Genocide, War Crimes and the West History and Complicity

by Jones, Adam

• ISBN13: 9781842771907
• ISBN10: 1842771906
• eBook ISBN(s): 9781848130982
• Additional ISBN(s): 9781848136823
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2004-07-23
• Publisher: Zed Books

Summary

Genocide and war crimes are increasingly the focus of scholarly and activist attention. Much controversy exists over how, precisely, these grim phenomena should be defined and conceptualized. Genocide, War Crimes & the West tackles this controversy, and clarifies our understanding of an important but under-researched dimension: the involvement of the US and other liberal democracies in actions that are conventionally depicted as the exclusive province of totalitarian and authoritarian regimes. Many of the authors are eminent scholars and/or renowned activists; in most cases, their contributions are specifically written for this volume. In the opening and closing sections of the book, analytical issues are considered, including questions of responsibility for genocide and war crimes, and institutional responses at both the domestic and international levels. The central section is devoted to an unprecedentedly broad range of original case studies of western involvement, or alleged involvement, in war crimes and genocide. At a moment in history when terrorism has become a near universal focus of public attention, this volume makes clear why the West - as a result of both its historical legacy and contemporary actions - so often excites widespread resentment and opposition throughout the rest of the world.

Author Biography

Adam Jones is currently Professor of International Studies at the Center for Research and Teaching in Economics (CIDE) in Mexico City. He is author of Beyond the Barricades: Nicaragua and the Struggle for the Sandinista Press, 1979- 1998 (Ohio University Press, 2002), and editor of Gendercide and Genocide (Vanderbilt University Press, forthcoming). His scholarly articles have appeared in Review of International Studies, Ethnic and Racial Studies, Journal of Genocide Research, Journal of Human Rights, and other publications. He is Executive Director of Gendercide Watch.

Table of Contents

PART I Overview
Introduction: History and Complicity	3	(28)
Adam Jones
Shades of Complicity: Towards a Typology of Transnational Crimes against Humanity	31	(28)
Peter Stoett
PART II Genocide, War Crimes and the West
Imperial Germany and the Herero of Southern Africa: Genocide and the Quest for Recompense	59	(19)
Jan-Bart Gewald
Genocide by Any Other Name: North American Indian Residential Schools in Context	78	(38)
Ward Churchill
The Allies in World War II: The Anglo-American Bombardment of German Cities	116	(18)
Eric Langenbacher
Torture and Other Violations of the Law by the French Army during the Algerian War	134	(12)
Raphaelle Branche
Atrocity and Its Discontents: US Double-mindedness about Massacre, from the Plains Wars to Indonesia	146	(18)
Peter Dale Scott
Bob Kerrey's Atrocity, the Crime of Vietnam and the Historic Pattern of US Imperialism	164	(22)
S. Brian Willson
Inaugural Statement to the Russell Vietnam War Crimes Tribunal	181	(5)
Jean-Paul Sartre
Charles Horman versus Henry Kissinger: US Intervention in 1970s Chile and the Case for Prosecutions	186	(15)
Mario I. Aguilar
The Wretched of the Nations: The West's Role in Human Rights Violations in the Bangladesh War of Independence	201	(13)
Suhail Islam
Syed Hassan
Indicting Henry Kissinger: The Response of Raphael Lemkin	214	(16)
Steven L. Jacobs
Crimes of the West in Democratic Congo: Reflections on Belgian Acceptance of `Moral Responsibility' for the Death of Lumumba	230	(11)
Thomas Turner
In the Name of the Cold War: How the West Aided and Abetted the Barre Dictatorship of Somalia	241	(19)
Mohamed Diriye Abdullahi
The Security Council: Behind the Scenes in the R wanda Genocide	260	(4)
Linda R. Melvern
US Policy and Iraq: A Case of Genocide?	264	(12)
Denis J. Halliday
Criminal Complaint against the United States and Others for Crimes against the People of Iraq	270	(3)
Letter to the Security Council	273	(3)
Ramsey Clark
The Fire in 1999? The United States, NATO and the Bombing of Yugoslavia	276	(23)
David Bruce MacDonald
Collateral Damage: The Human Cost of Structural Violence	299	(28)
Peter G. Prontzos
PART III Truth and Restitution
Institutional Responses to Genocide and Mass Atrocity	327	(19)
Ernesto Verdeja
International Citizens' Tribunals on Human Rights	346	(15)
Arthur Jay Klinghoffer
Coming to Terms with the Past: The Case for a Truth and Reparations Commission on Slavery, Segregation and Colonialism	361	(22)
Francis Njubi Nesbitt
Declarations on the Transatlantic Slave Trade	377	(6)
PART IV Closing Observations
Afghanistan and Beyond	383	(21)
Adam Jones
Letter to America	404	(5)
Breyten Breytenbach
About the Contributors	409	(4)
Index	413