[Genocide/1971] Jeremy Rice: Let's Not "Let it be"

In the recent years, the American foreign policy has come under sharper scrutiny. In this uni-polar world with only one superpower, the issue has become of much greater concern.

Jeremy Rice, with The Spleen, drives this point home by drawing special attention to the role of the United States in 1971 in regard to Pakistan-India tension/conflict/war and the events that led to the emergence of Bangladesh as an independent country.

Let's Not 'Let It Be'

Jeremy Rice

Courtesy: The Spleen [October 22, 2002]
http://www.thespleen.com/politics/xspleennation/index.php?artID=434

At the end of "The Concert for New York" on Saturday night at Madison Square Garden, Sir Paul McCartney launched into one of the signature songs of the late Beatles period. In a flashback more than 30 years to the past, people rushed the stage and began to sing with the band. The musicians played on, chorus after chorus, as if John, Paul, George and Ringo were there. The only thing missing (aside from the other three) was McCartney's beard.

The song was "Let It Be."

The scene was disturbing.

In 1985, my generation was supposed to have had its Woodstock, the transcontinental Live Aid show to raise money for the victims of African famine. Most of the people who performed Saturday night -- David Bowie, the Who, Mick Jagger, Eric Clapton -- performed at the Live Aid show as well, and most of them of course were of the Woodstock generation.

Nearly two decades later and there's no one in pop music who's come along to take their places. This seems to me as dangerous as any terror threat, and perhaps a symbol of why we're in trouble right now. Look at that brief list of people again. Not one American on it. Not one person born after 1960.

It's possible that we'll actually overcome this fanatical insurgency, that we'll strike at its heart and reduce the likelihood of more violent attacks, as well as wipe out the threat of chemical and biological disasters (that is, those we don't ourselves cause). But where will we be at the end of this? What new art forms, new music, new leaders will emerge?

New Forms? New Policies? Nada Chance ... An Aside

This question weighs on my mind now more than ever because we may be on the verge of a few election cycles tilted even more toward incumbents than usual (I know, no surprise there). The latest sour note in the age of hypocritical leadership is the upcoming special session of the Florida Legislature ordered by Gov. Jeb Bush. This column by Adam Joyce, from April of this year, provided links to articles critiquing the Bush brothers' devotion to tax cuts and how they're trashing state budgets.

Florida, according to The Miami Herald, faces a $1.3 billion budget deficit, "the biggest in state history." While the shortfall was apparent at least a year ago, GOP lawmakers -- the same people who would have brought you George W. Bush even if the Florida vote count had not warranted it -- contend it's the terror attacks that have resulted in the fiscal problem. I suppose the voters will have to decide who is right. But the voters likely will be thinking of things besides domestic politics when they next go to the polls. Or will they?

That's not to single out Florida. Here in New York City, home -- reportedly -- of the bravest people in the world, we're facing a major budget crunch that your tax dollars are going to help us out of (I and all others here thank you in advance for your support). Note that over the last six years New York has seriously reduced its tax revenues, the only part of the GOP platform that Rudy tends to agree with (oh, yeah -- there's also killing innocent civilians), and had we sensible airport security on Sept. 11, this city would still not have enough money to pay its teachers and its -- yes -- police and firemen what they deserve.

So enough of the Empire State warm and fuzzies. I'm talking rock 'n' roll.

God Plays a Solo and Strikes a Nostalgic Chord

As McCartney and company tore into the meat of "Let It Be," which can be a very powerful moment (next week: Olmstead rebuts the idea that this is true, or that the Beatles ever existed), Sir Beatle called on Clapton to come forward and take a solo. Now let's just say up front that Clapton -- bin Laden be damned -- is God. But damn if seeing Slowhand rip through a George Harrison solo didn't take me back 30 years, to another benefit show at the Garden which raised money for victims of violence.

On Aug. 1, 1971, Clapton, Harrison, Ringo Starr and Bob Dylan took that same stage for "The Concert for Bangladesh." Clapton's hair was longer. He chain-smoked. And he probably couldn't have played the gig that day had not some of his friends staged and intervention and saved him from heroin. But he's the missing link to this very important event.

"The Concert for Bangladesh" is perhaps the first rock 'n' roll record I remember. My father was obsessed with Leon Russell's performance of "Jumpin' Jack Flash/Youngblood." To this day I can hear him imitating Harrison's introduction of the indomitable keyboardist: "Now we're gonna hear a couple from LEON." If you've never heard this great moment in rock, it is a treat.

Apparently, though, the rock cognoscenti thought otherwise. "While Leon's music here is as dazzling as ever, during his set the concert suddenly became a Leon Russell show and I have heard that before," Jon Landau -- who later made fuckloads of money as Bruce Springsteen's butt boy -- wrote at the time in Rolling Stone. "Good as his actual performance is, his conception of the role was too commonplace for an event as special as this."

Landau suggests, and to some degree this is true, that these celebrity shows are supposed to be about the singular event of having these individuals together on the same stage. But he also implies -- or should have implied -- that these performances are about something more than just rock 'n' roll. This is why Harrison wrote the song "Bangladesh," which Landau excerpted in his review:

My friend came to me,
With sadness in his eyes,
He told me that he wanted help,
Before his country died,
Although I couldn't feel the pain,
I knew I'd have to try,
Now I'm asking all of you,
To help us save some lives.

Despite Harrison's good intentions, the poetry's not there. I'd rather hear Leon's alcoholic swagger.

In our situation now, apparently the British can feel the pain. Their Jurassic rockers have come to our aid, and I'm sure the policemen and firemen and other true heroes were very happy to hear from them (nice touch when Bowie played his transcendent "Heroes"). McCartney, not one to be outdone by Harrison, wrote a song for this very event, which he titled "Freedom." I have to say I would have preferred the George Michael song of the same name, which at least has some sort of energy to it, and perhaps somewhat of a sense of humor.

The "Freedom" McCartney offered Saturday night seemed to be some abstract concept at its most banal. Exactly what are we free of or from? And what is the evidence of this? That we have to write shitty tribute songs to mark our worst tragedies? I think that may be teaching the wrong lesson. As fond as I am of messages in my music (give me "Welcome to the Terrordome," if you're married to this concept), I have a suggestion for Sir Paul:

She was just 17
You know what I mean
And the way she looked was way beyond compare

Not your favorite song? Hate the Beatles? Then pick your tune. But this has energy, sex, romance, nostalgia. This is what we need to use our freedom for. If I seem unappreciative or cynical about this event, I'm not. But these issues are important to me and I cannot overlook them.

The U.S. Didn't Used to Be the World's Victim

It's pretty obvious why we were saluting New York and its fallen heroes Saturday night, but why were we raising money for Bangladesh in 1971 (aside from the fact that Harrison and Dylan would have been elected to the White House against Nixon the following year and could have sold out the Garden if they were raising money to go into the Garden Weasel business)? Well, as with many aspects of life in the United States, it all goes back to Pakistan ... and of course Henry Kissinger.

In March 1971, West Pakistan President Yahya Khan stepped in to prevent the East Pakistan -- or Bangladesh -- National Assembly from meeting, despite the fact that it had been democratically elected. This led to nonviolent protest. The Pakistan army responded by kidnapping the Assembly's leader. "At least 10,000 civilians were butchered in the first three days," Christopher Hitchens writes in The Trial of Henry Kissinger. "The eventual civilian death toll has never been placed at less than half a million and has been put as high as 3 million."

The United States, as one might expect, did not denounce the slaughter -- even though, according to Hitchens, some of the guns used against the citizenry were obtained through U.S. assistance programs. A month later, U.S. officials on the scene sent cables criticizing the silence from Washington. Hitchens quotes one such message, known as the Blood Telegram because it was written by the Bangladesh consul general, Archer Blood:

We have chosen not to intervene, even morally, on the grounds that the ... conflict, in which unfortunately the overworked term genocide is applicable, is purely an internal matter of a sovereign state. Private Americans have expressed disgust. We, as professional civil servants, express our dissent with current policy and fervently hope that our true and lasting interests here can be defined and our policies redirected.

Nixon and Kissinger repaid Blood for his candor, Hitchens says, by recalling him immediately.

Why was the administration so interested in Yahya Khan? Part of the reason may be that Pakistan was aligned with China, and Nixon wanted inroads for his détente. This would fit into the general pattern of U.S. foreign policy, which is to use other countries only for short-term strategic gain (check out this previous column for some of our other dealings with Pakistan). Hitchens notes that there were other back channels available for the United States to contact China. He speculates that Kissinger may just have been interested in showing Nixon that he wouldn't tilt toward India.

As we move forward in this war, this country must change its behavior of belittling the slaughter of others. It's part of leadership and stewardship -- and it can play a role in overcoming our image in some parts of the world as evil. Our president is, as we speak, cutting deals with world leaders in order to get them behind his anti-al Qaeda initiative. In some cases, like North Korea, this is long overdue. We'll see whom our other "allies" are and what we've promised them.

"Let It Be" indeed