Revcom.us asks in response to the U.S. Air Force bombing a hospital run by Doctors Without Borders in Kunduz, Afghanistan: “You want to talk about terrorism? Yes, terrorism is a method of reactionary jihadists. But they can only dream of carrying out massacres that bring destruction and death on the scale of massacres brought by the United States.”
At 2:15 in the morning, Saturday, October 3, the United States carried out a massive, sustained bombing attack against a hospital run by Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières in Kunduz, Afghanistan. At least 19 people are dead, including at least a dozen of the courageous hospital staff who were treating patients in the most dire circumstances, without supplies. Dozens more patients and staff were wounded.
The U.S. military coldly called the massacre “collateral damage”—their euphemism (wording that covers up reality) for killing civilians.
You want to talk about terrorism?
Doctors Without Borders revealed that the U.S. military continued the bombing for 30 minutes after receiving phone calls telling military contacts that the hospital was being bombed. “All parties to the conflict including in Kabul [the U.S.-backed Afghan regime] and Washington, were clearly informed of the precise location of the MSF [Médecins Sans Frontières] facilities—hospital, guesthouse, office.” And hospital staff told reporters there were no Taliban fighters in the area.
The bombing sent shockwaves through the devastated city of Kunduz, the latest focal point in the clash between the U.S.-backed regime of Dark Ages Islamic fundamentalist warlords who have aligned with the U.S., and on the other side, the oppressive Dark Ages Taliban—all of whom represent nothing but exploitation and oppression. The Kunduz hospital treated civilians as well as those wounded in fighting without regard to which side they were on—which is what a hospital should do.
Hours after the bombing, thick smoke continued to hang in the air over Kunduz—a message from the USA as it clashes around the world with factions of Islamic fundamentalists who are obstacles to its interests. A message to rival powers that smell weakness in the defeats the U.S. is encountering in clashes with these forces. And a message to the people of the world: Don’t fuck with us because there is nothing too depraved, too inhuman, too grotesquely in stark contradiction to our proclaimed values of “democracy” and “human rights” that we won’t do to teach you a lesson.
The U.S. attacked Afghanistan on October 7, 2001, and then invaded and occupied the country. They called it “Operation Enduring Freedom.” U.S. bombs, missiles, and bullets have killed thousands of Afghan men, women, and children. Night raids, special operations, covert assassinations, extrajudicial killings, drone strikes, the use of military contractors, massive detentions and torture, and all-around terror are embedded in the nature of this imperialist occupation. From 2009-2012 alone, nearly 30,000 non-combatants were killed or wounded.
And that’s just Afghanistan. The U.S. has brought the same and worse to country after country in that region. (See “What the Record Shows: Nothing Good Has—or Will—Come from U.S. Imperialist Intervention in Syria or Anywhere Else.”)
You want to talk about terrorism?
Yes, terrorism is a method of reactionary jihadists. But they can only dream of carrying out massacres that bring destruction and death on the scale of massacres brought by the United States.
This article was published on revcom.us on October 3, 2015.