I was astounded on walking into our local 'Waterston’s' yesterday. The No.1 bestseller (outselling the Lord of the Rings, Joanna Trollope etc) is a book about American politics. ‘Stupid White Men' by Michael Moore is a sensation in Britain - selling over 300,000 copies it has already been named as the book of the year. Moore is an American who writes in a passionate, humourous, sometimes blasphemous and sometimes vitriolic manner about his own country and especially its current leadership. If you are a conservative American it will make your blood boil. If you are a liberal or anti-war European it will confirm what you already knew. His analysis is simplistic and populist and for that reason all the more potent. More of which in a moment.

But firstly let us return to last weeks article. Thanks to all who wrote. I was surprised that no-one has attempted to fight the pro – war camp. Are there no hawks who read the Free Church website? Anyway another week has brought another batch of facts, most of which are marvelous illustrations of the wisdom of the bibles injunction to ‘trust not in princes’. Consider the following –

a) Donald Rumsfeld likes to talk of the ‘Old Europe’ versus the ‘New Europe’ – the implication being that the New Europe is more democratic, freedom loving etc. He should be careful. His new Europe includes that well known ‘democrat’ , the Italian prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi, who currently faces 10 criminal trials and investigations in Italy and Spain. Rumsfeld continued in his diplomatic bull in a China shop way by declaring that Germany was to be compared to Libya because it did not support Bush’s position. It is little wonder that the Spanish Prime Minister (next to Tony Blair, Bush’s staunchest ally) has asked the US to keep Rumsfeld quiet.

b) Time magazine carries a chilling quote from a Marine Lieutenant. Speaking about the run up to war he says “We’re building them up to the point where they are emotionally ready to kill”. Time adds “Let a 19 year old sit around for long enough, commanders say, and he will start to think about what killing means. Military leaders want to avoid that. It would be as debilitating as the temperature that creeps up with each passing day”.

c) Why are we fighting this war? To disarm Saddam, to combat terrorism and to effect regime change. In particular George Bush has told us we are there to bring democracy to the Iraqi people. Try telling that to the people of Bahrain. Our defence minister, Lord Bach, has announced that BAE systems is to sell hawk jets to His Majesty Shaikh Hamed Isa Al Khalifah. Bahrain has one of the worst torture records in the Middle East (and that’s some standard!). Last year he announced the first elections since 1973 but then annulled them by removing the powers of the elected Assembly – thus causing the main opposition and democratic groups to withdraw. Both Britain and America backed this – because of their arms sales to Bahrain and because of the American military bases there. Ironically this meant that Britain and the US in supporting this negation of democracy were in actual fact backing the election of extremist Islamic parties at the expense of the democratic secular parties. And we wonder why the Arabs don’t trust us?

d) In the same way spare a thought for the Kurds in the new democratic Iraq (run with the same Baahist structures and personnel overseen by an American military governor). Their position is desperate. America has struck a deal with the Turks to allow 40,000 Turkish troops into Northern Iraq. The Turks want this because they are scared of any kind of democracy or autonomy for the million Kurds in Iraq. At a meeting yesterday the Iraqi Kurds declared they would rather have Saddam (who has killed at least 100,000 of them) rather than the Turks. They remember the Turkish massacre of more than one million Armenians in the early 20th Century and the subsequent oppression of the Kurds. That was a long time ago – some might think. But memories run deep. The Turks for example whilst being willing to be bribed to allow American troops in ($20 billion plus rights to invade Kurdistan) will not under any circumstances allow the British. They remember the days of war between the British and Ottoman empires.

e) And today The Times carries news of the British taxpayer having to fork out £33 million to arms companies to pay for their deals with Saddam. These were signed in the days of Mrs Thatcher. I wonder if our Daily Mail readers who like nothing better than to moan about subsidy junkies, will see anything amiss in the tax payer subsidizing arms companies who sell weapons to dictators (even if they were at the time our ‘friend’)?

f) Meanwhile …. the French. In some ways their opposition to the war appears highly principled. Forgive my cynicism but I don’t suppose their oil contracts with Saddam would have anything to do with it?

Which brings us nicely on to the main topic of this article. How the use of language is inflaming the whole situation. One of the saddest things in the current debate about the now inevitable Gulf War II, is the extent to which ignorant and abusive language is being used by both sides.

On the one hand we have Bart Simpson acting as spokesman for Donald Rumsfeld’s view on 'Old Europe". "Cheese-eating surrender monkeys' will doubtless have raised a hearty Amen from Rush Limbaugh and other right wing talk show hosts. What is disappointing is that this language and stereotypical understanding of the French has been repeated by other American opinion makers and politicians. "The Axis of Weasel" was the headline in the New York Post - speaking of the Franco-German position on the war. That same paper declared "A poll says that 91% of the French are against war. But then, the French are against everything, including the curious American habit of showering every day". "Lets beat up the French" said the host of CNN's Crossfire show. Another newspaper columnist tells his readers that France is performing a 'manoeuvre which it has been perfecting since 1870: retreat". Not to be outdone the Wall Street Journal says that "France has been in decline since, oh, about 1815, and it isn't happy about it. What particularly galls the Gauls is that their rightful place in the world has been usurped by the gauche Americans, with their hamburgers and blue jeans". Meanwhile Colin Powell gets in on the French bashing "The French suggestion for more weapons inspectors conjured up an image of hundreds of inspector Clouseaus running around Iraq looking for banned weapons". So there you have it - the French are cowardly, treacherous, smelly, jealous, comic and ungrateful. The New York Post ran a front page of a US military cemetery in France with the headline , "Sacrifice: they died for France but France has forgotten".

These kind of comments and headlines are ignorant, damaging and dangerous. They are ignorant because they do not reflect the truth about the French situation. The French could quite rightly point out that the First World War was fought on their soil, as was much of the Second and that hundreds of thousands of French men and women died in those wars. They could equally point out that far from rushing to defend France the USA did not enter the Second World War until 1942 and that the sacrifice of US soldiers, whilst considerable, does not begin to compare with the sacrifice of the Russians or the many Europeans who died in this war. The historical comparisons are based more upon the John Wayne version of World War II rather than any reality.

And they are damaging. Firstly because they encourage ignorance and racism. Of the type that caused a restaurant in Carolina to change ‘French Fries’ into ‘Freedom Fries’. Secondly because these remarks are heard in Europe. The New York Post and others seem to forget that people in Europe read newspapers avidly and that such words and comments are reported diligently. Le Figaro helped translated Bart Simpson's comments as "Primates capitulards et toujours en quete de fromages". There is a very different culture to the US where people in general do not have either a great interest in, or regular access to, news from other countries. Which means that in the US those who are opinion makers need to be very careful not to reproduce Hollywood stereotypes or reinforce prejudices based upon ignorance and frustration. The French may be wrong but no-one listening to the French ambassador at the UN could fail to be impressed by his eloquence, arguments and conviction. To dismiss such as the product of a cowardly, jealous and unwashed people is more the attitude of the playground bully who does not get his way, than it is of the leading nation of the Free and civilised world. And it is dangerous. America may think that it no longer needs the UN and that the Pax Americana is a fait accompli but American should also learn from history - all great empires fall and it is better for nations to work together as friends rather than seek to dominate one another. France is Americas friend and as the Scripture tells us - the wounds of a friend are faithful'. It is one think to bribe the Turks ($20 billion and freedom to repress the Kurds) and to claim that the New Europe (Poland, Slovakia and that bastion of liberal democracy , Berlusconi) is the way forward, but it is quite another to dismiss the concerns of most Europeans in such a dismissive and arrogant manner.

Arrogance and ignorance are not all one way in this current debate. One has only to listen to some of the anti-war protestors in this country to realise that. The prime example for me was a spokesman for the Scottish Socialist party on Radio Scotland the other week. He managed to combine being simplistic with a level of illogicality and an inability to communicate in other than banal clichés, which was quite astounding. Tony Blair was a mass murderer. George Bush was a mass murderer. They wanted to kill people for oil. It is a refrain that I have heard used, sometimes in a more sophisticated form, many times. George Bush is a president who presided over the Texan 'killing fields'. He is in hoc to the oil companies and so he is prepared to kill 'millions' on their behalf. And it is all because he is an ignorant, fundamentalist right wing Christian. In fact this war is being increasingly portrayed as a battle between fundamentalist Islam and fundamentalist Christianity. Radio Four quite seriously had a commentator who stated that Bush was actually a nice guy, sincere but ignorant and that in fact it was Cheney and Rumsfeld who were pulling the strings and using Bush's simplistic Christian fundamentalism to further their own political agendas.

Like the comments about the French these opinions are also ignorant, damaging and dangerous. They are ignorant because they do not take into account the complexities of the situation, nor the genuine fears felt in the US since Sept 11th. They do not understand the differences between fundamentalist Islam and biblical Christianity and they have little or no conception of how Christianity is the founding gel of our Western liberal societies. Furthermore they do not recognise the dangers of a fundamentalist anti-religious secularism.

However they need to be taken seriously. Why? Because they are becoming increasingly widespread. Indeed the more the two sides of the argument talk in such terms the more the differing positions become entrenched. It should be a warning to all concerned that Michael Moore's book Stupid White Men was recently awarded the Book of the Year in Britain. In it Mr. Moore ties in all the usual suspects, big business, Bush's alleged ignorance, American foreign policy and equates it with anti-abortionism and 'born again' Christianity. There are parts of Moores book that one can appreciated but sometimes its analysis is to say the least superficial. For example in his understanding of the Northern Irish situation and his stupid statement that slavery was invented by the white man (unless he wants to argue that Arab slave traders were in actual fact white).

We need to stress over and over again that this is not a religious war. Both left and right in the US and increasingly in Europe seem to be forgetting that. I was helpfully sent a commentary by a man called Dennis Prager whose view is I understand fairly reflective of some 'Christian' opinion in the US. He tells us that the worlds future is being decided at this time and that it is a battle between three ideologies - militant Islam, Western European secularism and socialism and American Judeo-Christianity and capitalism. Mr. Prager tells us that whilst Islam and secular socialism dominate several countries there is only one country which claims to be Judeo-Christian and has such strong support for capitalism and small government. Therefore America must go it alone (with the partial exceptions of Britain and Israel). He believes that American values are unique and 'superior' and that American children need to be taught that. The important battle is the ideological one within the US. If that is lost then as he pts it "humanity has a very dark future".

There are some Christians who will regard this as a profound and biblical analysis. I beg to differ. It too is ignorant, damaging and dangerous. It is ignorant both of biblical theology, church history and what God is doing in other parts of the world. The success of the gospel is not dependant on the success or otherwise of capitalism. It is damaging because there are many who will accept this analysis and for whom it will confirm their prejudices about biblical Christianity. And it is dangerous because within the Church it risks creating a division which will takes years to recover from. If, even subconsciously, my Christianity is to be judged by such issues as whether I support going to war with Iraq, or think that driving an SUV is an inalienable right, or whether I am on the side of the 'Cheese eating monkeys' or the ‘stupid white men’, then we have already been defeated. Much as it is a tragedy that Bush and Chirac have fallen out, it would be of far greater significance if the evangelical Christian world was to be determined by our loyalty to George Bush (or any other politics or political leader) rather than our allegiance to Jesus Christ.

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