By Allison Campbell and Nandita Sharma

With the declaration of the "war on terrorism", the people of the world are being told we are entering a new era; that this war will be unlike anything we have yet experienced. And yet, as bombs now strike Afghanistan and as so-called "western democracies" line up to eradicate this ill-defined entity called "terrorism", something about all this seems eerily familiar.

In trying to understand the scope and effects of the US's latest military extravaganza, it is helpful to keep in mind the war the US has been waging inside and outside its borders for the past three decades. It can be argued that the "war on terrorism" had its beginnings not in the collapse of the World Trade Centers, but under the auspices of the "war on drugs" first declared by US President Nixon in 1971, and fully unleashed by Reagan and Clinton in the 1980s and 1990s. Let's look at the similarities.

A war on two fronts

Like the "war on drugs", the "war on terrorism" is being fought on two fronts - in the "supply" countries of the South, and at "home". Although the focus is on the external enemy - bin Laden, the Taliban and perhaps other countries, such as Yemen, Sudan, Malaysia, Indonesia and perhaps others - an internal enemy has also been constructed as a threat. The first "internal enemy" to be identified are diverse communities of people of colour, especially anyone "perceived" to be Muslim.

The "war on terrorism" grows from the racialized ground established by the "war on drugs". Having already criminalized an entire generation of Blacks, Latinos and Indigenous men and women, the "war on terrorism" extends this to all people of colour -especially Middle-Eastern, Central Asian and South Asian peoples. Terrorism, we are told, could lurk in their homes, their schools, their places of prayer, their hearts.

The undefined "enemy"

But what is this "terrorism?" What is this enemy in our midst, waiting to "cross our borders" and destroy "our freedom"? Those in control of this war are content to leave the "enemy" undefined and unlimited. White House spokesperson Ari Fleischer (Globe and Mail, Oct. 9, 2001) tells us the "war on terrorism" is not about capturing Osama bin Laden. Instead, he gives us a purposely vague response: "this is a war against terrorists on multiple fronts." This spreads the web of suspicion very widely, something that is necessary to sustain the war for years to come.

Such a widespread and undefined target of "terror" takes its cue from the drug war. To this day, the scope of the "drug problem" remains largely undefined. In the US, this has led to a culture of suspicion and fear being constructed based on racist and classist stereotypes of drug traffickers, dealers and users. It has also justified massive amounts of military and other funding to "friendly regimes" around the world - $1.6 billion (US) given to further arm a corrupt Colombia military and government in 2001 alone. This increased militarization of "friendly dictatorships" has resulted in widespread loss of life, the dislocation of millions of people and fabulous wealth for defense contractors and the oil and mining industries.

Fighting "terrorism" is even more murky than fighting drugs - and those in power are keeping it that way. Again, a culture of suspicion and fear has easily been constructed based on racist and classist stereotypes of "terrorists" and their supporters. The enemy in the "war on terrorism" could be practically anyone, anything, or any activity. We all shuddered with Bush's statement, "If you are not with us, you are with the terrorists".

As we have seen too often in the last month, it has become instantly legitimate to harass, stalk, chase, beat and murder people allegedly "suspected" of terrorist activity, all in the name of "protecting democracy and freedom". Linking the presence of the "enemy within" with threats to "national security" has raised the stakes for people of colour considerably. In this quest to protect "freedom", we have been told that we might all have to carry "national identity cards" (Papers, Please!) and, learning from history, it will be people of colour who will be among the major targets of police harassment.

Legitimization for increased power of the military

Prior to the declaration of a "war on drugs", the role of the standing military was confined to activities outside of the US borders. By constructing the "enemy" as drug traffickers bringing cocaine and heroine into the US from Latin America via Mexico, the drug war helped to create a perception that we needed to "protect the nation" at the US/Mexico border. This justified a massive increase of US military presence along the US borders - particularly the southern border with Mexico, where there are now 16,000 border and customs agents stationed. This has made it much more dangerous for Latinos and other people of colour to enter the US, and has rendered people much more vulnerable once they do arrive. 400 people are now killed every year trying to enter the US. There is no public reporting requirement for the military along the border.

Building on this, the "war on terrorism" has provided increased legitimacy for the military to be a strong presence throughout the US. Defense Secretary Rumsfield has openly called for a greater role for the US military so that it can be used to fight "terrorism" in the US itself. These are powers that have not been considered necessary since the post-Civil War Reconstruction era, when the 1879 Posse Comitatus law effectively outlawed domestic military participation.

Already the US Congress has approved US$40 billion in aid, much of that going to the military machine. In addition, the US House of Representatives has approved a 9% increase in spending for spy agencies that were already consuming US$30 billion per year. US Attorney General John Ashcroft called recently for "increased surveillance and detention ability for agencies such as the FBI." $300 million was approved for "aid" to Afghanistan. How much of that money will be spent arming the murderous and terrorizing band of thugs called the Northern Alliance in that country?

In Canada, the Liberal government has approved $250 million in new spending as a "first instalment" in the "war on terrorism", and Finance Minister Paul Martin has indicated support for spending the entire $7.2 billion surplus (created by slashing social programs) on the "war effort".

Criminalization of people of colour

The criminalization of the enemy is an integral piece of gaining support for any war. Like in the drug war, not only are underlying causes for terrorism being ignored, they will be exacerbated by rendering more people dispossessed and by increasing the gulf of global inequalities. Latin America has been massively militarized over the last 15 years - allegedly to eradicate the production of heroine and cocaine. Likewise, Central and South Asian countries have been recipients of US funding to fight the drug war. In May of 2001, US Secretary of State, Colin Powell, gave $43 million (US) to the Taliban. Yet drug production has increased because there are few other viable cash crops to grow, and people are becoming increasingly desperate. Likewise, on the "home front", the number of drug users in the US has steadily increased since the early 1990s. Much of the money to fight the war drug was channelled to fund repressive regimes, not to formulate effective strategies to help drug addicts.

Like the "war on drugs", this "war on terrorism" is calculated precisely to avoid addressing the underlying factors leading to terrorism. If we can't discuss colonial practices, the systemic attempts to destroy social movements worldwide or the startling increase in the strength of fundamentalists of all sorts; if we can't talk about the growing gap between haves and have-nots or the growing environmental crisis; if we can't talk about the crisis of hundreds of millions of people being displaced and forced to migrate, forced evictions and mega development projects that destroy people's homes, if we can't talk about the lack of sufficient food, health care and education that most of the world's people suffer at the hands of "western democracies" - if we can't do this without being dismissed as naive or even as "terrorists" ourselves, can we ever expect to end terrorism?

We can't. Not addressing the root causes of terrorism amounts to allowing the beneficiaries of the military and prison industrial complex to write themselves a blank cheque on the backs of peoples of colour and Indigenous peoples the world over. This will allow the "war on terrorism" to go on and on and on. With such vaguely defined goals as "protecting civilization", how will the world know when the "war on terrorism" is over, or be able to judge what is "reasonable" to combat it? President Bush has told us this war will be long and widespread, and that he himself doesn't know when it will be over.

The invisible "victims"

"In a war, the losers are reflected by the victims of that war." It is clear that the "war on drugs" has had varying effects on different communities. The US prison system has grown by 400%, with much of the required funds for this expansion going to private, corporate interests.

61% of the US federal prison population - the largest in the world - is incarcerated for drug offenses. Yet not all drug users are targeted in the "war on drugs". According to the US federal Household Survey of 2000, fully 72% of all illicit drug users that year were white. Only 15% were Black, and 10% were Latino. Nonetheless, Blacks make up 37% of people arrested for drug violations, 42% of people in federal prisons on drug charges, and 58% of those in state prisons for drug offenses. Latinos, meanwhile, account for 21% of the state drug-related prison population. One in three Black men and one in six Latino men can expect to spend part of their lives in jail. Compare this with one in twenty-three white men. Black women in the US are eight times more likely than white women to go to prison, and Latina women are 4 times more likely.

Likewise, in the "war on terrorism" not all "terrorists" are to be targeted. Namely, the terror unleashed by the US, Canadian, British, French and other G8 governments will not be stopped. The terrorism of fundamentalists, like the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan, the military dictatorship of Pakistan, the dictatorship in Saudi Arabia - these will be strengthened not stopped.

The "war on drugs" has been called a "war on peasants and poor people of colour". Are the real victims of the "war on terror" going to be any different?

Countering the War Propaganda

The propaganda of the "war on drugs" claimed it would accomplish at least three things. It would prevent drug use; prevent drug trafficking through criminalization of traffickers and cut off supply by closing the borders. None of these were accomplished. What was accomplished was the criminalization of people of colour and people living in poverty both in and outside the US, a massive transfer of public funds to private (military and prison) industries, and a massive militarization of the US/Mexico border.

Thirty years and thousands of casualties later, social justice activists were beginning to make real gains against the "war on drugs". This was before September 11th. Just as we were beginning to feel hopeful, we are faced with a "new". We need to take serious stock of the situation and learn from the hard lessons of the "war on drugs". Just as the elimination of illicit drugs was not the goal of the "war on drugs", we must remember that the elimination of terrorism is not the goal of this war. The "war on terrorism" rather, strives to build on the legacy of the drug war: calling for increased profits for military and prison industries, increased legitimacy for repressive measures against already and increasingly criminalized peoples and increased de-legitimacy for social justice activists and our movements. This is the fertile ground for fundamentalisms of all sorts, including that of the Christian Right in North America.

The "war on drugs" taught us to see war as a wide range of activities, not just bombs. It also taught us to see that there was one war with multiple fronts being waged against people in the South and against people in the North. Bombing and starving Afghans, destroying civil liberties, racist scapegoating, the suppression of dissent and support for fundamentalists are all part of the same war. We desperately need to keep this analysis in mind as we prepare to fight the latest realignment of imperialist power.