Architects against War                                                   

Reflections on the First Anniversary 

Charles Jencks

After the Madrid bombing, on the first anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, and while there is a moment of peace, it is a good time to pause and reflect on how terrorism is working. Virtually all those in a position of responsibility – the Prime Minster, the police, MI6, Mr Blunkett – have said that an attack on the UK is not only inevitable, but ever more likely as elections approach. It is in this breathing space we should carefully consider what a national response should be; and as a profession, somewhat responsible for the environment, we should start a debate and open a more balanced discussion than has occurred. This we did try to do previously.  

Two months before the start of the Second Iraq War, on January 20, 2003, a group of leading architects published a letter in the national press speaking out against an immoral war. The signatories included such international figures as Rem Koolhaas, Frank Gehry and Zaha Hadid, as well as past and present presidents of the RIBA and many leading British architects. Paul Hyett, the then President of the RIBA, and I decided to organise this pressure group with the idea that it might form the spearhead of many others. Then this pressure from the professions on Blair to change his mind would become unstoppable. Without Blair’s support the US public would not support Bush’s invasion, and thus through a sequence of interactions one might create a reverse domino effect. It didn’t happen; but one to two million protestors did march to Hyde Park, the biggest such demonstration in British history. All the major points of the letter have, unfortunately, become true.

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The moral case for war was never made. The WMD proved a myth.

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The link with al-Qa’ida was equally fictitious but now, as a consequence of invasion, al-Qa’ida is actively involved in Iraq.

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As we said, a war was likely to kill large numbers of civilians and intensify the great suffering there. Conservative figures show that 10-15,000 Iraqis perished.

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The war did set a dangerous precedent for pre-emption and struck a blow against international law.

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The war did indeed look like Western imperialism in Muslim eyes, and it did make the West adopt terrorist tactics and premeditated assassination. 

In other words, some predictions can be quite accurate, especially the basic one of our letter, that Terrorism is winning the War on Terrorism. What should be done? Now that the US is the major security force in Iraq it seems to me it would be folly to beat too hasty a retreat, especially before the local police is trained and empowered. The UN is almost as unpopular as the US in Iraq, because of crippling sanctions, but still probably the only international body that has some credibility to oversee the longer transition, after June 30th. According to BBC polls etc. most Iraqis are optimistic and glad to have seen the end of Saddam, but they want their sovereignty as soon as their security can be guaranteed.

However many compromises are necessary to reach this end, it is an obvious goal. Perhaps less obvious is that the War on Terrorism is framed in a self-defeating way. Bush’s invasion recruited for terrorism, as many predicted including us, and the reasons were foreseeable to those who study such asymmetric warfare.

The one thing the disadvantaged terrorist wants is to leverage his opponent into shooting himself in the foot. Create fear, stagnate the economy, make travel and trade difficult, stimulate repressive laws, lower the stock market, increase defence spending to bankrupting proportions – all these are terrorist victories. America now enjoys the greatest external deficit and internal debt in its history, a direct consequence of Bush’s desire to stimulate a fearful economy. Above all,  the terrorist seeks to make his adversary overreact, so that he gains new adherents. There are over a billion Muslims, and more and more are hearing about the so-called clash of civilisations. As the adage has it, “some paranoids have real enemies, they create them with their paranoia”. Unless we understand the theory of terrorism, we will continue to respond with press hysteria, counter-bombing, tanks at Heathrow and more cancelled flights – all rewards for their outrage. The proper tactics are silence, covert operations, refusal to create a climate of fear and movement on a just peace in the Middle East, where their gripes are legitimate.

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