As to the extent to which this is carried on, he informed me that in six months the State on the Mambogo River had used 6,000 cartridges, which means that 6,000 people are killed or mutilated. It means more than 6,000, for the people have told me repeatedly that the soldiers kill the children with the butt of their guns."
The sad fact is that Continental Europe never entirely escaped barbarism. The complacency with which Europe today regards Palestinian children, wearing bomb belts studded with poison-tipped nails and screws, who blow themselves to bits to kill innocents, is nothing new, nothing strange to the complacency with which it once regarded Leopold's Congo. America today, as before, stands as a lonely pillar of civilization in a largely barbaric earth.
Now, as nuclear weapons proliferate, humanity is at a crossroads. We must spread civilization, or civilization itself may be lost. The U.S. itself will become increasingly vulnerable to nuclear terrorism and stealth warfare. Fortunately, the success of the United States and the spread of knowledge through the Internet and other media have created world-wide popular support for liberty even in oppressed lands such as Iraq. We have many allies -- outside of Europe. The opportunity for victory is ours to seize.
Thus we face a great challenge. The alternatives before us -- the promise of universal liberty, and the threat of universal subjection -- have never been so stark. Let us rise to the challenge; and let us understand that we will have to do it without the Belgians.
Posted by Paul Jaminet at April 9, 2004 7:30 PMBeautiful Paul. Oj please note.
Posted by: NC3 at April 9, 2004 7:40 PMThe only really worthwhile thing that's come out of Belgium any time recently is "French" fries (and I will note here, for the record, that the "french" refers to the method of slicing the potatoes). Leopold's conduct in the Congo - did you know that the whole place wasn't even under the control of the Brussels government, it was his PERSONAL property? - is an astonishment and a hissing even today, and it's the height of hypocrisy, though not at all surprising, for the current Belgian government to omit it from a monument commemorating genocides.
Posted by: Joe at April 9, 2004 8:12 PMPJ: Totally agree, but let's keep in mind that even the French make fun of the Belgians.
Posted by: Chris at April 9, 2004 8:19 PMWhen was the change made from monuments to commemorate great people or deeds and virtues, to the present practice of monuments to only to commemorate failures and the real or imagined evil committed by others? There's something altogether defeatist about all of them, including the Vietnam Wall and the Holocaust Museum to the plans for the World Trade Center site.
I think the post-Columbus "genocide" is largely b.s. As I understand it, a far greater number of Native Americans died unintentionally from European diseases than from violent attacks. In other cases, tribes fought Europeans and lost. The term "genocide" should mean "intentionally wiping out a race," so I don't think it applies here.
Posted by: PapayaSF at April 9, 2004 9:28 PMNonsense! It was the Europeans' fault that the natives weren't adapted to the microorganisms they brought over! They should have done a thorough environmental impact statement before stepping foot on the so-called "New World."
Posted by: Timothy at April 10, 2004 12:48 AMI never realized it was the United States flag that Columbus planted when he arrived in the New World. Stupid of us Yanks to then wait until 1776 to declare our independence.
Posted by: R.W. at April 10, 2004 2:53 AMThe word genocide has largely become meaningless as a medium of communication, except for iseological purposes, and should be retired, at least for a time. If you google it you will be amazed at the number of people and causes trying to latch on to the Holocaust (many with the official sanction of Israeli Holocaust scholars). It now just means a lot of brutal deaths. I stopped browsing when I hit the "1922 Christian genocide in Smyrna."
Posted by: Peter B at April 10, 2004 5:07 AMDo it without the Belgians? Oh, the horror.
Posted by: Jeff Guinn at April 10, 2004 8:05 AMNot to minimize the perfidy of the U.S. government in dealing with the Indians, but they were pretty skilled at killing each other before Europeans arrived.
Posted by: Paul Cella at April 10, 2004 8:18 AMR.W. - Since we have global hegemony, we must have been responsible for Rwanda too.
Jeff - We may console ourselves with their chocolate from time to time.
PJ:
On Rwanda, don't laugh. The sweet young progressive who works at my local bookstore was organizing a speech/book launch by Romeo Dallaire, the Canadian general in charge of UN forces in Rwanda. Dallaire was betrayed by Annan, but he flipped out when he came home, tried to commit suicide and is now a poster boy for PTSS and darling of the left. Anyway, I stupidly struck up a conversation with her and learned that Rwanda was the fault of "the great powers."
One of the great things about the UN is that its members are never responsible for its cock-ups, because like good world federalists they handed authority over to the UN. Neither is the UN itself, which always fails through lack of support from its members. Neat, eh?
Posted by: Peter B at April 10, 2004 9:52 AMNC3:
I'm generally amenable to genocide. I just think the secularists threaten our civilization and the Islamicists don't. The problem is in our culture, not theirs.
Posted by: oj at April 10, 2004 10:06 AMOJ:
Guess you haven't read much on Islamist web sites. So long as you are happy to toe the Sharia line, you will be safe.
How French of you.
Posted by: Jeff Guinn at April 10, 2004 7:04 PM"America today, as before, stands as a lonely pillar of civilization in a largely barbaric earth."
Paul, not to give any creedence to the genocide claim, but I think that you turn too blind an eye to the barbarisms of our own past, especially the slave trade, and the post-bellum oppression of blacks up until recent times. We shouldn't be too smug.
"I'm generally amenable to genocide. I just think the secularists threaten our civilization and the Islamicists don't. "
If you are amenable to genocide, and think that our culture need not avoid it (a logical extension), then what exactly is it about our civilization do you think is worth defending? You can't hold the secular slaughter by Stalin over our heads if that is your attitude.
Posted by: Robert Duquette at April 11, 2004 8:21 AMRobert - We shouldn't be smug; we must see the world as it is. "The line between good and evil cuts through every human heart," as Solzhenitsyn said, including American hearts. But when tested most severely, we've managed to land on the right side of the line -- in the Revolution, in the Civil War, and at other decisive moments in our history. I am inclined to credit this success more to divine providence than to our virtues; and I do believe that America stands today, as so often since 1776, as a "city on a hill," a light to the nations. It is our responsibility to live up to that calling. And if we fail, we cannot expect that such peoples as the Belgians will step up and take our place.
Posted by: pj at April 11, 2004 10:52 AMThis shows how pathetic this website is:
"King Leopold II's reign over the Congo Free State resulted in half the population dying in twenty-three years -- a total of 10 million dead. Yet, the genocide is little remembered in Belgium."
All Belgians learn about this genocide in history, so we do know about it! Unfortunately education in your country is not developed as well as in our country, so we can't expect you to know, or spread the truth.
Posted by: Johny at April 11, 2004 1:36 PM