Rabat – The present era, with its new types of threats, is also one of geopolitical “musical chairs,” where alliances evolve, others are forged and still others are strengthened. It is sometimes useful to look back at history to get to better know one’s friends and allies, and to revisit one’s collective memory to know exactly who one is dealing with.

As such, it is interesting to return to the recent words of former French President Nicolas Sarkozy: “Of all the continents, Europe is the most brutal continent, the most savage, and it can be a source of barbarism.” The former head of state specified that he meant “not in the Middle Ages, in the 20th century.” Sarkozy,  a man who participated in this “savagery” in Libya and Ivory Coast in 2011, and who, at the twilight of his career, is making amends like his predecessor Jacques Chirac who, once outside the Elysee Palace, recognized the plundering of Africa by his country.

Since we are talking about Europe, and therefore the West, the picture will be even more complete if we add the Americans, who are essentially descendants of the European settlers in the New World. On this American continent, Westerners, Europeans, have committed not one genocide, but two. The indigenous people of Central America, properly decimated by Hernan Cortes (“Cortes the killer”, sang Neil Young sadly) and then, a few centuries later, that of the Amerindians. These genocides are estimated at several million deaths, of which no one speaks about today, nor are we proud of the era of slavery that followed lasting about two centuries, leading to 15 million people displaced, and 1.7 million deaths.

Then there was colonization, the famous “civilizing period” from the second half of the 19th century to the end of the first half of the 20th century. There too existed mass killings, genocides, deportations, mutilations, executions, and exterminations, under the guise of development and civilization. The Western powers, having gained a great lead over other civilizations due to the industrial revolution and its financial and military corollaries, projected themselves all over the world, but mainly in Africa and Asia. The 19th century is known as the century of “humiliations”, China, India, Indochina, the dismantling of African kingdoms and empires, and Congo becoming the “personal property” of King Leopold II.

We now come to the 20th century, as mentioned by Nicolas Sarkozy, with its two world wars, its wars of independence, its Holocaust, with a special mention for the butchery of Verdun, the use of poison gas in Europe and in the Rif, and of course the dropping of two atomic bombs on an already defeated Japan. Let’s also not forget the millions of deaths during the Korean War, instigated by the US, and of course the Vietnam War with napalm and other technological gems, such as the depleted uranium used in the two Gulf Wars, as well as in Serbia and Kosovo.

All civilizations on all continents have had their wars and their conflicts on borders or between neighboring and antagonistic countries, but nowhere has there been a hundred-year war, or even thirty years, for dynastic or confessional issues. Nowhere has there been so many genocides with several million deaths, conducted with method and rigor. Nowhere has there been the extinction of entire communities like the Amerindians. Nowhere has there been a sentence as famously terrible as “kill them all, God will recognize his own!”

Not being satisfied with this, or rather to strengthen their power over the world and their grip on humanity, Westerners have ruled the world for more than a century, covering it with the truly great and eminent values of philosophers and humanists of the Enlightenment. This regency of the world operates under the generic name of “international law,” a set of rules made by the West, for the West, and defended by the same West, which continues today, attacking in packs, defending in bands, and showing admirable solidarity with each other.

The illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003, based on proven lies, did not give rise to any criminal prosecution or public condemnation, nor did the Franco-British attack on Libya in 2011 or the involvement of French forces in Ivory Coast in the same year. Paris, Berlin, and London look elsewhere when Washington deploys its forces for its interests, and vice versa. As for Israel, between the barrier of separation, violence, and successive annexations, with total impunity would suggest that it exists on another planet. The West redeems itself at the expense of the Palestinians for its hundreds of pogroms over several centuries and its inaction in the face of the Holocaust.

And all this is still going on in Ukraine, a war the world could have avoided if the Americans did not want to weaken Russia, which has fallen into the trap of being the aggressor, which it is. But behind the scenes, pulling the strings and manipulating everyone,we must look to Washington DC for the real reasons for this war that is ruining the world.

Even today, Europe and the United States are barricading themselves behind their borders, erecting sharp barbed wire fences, leaving migrants to drown in the sea, elaborating clever deportation policies, locking up people in camps, firing live ammunition, deportations to Rwanda… but keeping the useful brains for themselves, in a new form of resource plundering. And all of this has been done with the assent of the European and American populations, who continue to give credence to everything that the propaganda of their states throw at them, in what Sergei Chakhotin has so rightly called “the rape of the masses”.

But today, the world is taking advantage of this war in Ukraine to reread the codes that have hitherto governed international relations. China offers an alternative, regional powers emerge here and there, old empires are resurrected, and Westerners appear for what they have in reality always been, violent and exclusive.

If China and Russia are not exemplary today, who is and who can claim to be? When it comes to respect for others and their right to exist and prosper, they neither hide nor present themselves as models Unlike the Western countries, whose history is written in red and which today, in a situation that is still as red as ever, are giving lessons in ethics to a world that has, in the meantime, understood their reality.

Statements, comments or opinions published in this column are of those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Warsan magazine. Warsan reserves the right to moderate, publish or delete a post without prior consultation with the author(s). To publish your article or your advertisement contact our editorial team at: warsan54@gmail.com