Deaglán de Bréadún, Foreign Affairs Correspondent, examines the Tánaiste's charges of anti-Americanism against leaders of the Irish anti-war movement
Are you now or have you ever been anti-American? When you listen to George Bush addressing a gathering of troops in his bomber-jacket, are you stirred with martial fervour or does it remind you of Dubya's own modest military record, flying a plane for the Texas National Guard while others were fighting and dying in Vietnam?
If you marched, as at least 100,000 people did, in Dublin on February 15th (now known colloquially as "F15"), were you motivated by antipathy towards Uncle Sam and all his works and pomps, or just registering a protest against the proposed military attack on Iraq?
This week Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise Mary Harney was wrongly accused of smearing the protesters as extreme leftist opponents of the US and the European Union who were putting our vital national interests in jeopardy. In fact, she was careful to distinguish between the majority, who were against US policy on Iraq, and "a lot of the left wing" who had a broader anti-American agenda.
These were some of the same people who campaigned against the Nice Treaty; she said they were "virulently" anti-American and anti-EU and were now trying to "infect" the centre-ground.
It was typical of Harney to speak her mind while others who may have felt the same way kept their counsel.
She got little support from the political establishment apart from her party colleague and Minister for Justice Michael McDowell, who went so far as to say that some left-wingers supported Saddam Hussein, and Minister for Foreign Affairs, Brian Cowen, who accused some campaigners of being anti-American.
It is true that key organisers of F15 campaigned for a No vote in the two Nice referendums. Does that make them anti-EU?
Not so, says Roger Cole of the Peace and Neutrality Alliance, who was chief steward on F15: "We opposed Nice because we do not support the militarisation of the EU. We have a vision of the EU as an association of independent democratic states with no military dimension."
He also rejects the charge of being anti-American: "That is utter rubbish. We are very definitely opposed to the policies of George Bush on this issue as, indeed, are millions of Americans." But what really incenses Cole, a long-time Labour Party activist, is any suggestion that he supports the Iraqi dictator, which he describes as "absolutely" false and an outrageous misrepresentation of the people who organised and took part in the demonstration.
"There is not a shred of evidence for that remark," he says. "I have not come across anybody in Ireland who supports Saddam."
Richard Boyd Barrett of the Irish Anti-War Movement, who was chief organiser and master of ceremonies at the Dublin protest, also vehemently rejects the charge of being a supporter of Saddam. He recalls that it was the Left which protested about Saddam's notorious gas attack on Halabja in northern Iraq in 1988 in which 5,000 Kurds were killed. He says the Government of the day, which included Bertie Ahern as Minister for Labour, were effectively subsidising the Baghdad regime by providing millions of pounds in export credit insurance to Irish firms exporting beef to Iraq.
Nor does he accept the charge of being anti-American: "What we are opposed to is the bloody history of US foreign policy in the last 30 years." As he sees it, the US is a reactionary power which supported repressive regimes in Indonesia, the Pinochet dictatorship in Chile, the death squads in El Salvador, the "Contras" in Nicaragua, Saddam Hussein's Iraq when it was at war with Iran, and Israel against the Palestinians.
Cole and Boyd Barrett may have been marching in step on F15 but they are taking different approaches to protests taking place today. Cole will be joining a peace vigil outside the Department of Foreign Affairs in Dublin at 2 p.m. this afternoon while Boyd Barrett is helping to organise a rally and march at Shannon against the use of the airport for the US military build-up in the Gulf.
Cole is staying away from the Shannon protest because of concerns about a "mass trespass" being organised simultaneously by the "Grassroots Gathering", described as a loose network of anarchists, environmentalists and militant peace activists, which is urging its supporters to pull down the fence at the airport in order to make a protest inside.
"They will be marching separately from us," says Boyd Barrett, who is also a member of the Socialist Workers' Party. The Irish Anti-War Movement will be holding a rally at Shannon Town Centre while the Grassroots Gathering goes ahead. "Their numbers are going to be very, very small," he says.
Fears of a clash between protesters and a large Garda contingent will affect the turnout at Shannon today and several organisations have declined to participate. But the movement against war will continue and could become even bigger.
A series of locally-based protests throughout the State is planned for Saturday next, International Women's Day, and already plans are well-advanced for a co-ordinated international response as soon as war breaks out. In Ireland, for example, people are being asked to protest outside the US Embassy that evening, to stop work for 10 minutes at noon the next day and to take part in another worldwide day of protest the following Saturday.
It is expected that a one-day general strike will take place in Italy, which is in many ways the heartland of the European anti-war movement as it has been the cockpit of continental protests against globalisation. It is undoubtedly true that the Left has been in the driving-seat in anti-war protests up to now but there are signs that more moderate forces are becoming more centrally involved, such as elements of the Democratic Party in the US.
What does it all mean? It is too easy to dismiss it as a case of politically unsophisticated citizens being led astray by scheming left-wing activists with revolution as their ultimate goal. Moves towards war in Iraq have aroused a great movement internationally which is already far larger than the protests against the Vietnam War in the 1960s. This happened without a shot being fired. The early protests over Vietnam were organised by small groups of leftists but opposition to the war eventually became the mainstream view.
Something similar may be happening in this instance. Women in mink coats were on the streets of Manhattan on F15.
What is surprising is the depth of incomprehension between the people and their elected leaders, which is most obvious in the case of Tony Blair and the great British public. It is also apparent nearer home where the generally reticent approach of the Government is in contrast with the massive and vociferous turnout on the streets of Dublin.
The protests go deeper than just opposition to George Bush's war-plans, reflecting a disenchantment with the political process which has not yet been fully articulated. One wonders for how long political leaders can appear to be deaf to what the people are saying.
Are we back again to the moment Bob Dylan captured at the start of the US build-up in Vietnam in 1965 when he wrote:
Something is happening here
And you don't know what it is
Do you, Mister Jones?