Throughout the reading I tried to put myself in Kurnaz’s shoes: I tried to imagine myself fulfilling my social obligation by marrying a young lady from my parent’s place of birth. And in order to live happily with her and also to fulfill my religious obligation, I decided to go on a pilgrimage to a country where my religion is widely practiced just so I could learn from the people and become a better religious person. But like an old man from Florida living in the Berkshires in coldest month January, I imagined how inappropriate it could be, visiting a country that is associated with terrorism, days after the world’s most powerful country was attacked.
But kurnaz is a symbol of truth and freedom. Like he said in the YouTube interview we saw in class, the incident on 9/11 was a surprise to him and he felt for Americans and especially those who lost their lives. But he also believes like some of us do, that our greatness is defined by not what we do in times of prosperity and freedom, but rather what we do or must do even in the midst of crisis like 9/11. Our ability to tackle challenges when they prove to be the most difficult. Our ability to pursue, capture and crush Alkaeda while at the same time allow innocent men and women like Kurnaz to travel without any fear of illegitimate arrest. America’s Greatness is not defined by its ability to arrest so many people, mostly innocent, in its pursuit of those responsible for 9/11. But rather, America’s greatness is defined by its ability to live up to the true meaning of its creed, not because it is easy, but because it is hard. Its ability to live by its own laws like “no detention without trial”.
Nothing bothers me more than the fact that the Pakistani policemen are paid a huge amount of money for each person they turn in: “I’d been sold for a bounty of $3,000 to the Americans. That’s what the Americans themselves told me in one of the endless interrogations in Guantanamo Bay” (Kurnaz 47). I am troubled by this, mindful of the fact that reward may encourage hard work and cooperation. The average monthly income of a Pakistani police is Rs 3500 to Rs 6000, which is approximately between 85 dollars to 150 US dollars. So $3,000 US dollars equals the amount of money earned by a Pakistani policeman in three years. I mean 3 years. And so it is very hard to believe that there could hardly be any motivation for turning a “terrorist” in other than for the sake of making money. The fight against terrorism in the 21st century may be pioneered by America, but without a doubt, it is not America’s fight alone. Every nation must be part of the fight, because the activities of these terrorist affect every nation. The three thousand men and women who died on 9/11 were from thirty different countries across the globe: some were Muslims. And so what is required is to get every nation involved in the fight against a common danger. And even though I am not a war expert, I truly believe that there is a better way of getting other nations like Pakistan to cooperate without using money. Cooperation is necessary for Pakistan’s own safety reasons. That alone is enough. But paying them huge amount of money is just a way of providing jobs for the jobless, more salary to the poorly paid policemen and the result is very apparent: these policemen will try as much as they could to turn in as many people as possible ( some of them might be true suspects but mostly, those turned in are innocent foreigners like Kurnaz or people within the society that these policemen men hate or envy). This to me did not and will not make America and its allies and the world at large safe.
If anything must be done about be done to combat terrorism, it must be done well. The use of money will not motivate these policemen to do what is right. So we must gain the support of countries like Pakistan by convincing them that the war on terror may be led by America, but it cannot be America’s fight alone. This among other reasons might be better.
Mohammed Adawulai
Simon’s Rock.
