Crystal Bartolovich
Syracuse University
clbartol@mailbox.syr.edu
Unveiling Guernica
When Colin Powell came to the UN in order to make a case for war against Iraq,
he spoke to the cameras right in front of a reproduction of Picasso's "Guernica,"
although no one watching could know this: it had been covered over with a blue
cloth, and Security Council flags lined up in front of it. Evidently someone
thought that images of bodies on fire, dismembered, screaming, imploring, did
not provide the best possible backdrop for Powell's insistence that the U.N. had
the responsibility to support the U.S administration's desire to go to war.
Veiled or unveiled, however, "Guernica" demands that we bear witness
to the Nazi immolation--with Franco's approbation-- of a Loyalist village in
1937 during the Spanish Civil War. In his painting, Picasso records not only his
own horror, but that of all of us who are shocked and repelled by what our own
governments, saying that they act in our name, feel authorized to do. When we
unveil Guernica, it demands that we ask: are there other options to this war if
the goal of the U.S. truly is to "defend freedom and all that is good and
just in our world," as Bush has claimed?
Would it not be better to actually behave in the way that the U.S.
administration claims it would like to see the Iraqi regime behave? As far as
relations with the U.N. are concerned, after all, the most powerful, dangerous
rogue state in the world is arguably the U.S., which has shown little interest
in going along with the U.N. unless it conforms to the narrowest of its
interests. While calling all the time for "justice," the U.S. has done
everything it could to stymie the institution of the World Court, and continues
even now to pressure other nations to sign agreements promising never to hand
over a U.S. citizen to such a court. U.S. officials have much to worry about on
that score, not only by engaging in this unprovoked war in Iraq, but also for
the internment of over 600 prisoners at Camp X-ray in Cuba in violation of
numerous Geneva Convention protocols, as well as the secret incarceration of
migrants it deems suspect, without access to lawyers or appeal, in the U.S.
Furthermore the U.S. is one of the 48 nations who has not ratified the Land-mine
Ban Treaty (a dubious distinction we share with Iraq), much less the
Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which our putative concern for proliferation of
weapons of mass destruction should have put us at the head of the line to
promote. We provide only a tiny fraction of our GDP in foreign aid--a
significantly smaller proportion than other wealthy countries--and typically use
it to manipulate aid recipients into capitulation to U.S. policy objectives
rather than furthering "good" in the world, as the arm-twisting in the
assemblage of the so-called "coalition of the willing" has
demonstrated so emphatically. I wish that I could say that in my lifetime, the
U.S. has been an exemplary agent of peace and justice in the world, but its
actual effect has been quite contrary: supporting questionable regimes when it
has suited its purposes, bombing civilian populations in tiny nations,
undermining democratically-elected governments, selling high price-tag military
hardware and expertise hither and yon. If an impartial intergalactic visitor
were looking down on us, I am afraid we would be hard pressed to win the
"propaganda war" based on both past and current behavior.
So we have to ask more questions of the present war: is it merely incidental
that in a world crawling with brutal dictators, many of whom have been--like
Saddam Hussein himself-- or are now, being supported in various ways by the
U.S., several of whom certainly have weapons of mass destruction, including
nuclear weapons, that Iraq has become the target of U.S. special interest at a
time in which U.S. reserves of oil are near exhaustion and the Gulf states, Iraq
in particular, have over a 100 years of supply remaining? Is it merely
incidental that French and Russian oil companies have secured lucrative
contracts with the Iraqis, but that British and American oil has been shut out,
and that the coalitions of the willing and unwilling prominently include these
countries divided along oil contract lines? And might we not be skeptical about
how much freedom, good, justice, democracy, and so on will flow into Iraq even
if its oil were to flow out in U.S. flagged vessels instead of French or
Russian, when we look around and see how much freedom, good, justice, democracy
and so on can be found in this region as an effect of U.S. intervention, past
and ongoing?
We desperately need to ask what "good" and
"freedom" and "justice" might mean if a different sort of
"coalition of the willing" --people like you and me, and those other,
distant, unregarded men and women, in Iraq, for example --were assembled. What
if we, collectively, were to have a hand in defining them instead of Donald
Rumsfeld and Tom Ridge? What we need, most of all, of course, to enable anything
like a free and just conversation on these issues is a massive redistribution of
global wealth, but I will restrict myself to humbler suggestions. To keep it
nice and concrete, I'd like to ask: if we could spend the money--our tax money--
as WE would like-- to do good in the world, would we really spend it on this
war? The minimum figure being bandied about as its price tag is about 75
billion. It's going to cost a lot more than that, of course, but let's just go
with this figure for now. Would we really say, yes, blowing up Iraqi cities,
killing its people, that's our best shot at advocating global peace and justice?
I'd like us to think about some other possibilities. The U.N. estimates that it
would cost 6 billion dollars to establish basic education for all children where
such services are currently nonexistent: for girls as well as boys, in every
country. We could build these schools and still have 69 billion dollars in
change. The U.N. also estimates that it would cost somewhat more, 9 billion
dollars, to make sure that all people had access to clean water and basic
sanitation. We could build these water treatment facilities, and we'd still have
60 billion dollars in our account. For 13 billion dollars more, the U.N. tells
us, basic nutrition AND health care could be made available to everyone. No more
starvation; no more babies dying of diarrhea because electrolyte replacement
therapy, costing pennies, was unavailable; everyone would get immunizations for
childhood diseases; and we would STILL have 47 billion dollars in change! Think
of what we might be able to accomplish if we could just get our hands on the
hundreds of billions spent each year on advertising!
And since we are on the subject of what we could do, let's not stop there. Let's
dream a little more. For "Guernica, " whose troubling images I
conjured up when I began this speech, is not just the most eloquent of Nos to
War. To Destruction. To ignorant armies clashing by night. An emphatic No to the
limits of the World as it is. Great Art is always a Yes. A Yes to what is great
and humane in us. To what is good and free. To what is just. To what the world
could be. We must unveil Guernica and let it speak loud and clear over the
war-cries of George Bush, over "Shock and Awe," over the worst in us,
and reclaim the best. So after you leave here today--this is the teacher in me
speaking-- always lift veils and ask questions; learn; imagine a better world--
and help make it prevail.