<nettime> Down with war criminals

[Luther Blissett <tom9351@iperbole.bologna.it>]

Down With War Criminals!
A press release


Europe is finished
Q, p. 643

We consider the NATO offensive in the Balkans as useless, absurd,
criminal and even apocalyptic. Useless, nay, counterproductive: it turned
Slobodan Milosevic and his cut-throats into unconvincing heroes and
self-styled opponents of the New World Order, leaving Serbian people with
no choice but siding with their dictator. Absurd: historical ignorance
and lack of strategy stirred up a war with dark prospects, in a
geopolitical area that worked as incubator for the bloodiest conflicts in
modern history. Criminal: while it is dubious that NATO wants to impede
ethnic cleaning, it is certain that they’re ratifying and speeding it up.
>From Dayton onwards the Western powers have promoted, as a "solution" of
the Balkan problem, the invention of grotesque mono-ethnic states whose
borders can hardly be outlined, kept together only by hatred for their
neighbors.  Apocalyptic: the abovementioned lack of strategy and the
inexistence of clear political purposes are making a ground attack
unavoidable, with unimaginable consequences. 

In times like these, it is difficult not to sound rhetoric; you hear your
own voice and immediately experience a sense of triviality at the bottom
of your stomach. Yet every passing day of war and carnage, every bunch of
falling bombs brings about certainty that we wrote a book abot what’s
going on. *Q* is an epic on the origins of so-called Modernity which
actually deals with the present, with this epoch, the end of Modernity
itself. Q’s scenario is XVIth century Europe, a continent swarming with
religion wars, characterised by a conflict between old and new powers
(both of which wave the flag of Faith to cover quite other interests) and
a mercantile integration that crosses borders and overcedes local wars by
launching a new, global one, the war of finance. This Europe is
constantly reconstructed by political decisions which are determined by
German bankers. Faith is "defended" by mercenary gangs that often abandon
themselves to rape and looting, to the detriment of entire populations
subject to martial law.  In consequence, columns of fugees leave their
villages aflame, as desperate rebellion encounters the solid response of
both old dynasties and emerging merchant powers, the usual shitty
response: guns, further war, genocide.  In the end, it is a continent
over which one man, an emperor whose domain stretches from America to the
Balkans, tries to impose one order, his own, with support of the most
powerful bank in the world. 

Those pages are about the folly of NATO bombings on towns, factories,
houses and people, about escalation to global massacre, about gasoline
thrown in the fire of ethnic hate, and what’s more, about the
unbelievable annihilation of intelligence, about this chilling silence.
Fear of bombs in Belgrade and Pristina has an equivalent on this side of
the sea, in the fear provoked by the deliberate impotence of these
miserable European government celebrating themselves as Socialists, not
to mention the obtuse faces of intellectuals and opinion leaders, none of
which is able to grasp the meaning of what’s going on.  Indignation is
good for nothing. Generic appeals to peace never roused our interest:
war, today as four centuries ago, has a very solid raison d’etre, rooted
in the criminal decisions of states and supernational powers, the United
States as well as Charles V’s empire. Ethnic cleanings and retaliations
have their reason too, a reason that we reject and oppose, being aware
that time won’t stop rewarding with victories and defeats those who keep
up this struggle, i.e. the only conflict worth enlisting for. These days
of bloodbath coincide with our Q promotional tour all over Italy. It
would immoral and inconsistent with our long-time political praxis not to
seize this opportunity, that’s why we’re using our paradoxical "fame" to
censure both the madness of rulers and the apathy of the ruled ones. 

The collective of Q’s "authors"
Luther Blissett Project - Bologna
April 1st, 1999

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