A tale of injustice

U.S. imperialism is losing its attempt to occupy and control Afghanistan. It is beginning to lose control of client state Pakistan. Now the Pentagon — in collaboration with federal courts — has gotten a little piece of revenge for its setbacks in the “Afghanistan-Pakistan” theater. It has imposed a grotesque injustice on a Pakistani woman after the corporate media demonized her.

All NATO’s power can’t force the Afghan resistance to submit. But a judge can impose a sentence of 86 years on Aafia Siddiqui, a 38-year-old neuroscientist trained at Brandeis and MIT, whom the Pentagon separated from her children for five years.

Her alleged crime? While in military custody in occupied Afghanistan, U.S. witnesses testified, this diminutive Pakistani grabbed a rifle and fired at U.S. troops. But she was the only one with gunshot wounds.

Why had she been in custody? The court allowed no evidence to be presented to explain this.

It is hard to imagine a greater travesty of justice, brought by the same forces that imposed Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo prisons on the world.

Pakistani reactions further prove the injustice. The current government is the friendliest to and most dependent on U.S. imperialism in Pakistan’s history. Yet even this regime has to pay attention to the protests that greeted Siddiqui’s sentencing. Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani called Siddiqui “the daughter of the nation” and promised to work to get her sent from the U.S. to Pakistan. (Christian Science Monitor, Sept. 24)

Along with the Pakistani people, we are outraged by the sentence. But we are not surprised by the complete lack of justice. The only surprise is that the Pentagon is willing to publicize a story — however its lies may color it — that is an allegory of U.S. imperialism’s failing attempt to occupy and conquer the countries of West and Central Asia.

First the George W. Bush gang seized on the pretext of 9/11 to invade Afghanistan. Then it invented the “weapons of mass destruction” pretext to justify the invasion of Iraq. The Democratic administration, despite its promises and hesitations, is continuing these illegal and murderous occupations, has spread the war to Pakistan, and is threatening a conflagration in Iran.

The Iraq war is not over, nor is there a stable regime there, but the country and its formerly cohesive society lies in ruins. In Afghanistan the war is growing, along with more NATO casualties and more Afghans killed monthly, including civilians and resistance fighters. Drone flights, hired mercenaries kindly called “contractors,” and the massive NATO technological advantage have killed Afghans and Pakistanis, but that has only increased recruits to the resistance.

The Pentagon constantly underestimates the courage, the competence and the willingness to sacrifice of the people it is trying to conquer. It can take out vengeance on the people. But in doing so, it creates more enemies. As Aafia Siddiqui’s fable of injustice shows, even under the worst odds, people threatened with foreign rule find a way to fight back.

For the progressive and workers’ movement in the U.S., there is only one position to take. Oppose the U.S. government and the Pentagon. Oppose the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. Oppose any attack on Iran.

U.S. troops out!

Free Aafia Siddiqui!