9-11
by Noam Chomsky
Seven Stories Press, 125 pp.
FIVE MORAL PIECES
by Umberto Eco
translated by Alistair McEwan
Harcourt, Inc., 111pp.
9-11 is the publication of a series of interviews conducted with MIT professor of linguistics and political activist Noam Chomsky. Recorded in the month immediately following September 11, the interview format is question-and-answer, with most taking place by e-mail with foreign journalists.
Chomsky acknowledges the horrible atrocities of September 11, but moves on to the damning dossier he has compiled over many years as an unofficial watchdog. Not surprisingly, it is the United States itself that Chomsky indicts in 9-11. It is an important book because it contains exactly what the corporate media avoids discussing – the longstanding role of the U.S. in the creation, support, manipulation and guidance of terrorist activities around the world.
From an alphabet of nations: Afghanistan, Cambodia, Chile, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Korea, Iraq, Nicaragua, Panama, Somalia, Vietnam, Yugoslavia – and only a shortlist at that – Nicaragua makes a compelling example. Despite a systematic decade-long terrorist onslaught by the U.S., which killed tens of thousands of people, and which was well documented by the New York Times and other major newspapers, Nicaragua "didn’t respond by setting off bombs in Washington." Chomsky continues, "They went to the World Court, which ruled in their favour, ordering the U.S. to desist and pay substantial reparations. The U.S. dismissed the court judgment with contempt, responding with an immediate escalation of the attack."
For an example from within the U. S., Chomsky writes, "When a federal building was blown up in Oklahoma City, there were calls for bombing the Middle East, and it probably would have happened if the source turned out to be there. When it was found to be domestic, with links to the ultra-right militias, there was no call to obliterate Montana and Idaho. Rather, there was a search for the perpetrator, who was found, brought to court, and sentenced, and there were efforts to understand the grievances that lie behind such crimes and to address the problems."
The argument that Chomsky builds in 9-11 is logical and direct. By contrast, the "war on terrorism," with its adolescent axis-of-evil jargon, becomes all the more frightening. While 9-11 is essentially a snapshot, a moment in time, Chomsky does take the opportunity to point the reader toward other sources of dissent. He refers to a brilliantly scathing feature in The Guardian (www.guardian.co.uk) by Indian writer Arundhati Roy. Of the then pending U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, she writes, "Witness the infinite justice of the new century. Civilians starving to death while they’re waiting to be killed."
Umberto Eco’s Five Moral Pieces begins with "Reflections on War." Published during the Gulf War, Eco argues that, "It is an intellectual duty to proclaim the inconceivability of war." As a practical alternative – which the warring nations of the world, and their powerful and attendant industries would surely demand – Eco puts forward the "cold wars" of the 20th century. Hardly a bloodless option, but perhaps preferable to what makes the news.
While 9-11 pinpoints a specific incident in time, Five Moral Pieces jumps here and there. The second essay, "When the Other Appears on the Scene," is derived from correspondence with Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini, and tackles the perennial question of morality, from within or without religious faith.
"On the Press" is the most detailed piece in the book, originally presented to the Italian Senate and the editors of Italy’s biggest daily newspapers. A diagnosis of what plagues the press in Italy, this piece is a chronology of dailies and weeklies, the business of entertainment and television, the artifice of the interview, and how these all affect what is called news. Eco isn’t afraid to be prescriptive, often finishing these pieces with a list of cures.
"Ur-Fascism" is perhaps the most personal piece in the collection. Eco details the repugnant fascism of his youth in Italy, crafting a poetic essay that might have been titled "Fourteen Ways of Looking at a Fascist."
The book’s final piece, "Migration, Tolerance, and the Intolerable" reiterates Eco’s argument for the inconceivability of war. He writes: "Intolerance comes before any doctrine. In this sense intolerance has biological roots, it manifests itself among animals as territoriality, it is based on emotional reactions that are often superficial – we cannot bear those who are different from us." Eco argues passionately for a world view that is tolerant of those who are different, as we all ultimately are.
Although published almost five years ago in Italy as Cinque Scritti Morali, these essays now refract through the dark glass of September 11. While Eco’s Five Moral Pieces feels the more polished of the two collections, the immediacy of Chomsky’s 9-11 makes up for any shortcomings.
For most readers, though, I suspect it is the substance of these slim books, and not the style, that will matter.
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