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Bertie’s view is no laughing matter
By Joe Horgan
When the USA decided upon a pre-emptive strike against Iraq, as part of a curious ideology that involves going to war in the name of peace, Ireland nailed its colours to the mast.
In our actions we presented ourselves to the world in the image of our leaders. A small nation, in many senses of the word, economically in thrall to the USA, with an ideology based upon crude financial calculations.
If opposing the war was the correct thing to do legally, morally and in terms of Ireland’s historical stance that was one thing, but if it opposing it was bad for business that was something else. Ireland the economy called the shots, if you’ll pardon the pun, and Ireland the nation disappeared further into a ledge book of credits and debits.
To carry this through and to continue to carry it despite the growing debacle of the US presence in Iraq a certain kind of figurehead was needed. Up steps Bertie Ahern. Not only has this country’s presidency of Europe managed to remain startlingly quiet about US abuses in Iraq, replacing the population of Saddam’s torture chambers with an intake of its own and in good economic sense even using the same building, but Bertie’s track record on the war remains unique.
This is not a politician who, free from the shackles of a political ideology or any kind of definable belief system, has questioned things in an honest and public way. This is not a leader navigating his way through the moral maze of international politics. No, this is an individual who appears to see no apparent contradiction in his public utterances.
This is Bertie Ahern speaking just after thousands had taken to the streets of Dublin protesting against the war in February 2003 and his government’s opening up of Shannon airport to US troops on their way to Iraq.
“I have always been against conflict and war which everyone in this house knows and I will continue to be so. I am heartened that 100,000 people take the same view as I hope does everybody in this house, that they do not want to see war.”
So Bertie Ahern, whilst facilitating the transport of troops to war, whilst avoiding any criticism of US policy, still feels that he can align himself with those protesting against the US led war and his government’s role in it. Is that not funny?
This is Bertie Ahern in the Dail again in May 2003 shortly after the utterance above and as US forces took control of Baghdad.
“I am not prepared to apologise for any small role we might have played in helping to remove a dictator who made his people suffer for twenty years, carried out horrific acts and didn’t care about democracy.”
So Bertie, as those pro the invasion of Iraq were crowing loudest and as the country appeared to be welcoming US forces, jumped firmly into the camp applauding the war just a few weeks after saying he did not want to see it. Is that not funny?
This is Bertie Ahern in December 2003, when things in Iraq had begun to go sour for the Americans and as it became clear that many Iraqis did not see them as the liberating army they proclaimed themselves to be.
“I was always dead against the war.” Is that not funny?
It’s not funny is it? To have a political leader of a country who can so shamefacedly vacillate between positions of major importance is not really very funny after all. Just what does our Taoiseach believe in? Politics throughout Europe has drifted away from the old ideological confines but what do we have instead.
The smiling trust-me faces of old Tony and Bertie, two chummy fellows, who will do their best, try and keep a steady hand on things but are the first to admit that we should not expect too much and that there is only so much a government can do however friendly and decent the chap in charge is.
Opportunity, freedom, a brighter future, a better country. These are the trite, somehow meaningless political phrases that today}s governments bandy about. Bertie takes a pint, goes down the match, is just a regular fellow like everyone else. Except that that projected image is a blatant untruth because the fact remains that he happens to be Taoiseach.
But does this matter? Does a belief free zone at the helm of our political life really have any impact upon us? After all the essence of what the likes of Bertie and Tony have achieved is the making of party politics and political life irrelevant or at least only as relevant as any other form of celebrity.
Yet, for better or for worse, political life does remain relevant. It is relevant to those Iraqis now experiencing American peace and security and oil hunger. It is relevant to those in Ireland to whom the Celtic Tiger was a far away whisper. It is relevant to those who believe that Ireland and its people are still worth more than can be accounted for in a treasury office.
So Bertie Ahern’s public utterances on the war in Iraq are not funny. Strange, yes, but not funny. As a yardstick for the political soul of this country they are deeply worrying. If Ireland pre-Celtic Tiger, in those far of days before shopping malls and cars for everyone, was a far more innocent country, lacking in sophistication and maturity, free of any real international aspirations, then just how did it manage to be a more readily definable entity?
If modern Ireland in all its savvy has a vacuum where it should have a heart is Ireland a better place? I wonder what Bertie would have to say. And what he would have to say the week after? And the week after that?
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