Memory, War, and the Memory of War

Memorial Day is meant to remind us of the hardship of war, and on this Memorial Day I find myself asking how we will remember the "war on terror." What will our children's children know about this period?

We choose in the present how future generations will remember the past. One of the great contributions of the human rights movement is showing that how we remember and memorialize trauma in the past -- torture under brutal regimes in Argentina or during the apartheid era of South Africa, the evil committed during the Holocaust -- can help prevent abuses in the future.

What does it mean to choose how to remember? Memories come flooding back, often unwilled, sometimes unwelcomed. The raw material of memory resembles dreams, uncontrolled and full of non-sequiturs.

But consider the terrible affliction of "Funes the Memorious,"a character in a Jorge Luis Borges short story. He remembers everything, every shadow on every leaf on every tree, and he is thus immobilized and must sit in the dark to avoid sensory experience. In real life, societies, like individuals, cannnot remember everything. We organize collective memory, purposefully or not.

Imagining the future, we may choose to remember the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, for example, more in terms of heroism than error, since that is the tendency of all nations. We may remember the irreparable loss of life of those who went to fight, and we will think about their families and the suffering they endured. Our national memory may focus on the deaths of the Americans, in the same way that our memories of Vietnam focus largely on American causalities.

Will we remember that there was a place called Abu Ghraib on the dusty outskirts of Baghdad, and that torture took place there, for which we were responsible? Will we remember that we acquiesced to a terrible policy put forward by our leaders and with the endorsement of many -- Democrats, Republicans, journalists, legal scholars -- that allowed for us to ignore international and American law prohibiting torture?

If we care about the future, we must, first, clarify the truth. Second, we must find ways of clearly condemning torture wherever and whenever it was committed. Third, we must take steps so that we remember our rejection of those acts. Our thinking about future memory is one way of preventing torture in the future.

We need to know the full truth, including who among us was complicit in allowing this to happen, even if it means looking inward to our own communities. Why did not more of us protest more loudly and sooner? Why did so many permit government lawyers to pervert the law for dubious ends, making a mockery out of the idea of reasonable legal interpretation?

We must engage in a serious inquiry and introspection with the goal of accountability. Journalists and scholars should continue their investigative research and analysis of what has transpired. A nonpartisan commission of inquiry should also be a part of this picture, as should the continued declassification of government documents. We should also help others transform Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, and other sites of torture into sites of learning for the future. Seen from the perspective of memory, fair trials of those most responsible for wrong-doing are essential. The documents produced by trials would be vital elements of a true historical record. And trials are the strongest way of representing moral condemnation of wrongful behavior.

Friedrich Nietzsche, the German philosopher, identified three forms of history: antiquarian, monumental, and critical. The first sees history as quaint, curious, distant and irrelevant to our current lives. The second celebrates victory, heroism and tragedy in the past as precursors to current glory. The third suggests an engagement with the memory of the past, seeing the linkages between past, present and future and seeking to understand them.

Former Vice-President Dick Cheney is seeking to convince Americans that torture was justified. It is clear that he is interested in how this period is remembered; he is speaking both to us and to our progeny. He wants the history books and national memory to validate his time in office, and he is making active attempts to guarantee that they do. He wants to create a monumental history of the period.

If former officials succeed in making us forget that there was torture and that it was contrary to our values, they will establish impunity for the present and also for the future. That must not be allowed to happen. Extreme violations of human rights in any context, including a war, are too important to forget. We want future generations to remember that we insisted on accountability for them. Those are good reasons to have Memorial Day.

Comments

[langej]

Nice sentiment, though the base premise is untrue.
How did remembering the holocaust of Germany prevent China's Great Leap Forward, Cambodia, East Timor, or Rwanda? Indeed, what single holocausts have been prevented, or even ameliorated by the way the Congolese, Armenian, Ukrainian or German genocides were remembered?
In remembering, you are asking: "Is this war a WWII, a Korea or a Vietnam. Do we wish to remember this war as one we are proud of or one we are ashamed of. " Your central tenent - if we are ashamed of our wars, we are less likely to wage one in the future - may be true.
However, it is also true that the more ashamed we are of war, the less likely we are to win one in future. One reason we did so badly in Iraq was that the way we remembered Vietnam prevented us from sending enough troops to do the job in the initial invasion - thus allowing vacuum of both power and morality to develop where looting and sectarian violence were permitted to run free. As a result, there were more casualties on all sides, we have had to keep forces there longer and the Iraqi people are worse off than when we started.
Had we gone into Iraq remembering WWII (instead of Vietnam) we would have sent 1 million troops, shot looters and sectarian killers on summary court martial, and probably been home by now leaving a stable Iraq behind us.

[AllenShadow]

We do need to preserve our moral stand regarding conduct during war. That said, while it's important to vet our past regarding prisoner treatment at Gitmo, I believe we should keep most of its inhabitants off shore.

[dfranz]

I remember the deaths of 5 soldiers and friends I fought with in Vietnam and I ask myself, What did they die for? What did we accomplish? Why didn't I die? I find myself haunted every memorial day and Veterans day by their memories. I came to the conclusion that we all were victims of a war fought on false pretenses based on our leaders egos. They lost their lives and I lost my innocence and faith in the government that sent us there for nothing. This is the greatest sin of the Bush administration and those who pushed the Iraq war of choice. They did so with no clue as to what it would do to the men and women who go to do their countries service because they themselves never served. There was no accountability for the decisions back then and I haven't seen many with the stomach for accountability now. Wars are started by men and they must be prevented by men as well.

[MJinCanada]

Thank you. Your perspective is very valuable.

[lynettema]

"They did so with no clue as to what it would do to the men and women who go to do their countries service because they themselves never served."

"They" didn't have to go. "They" belong to the American royalty. "They" get to make the rules the rest of us have to live by. "They" sell us on the patriotism routine while "they" rake in the money from their war business. "They" buy the politicians. We will never see peace in this country because those who really run this country (they) are in the war business.

[raprap373]

I will remember the Twin Towers falling as i was walking home over the Bridge.
I will never remember WATER BOARDING OF A FEW heartless KILLERS.
I will pray for all the friends and relatives we lost that awful day of 9/11.

[CherokeeGirl]

while you are at it, refresh yourself on Jesus commandment:

"Love one another. Love those that hate you. Pray for those who persecute you."

remember?

Look, nobody likes terrorists, but the point is, these people may or may not BE terrorists because the Bush Regime didn't use the rule of law, terrorists may be let go and innocents may have been punished. I sure hope you are never falsely accused of something you didn't do someday.

[JoBangles]

While individuals will remember war in their own particular way, nations let the historians tell the tale the way heads of state want it told. In the US the media will always put a pretty face on our military "adventures", regardless of the truth or the circumstances. Stability at any cost is the state business requires in order to be profitable. And business is what America is really all about. Everything else is secondary.

[CherokeeGirl]

I'm embarrassed for the education system when 50 years after Neuremberg, nobody remembers.

We have to teach this stuff in Government class to every student, so we will never again even have to have a stupid torture argument.

[DasBoot]

Yes. How many Americans could name how many Vietnamese people died during American involvement there? Heck, most high school graduates don't know that the U.S. and the Soviet Union were allies in WWII. Journalists love to frame everything according to different opinions, but when knowledge of basic facts of history is missing, how can people have anything resembling an informed opinion?

[jackwaddington]

We've lost the so called moral compass, BECAUSE we (subliminally) glorify war by calling OUR troops "brave and noble" military men. They are not either--they are just like everyone else's military men--PAID KILLERS.

Until and unless we start to call ALL ARMIES for what they are, we are subliminally glorifying WAR.

[CherokeeGirl]

that's a bit harsh on the people that defend your right to say that.

you are right, we train them to kill, and they come home and we expect them to fit in.

i will be there, waving a flag, if and when I am ever honored to welcome troops home.

[jackwaddington]

The guys that defended MY RIGHT to say what I said were around in 1215 AD at Runnymede. They are defending NOTHING, they are bullies being pain by even bigger bullies. You've bought into the SPIN.

[bighat]

Maybe you should travel to these other countries and express your displeasure. North Korea comes to mind. I bet in no time at all Kim Jung II would listen to you and disband his army, start feeding his people and give them the right to say anything they please.

You seem to like the freedom of expression allowed you as an American but you just do not like the way this freedom has been secured.

Maybe you should start a news agency in Sudan or Venezuela or even the Congo. I am sure they would love you for your ideas and they would all lay down their arms.

You sound like a fantastic person to party with. I bet Toby Keith would enjoy taking you on an USO tour. Maybe he drop you off somewhere in the middle east. The members of the armed forces i am sure would escort you safely outside of their protection.

[greatscot]

History also forces us to consider cause & effect. The United States government created and financed Al Queda as a particularly nasty terrorist group to kill Russians, including arming them with Stinger air-ro-air missiles. Now that Al Queda has dealt with the Russians, they are ready to deal with the U.S. Surprise, surprise! Freedom fighters are now terrorists.

Israelis steal the land of the Palestinians then bray like scalded donkeys when the Palestinians try to take it back, but history is being amputated by the powers that be,so that we only see reported the reaction which is branded "terrorism", not the cause.

History can teach us much, but it has to be the truth, not propaganda, and it must be the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Anything less will cause us problems down the line because he who will not learn from history is condemned to repeat it!

[daffey]

The third suggests an engagement with the memory of the past, seeing the linkages between past, present and future and seeking to understand them.

No doubt the most neglected approach.

He also forgot a fourth approach: the judgmental - it looks under every rock and in every paper to find how rotten, lousy, stupid, and evil people were in various periods of history. Often to make our own time in history seem that much better.

[pmb72]

It's not bad enough that DICK Cheney defends the ugly things he and his administration were responsible for; he wants these policies to remain in place. More torture. Not a scintilla of shame in thise man's body. Not only that, this coward want even fess up to what all the laws and treaties clearly state, what was done is "torture." I could go on about this despicable beast, but I feel myself needing to vomit.

By the way, I do call it his administration on purpose. Anyone who doesn't believe that he was pushing th buttons is participating in more self delusion then he is.

[PennP]

We cannot have memories of what we do not know, what we have not experienced. We are all Funes the Memorious, sitting in sensory darkness, unless we experience the truth.

Your post is a compelling argument for the release of the remaining torture photographs. They document the descent this country made into barbarity, something we all have to address. The torture deniers have to become what the Holocaust deniers are today--reviled as depraved individuals.

We also have to recognize that our current president is embracing of some of the prior administration's corrupt practices--namely, preventive incarceration. If Obama is unable or unwilling to accept that our illegal behvior in evidence collection may have cost us the right to prosecute a number of cases, the courts should step in. This country does not have the right to hold people against their will without being able to justify it under whole law, and Obama does not have the right to concoct some sort of trumped-up reasoning that would do Alberto Gonzales proud to do justify it. The "ends justifies the means" mentality is an admission of failure of the rule of law.

[ceindependence]

Yes, we should remember that three men were waterboarded. We should remember that 2700 lost their lives in the twin towers. We should remember that we lost 8-10 million souls in Germany. We lost 10 million people in the soviet union. We lost 30 - 50 million in China. We lost 2 million in
Cambodia. We have lost hundreds of thousands in various countries in Africa. And yes we loose 3000 babies a day to abortion in the US. We do have norplant, condoms, the pill and the day after pill.

But your right, go ahead, remember those three terrorists that were willing to kill women and children to make their political point agianst the United States. I'm sure your soul will be scarred over the mistreatment of these fine terrorists.

[DasBoot]

It's not about the souls of the terrorists. It's about this nation's soul.

[Car84]

Three?! From the reaction, I thought it was three THOUSAND, and that waterboarding was done nightly in the mess hall for entertainment. THREE?!

[RobertDavid]

Excellent piece and hats off to ICTJ!

[TRUE BLUE AMERICAN]

I'll tell you what I will remember- the twin towers coming down and the people jumping to their death. George Bush showing the world that enough is enough and giving the terrorists a beat down that should make us all proud. The left will forget that and force themselves to remember just how bad America is, after all it's all our fault.

[cdnnewsjunky]

You mean George Bush who was warned of an impending attack; and knew it was serious warning because he was engaging AQ in Afghanistan prior to 911; allowed it to happen while reading a serious book titled "My Pet Goat". That George Bush? The one who authorized an illegal invasion of a sovereign country? That George Bush? The one who invited AQ into Iraq, which by the way is one of the reasons that you can't leave now. That Geroge Bush? The one who spent his country into financial ruin? That George Bush? And your proud?

[TRUE BLUE AMERICAN]

One at a time junk- the "warning" was one of thousands that had no detail to it. "Allowed" it to happen, just liberal babble with no proof. "Authorized" an illegal invasion, congress authorized it and it wasn't illegal, Iraq was in direct violation of the first gulf war treaty. "Invited" AQ into Iraq, they came because they understand that freedom in Iraq spells doom for radical Islamic control. "Spent" his country into financial ruin, although I think Bush spent to much, alot was do to 9-11, do you remember that day and its cost to get us back on our feet? BTW Obama spent more in his first 100 days than Bush spent in 8 years. Proud, yes. I know you don't understand the concept of pride in your country, you would rather blame your own country and have tea with the terrorists, after all we want everyone to like us. Lay off the kool-aid goober and do some real research.

[againstzionistracism]

Where is Saddam's WMD?


Quotation from Negotiating for Dummies by M and M Donaldson (1996), pages 195-6:

“The Gulf War (‘Operation Desert Storm’) may well have been avoided if the diplomats had been clearer in the days just before the invasion of Kuwait by Iraq. President Saddam Hussein wanted to destroy Kuwait for a number of reasons – all of which were good and valid to him. He was not prepared to take on the US, let alone the entire world. Therefore, he met for several hours with the US Ambassador, April Glaspie.

The Ambassador said to Hussein, ‘We have no opinion on Arab-Arab conflicts, like your border with Kuwait.’

Astonishing.

The Ambassador insists that there was more to the discussion than was printed in the transcript, but she does not deny these comments..

Even Hussein’s telling of the tale indicates some lack of clarity regarding his intentions toward Kuwait. He never said his intention was to eliminate Kuwait from the face of the earth. On the other hand, the US never even hinted at the kind of response that was ultimately invoked.. Documents show that within the month before the invasion, the US communicated directly to Saddam Hussein in a way that caused him to think Iraq could cross the border into Kuwait without repercussions. Please think for a moment of the men and women who died in the Gulf War and their families who still miss them..”

[JoBangles]

Your post reveals how the US all but gave Saddam the go ahead for his invasion of Kuwait. I believe that the US planers had wanted to take over Iraq as early as the late
80's. The war hawks were itching to show global dominance by US military power and what better place than Iraq and it's extensive oil reserves? This meeting between Glaspie and Saddam is never talked about in the MSM. I wonder why?

[CherokeeGirl]

And Bush squawked "We will hunt down Bin Laden, Dead or Alive!"

And we all cheered like a bunch of dummies watching a John Wayne movie.

Then, they DID NOTHING to find Bin Laden, and even let him get away!

If that's what you are proud of, I feel sorry for you for aiming so low.

[TRUE BLUE AMERICAN]

Typical foolish liberal response, Cherokee. I like how you capitalized "did nothing". Are you saying that our military didn't attempt to hunt him down in Toro Boro(mountainous, cave complex)? Is it possible that the terrain was very difficult to operate in and he really did escape with help from people moving through their own backyard? "Let him get away" you really believe that ? A little bit of research would help, you might find out things like, Bin laden is in Pakistan and at this time storming an allies country with military might isn't a good idea. Crawl back into fetal position and dream about bashing your own country, it's what your good at.

[DasBoot]

Right, George Bush hunted down OBL, the man behind the operation, and forcefully...Oh wait, he didn't. Instead we attack Iraq based on lies attained by torture. Uups.

[GraceNeeded]

The future and our legacy was my main reason for expressing my 'righteous indignation' from immediately following the inauguration on. I am ALWAYS offended when the ideals and laws of my country are corrupted, especially in our leaders. When the Republican nominee for President encouraged Gov. Palin and her assistants to ignore subpoenas in the hearing for her ethics violation, I was absolutely livid. How could someone considering being President and V.P. take our laws so casually, especially when they took an oath to uphold them and they are supposed to act as models?
THEN, when I realized that the former administration had committed torture, even after Pres. Bush had given this wonderful speech denying that America would ever torture, I was extremely heartsick. Finally, when I found out how former V.P.Cheney had kept opposing legal opinions from seeing the light of day, as well as disregarding others who had dissenting views, I was outraged. What right did he have to do these things? How dare he deny others their God given rights to freedom of speech and trial by jury and humane treatment? His abuse of power is outrageous, but I know he will be held accountable in the here of the hereafter, so I am less concerned for him as I am our legacy to future generations.

[TRUE BLUE AMERICAN]

Spoken like a true liberal, Grace. The pain a suffering you must have went through thinking about how those poor , murderous thugs must have felt after the harsh interrogation. You probably didn't bat an eye for the dead Americans on the battle field or your 3,000 innocent countrymen. Have yourself a good cry for the terrorists and then take a nap.

[cdnnewsjunky]

The Republican party is about to take a nap for a very, very, very long time. Hope you enjoy being irrelevant for the rest of your life!

[CherokeeGirl]

that's NOT FAIR! You don't know this woman and have no right to make assumptions!