Of recent, your Eyewitness’s attention has been wonderfully focused on war and all that goes with it. Not that he’s gotten more hot-blooded, but against the background of Mad Maduro massing his massive armed forces and rattling his sabre on our Essequibo border. While some feel he’s just jumping up and down while squawking like a demented rooster with what’s taking place in Ukraine and in the Gaza Strip, your Eyewitness wonders: if “civilized” nations can decide to launch wars, when they know hundreds of thousands of human lives may be lost, what about this madman, who wants to hold on to power?? In WWII, over 50 MILLION persons died; what’s our 780,000?!!
Now, we’ve been having wars since we dropped out of the trees; and maybe we had wars even then!! Wise ones have expanded their grey cells to decide whether war and its killings can be justified. A “Just War Theory” has evolved to say the answer is “Yes!” – and several conditions are usually floated as justification. The first is “last resort”: meaning, the antagonists must’ve exhausted all non-violent options to settle their dispute. With Mad Maduro refusing to have the ICJ decide on the border controversy, he’s clearly already decided on war!!
Then there’s the “just cause” rationale: which has now boiled down to self-defence to military aggression. We’ve never – unlike Venezuela at Ankoko – attacked them. What was their rationale?? In the same vein, there’s the justification of “right intention”: which simply says that goals like revenge shouldn’t be the cause of starting a war. Yet, this is what the Israelis are doing in Gaza, innit?!! They’re also violating the rule of “proportionality”: meaning that any response to aggression, like the Hamas attack, should be measured, and the Palestinian people should not be obliterated wholesale!! Nowadays, the principle of “legitimate authority”: which holds that lawful war can only be conducted between sovereign states – is pretty much passe, since we’ve got all these non-state actors, like the Houthis or Taliban, who’ve effectively taken on and prevailed over sovereign states! It’s a new world in making war!! Similarly, the rule of “reasonable prospect of success” has been turned on its head by individuals like the Arabians, who crashed into the World Trade Center, or Hamas, in attacking Israel. “Success” is now defined by how many enemies the stronger power would create in retaliation!!
After war’s been launched, there are three rules on how it should be conducted: Only military targets are permitted, and civilian targets – cynically dubbed “collateral damage” – must be minimised. No genocide!! Allied with this rule would be that the force used mustn’t be greater than the provoking cause!! Lastly, the enemy captured should not be tortured.
War anyone??
…vending??
Your Eyewitness did a double-take when he saw that pic of the pavements outside of Muneshwer’s being COMPLETELY clear of vendors!! This was the first time in his life he was actually able to SEE the pavement!! And second of all, he expected officials at the M&CC to somehow get involved and encourage the vendors to disobey the orders of the court!! There was an attempt, but it was quite desultory: that the vendors should be ON the road!! – and evidently, the road was cleared!!
Now, your Eyewitness is quite sympathetic to the vendors. As they’ll let anyone who’d listen know, they “got mouths to feed”. But this has been the case for almost two hundred years. During slavery, the slaves would sell the produce and poultry raised on their small plots in the provision section at Sunday Markets. After slavery, one had expected them to transfer their skills to shops in the towns – but the indentured Portuguese and Chinese out-manoeuvred them!!
But isn’t it time they move from vending to businesses?? Maybe some malls at Durban Park?
…lifeline
Well, Rowley had reason to be smirking like the Cheshire cat. The lifeline thrown by the Americans to save his economy, by permitting them to exploit the Dragon Gas Field, evidently is for 2 years – so, unaffected by new sanctions!!
