Normally we fight wars against another country, an evil dictatorship that is going about killing Jews and the like. As Toblerone once pointed out to me, the War on Terror is the first war ever waged against an abstract noun. The Bush administration has fostered a lot of fear about terrorism in the wake of the horrific WTC attacks. But does this fear justify Dubya’s war efforts? Who is Bush really trying to fight anyway? And what does he think he’s going to achieve?
Terrorists have been around for a long time. They haven’t usually posed a very big threat to America or Australia. Terror attacks by foreigners are extremely rare. Even with all the hype in the past few years about terrorism, terrorism is still very uncommon (though it has increased under Bush and Howard). We’re all still more likely to die in a car accident than in a terrorist attack. A terrorist attack could happen, but there are other dangers that are more prevalent.
All this led me to wonder whether the Coalition of the Killing’s War on Terror was inspired by Lewis Carroll’s nonsense poem, The Hunting of the Snark. Although it wasn’t intended as a political satire (to my knowledge), the poem is all about people hunting some mystical beast that they have very little idea of. The Snark is an abstract concept in their minds. It is a nonsensical fear of the unknown that they pursue relentlessly to the corners of the Earth. Before you get upset, I’m not denying the existence of Saddam and Osama or the fact that what they did was awful, just ridiculing the idea that this is the way to defeat terrorism.
Some of the similarities are remarkable. Here are excerpts from the Mike Batt musical The Hunting of the Snark:
They sought it with thimbles, they sought it with care;
they pursued it with forks and hope;
they threatened its life with a railway share;
they charmed it with smiles and soap.
Children of the sky
Searching on mountains of wisdom and fears
Searching in forests of feathers and snow
Travelling through valleys of secrets and tears
Where only the brave and the foolish would go
“Just the place for a Snark!” the Bellman cried
As he landed his crew with care
Supporting each man on the top of the tide
By a finger entwined in his hair
The Bellman himself they all praised to the skies
Such a carriage, such ease and such grace
Such solemnity too! One could see he was wise,
The moment one looked in his face
But the danger was past - they had landed at last
With their boxes, portmanteaus and bags
Yet at first sight the crew were not pleased with the view
Which consisted of chasms and crags.
He served out some grog with a liberal hand
And bade them sit down on the beach
And they could not but own that their Captain looked grand
As he stood and delivered his speech
“Friends, Romans and Countrymen
Please lend me your ears
And I will carefully impart what you may have thought for years
But were too scared to ask
By day or after dark
In the Hunting of the Snark
This emotional occasion brings the moisture to my eyes
As I rise to remark
That I think we may be gaining on the Snark
I’m of notional persuasion that I hear its distant cries
And they’re never very far away
From my own investigations and the bearings on the chart
In my heart I can see
A potential Snark may lurk in every tree
A potential Snark may lurk in every tree.”
The beaver cried “It seems to me
We have landed in a lonely place
where the sun won’t shine of its own volition
and this crazy mission may be just a wild goose chase.
We’ve sailed for years
And we find ourselves upon this beach
Searching for some beast from the realms of fiction
It’s a wild addiction for something we’ll never reach”.
Then the Bellman cried:
“Pay no heed to the faint of heart
Don’t let these words of weakness fool you
This is the time to be strong
The chips are down, the hunt is on...”
They roused him with muffins, they roused him with ice
They roused him with mustard and cress
They roused him with jam and judicious advice
They set him conundrums to guess.
When at length he sat up and was able to speak
His sad story he offered to tell
And the Bellman cried “Silence! Not even a shriek!”
And excitedly tingled his bell
“A dear uncle of mine after whom I was named
Remarked when I bade him farewell”
“Oh skip your dear Uncle!” The Bellman exclaimed
as he angrily tingled his bell.
“He remarked to me then”, said that mildest of men
“If your Snark be a Snark, that is right
Fetch it home by all means, you may serve it with greens
And it’s handy for striking a light
But oh beamish nephew, beware of the day
If your Snark be a Boojum! For then
You will softly and suddenly vanish away
And never be met with again!”
All you fishermen and you fortune hunters
Sharpen your harpoons
Sing rhapsodies to the fickle gods that guide you
Awake the brave adventurer that sleeps inside you
Before you vanish away like midnight smoke
So that no signs or memories remain
You might vanish away like midnight smoke
And never be seen again.
“I engage with the Snark every night after dark
In a dreamy delirious fight
I serve it with greens in those shadowy scenes
And I use it for striking a light
But if ever I meet with a Boojum that day
In a moment, of this I am sure
I shall softly and suddenly vanish away
And the notion I cannot endure”
“Tis a pitiful tale, said the Bellman, whose face
had grown longer at every word
But now that you’ve stated the whole of your case
More debate would be simply absurd”
“The rest of my speech (he explained to his men)
You shall hear when I’ve leisure to speak it
But the Snark is at hand, let me tell you again
Tis your glorious duty to seek it
To seek it with thimbles, to seek it with care
To pursue it with forks and hope
To threaten its life with a railway share
To charm it with smiles and soap
For the Snark’s a peculiar creature that won’t
be caught in a commonplace way
Do all that you know and try all that you don’t
Not a chance must be wasted today”
Then the Banker endorsed a blank cheque (which he crossed)
And changed his loose silver for notes
The Baker with care combed his whiskers and hair
And shook the dust out of his coats
The barrister dreamed that he stood in a shadowy court,
where the Snark, with a glass in its eye,
dressed in gown, bands and wig
was defending a pig
on a charge of deserting its sty.
“I dreamed last night I was standing in a court of law
And the Snark was the Counsel for Defence
He was trying to establish the innocence
of a pig that I clearly saw
as stated hereinbefore
In a court of Law
And while I was standing in a court of law
The jury talked so they missed a lot
And some were listening and some were not
So the judge cried
I implore
Bring it down to a deafening roar
In this court of law.
The jury cried:
Let’s teach it a lesson it will never forget
For a devious deed it will live to regret
It’s clear that the pig must die.
We’re of the opinion the pig must pay,
we can’t let it live for another day
We fear if the rules apply
It’s clear that the pig must die.
But their wild exultation was suddenly checked
When the jailer informed them with tears
Such a sentence would have not the slightest effect
As the pig had been dead for some years”
They sought it with thimbles, they sought it with care;
they pursued it with forks and hope;
they threatened its life with a railway share;
they charmed it with smiles and soap.
Then the Butcher contrived an ingenious plan
For making a separate sally
And had fixed on a spot unfrequented by man
A dismal and desolate valley.
But the valley grew narrow and narrower still
And the evening got darker and colder
Til merely from nervousness, not from goodwill
The Butcher and Beaver marched shoulder to shoulder.
Then a scream, shrill and high rent the shuddering sky
And they knew that some danger was near
The Beaver turned pale to the tip of its tail
And even the Butcher felt queer.
“Tis the voice of the Jubjub” he suddenly cried
This man that they used to call Dunce
As the Bellman would tell he added with pride
“I have uttered that sentiment once”
“Tis the note of the Jubjub” he suddenly cried “Keep count I entreat
You will find I have told it you twice
Tis the song of the Jubjub, the proof is complete
if only I’ve stated it thrice”
The Beaver had counted with scrupulous care
Attending to every word
But it fairly lost heart and outgrabe in despair
When the third repetition occurred.
The Beaver confessed with affectionate looks
More eloquent even than tears
It had learned in ten minutes far more than all books
Would have taught it in 70 years.
Such friends as the Butcher and Beaver became
have seldom if ever been known
In winter or summer, twas always the same
You could never meet either alone
And when quarrels arose as one frequently finds
Quarrels will, spite of every endeavour,
The song of the Jubjub recurred to their minds
And cemented their friendship forever.
They returned hand in hand, and the Bellman unmanned
for a moment with noble emotion
said “This amply repays
all the wearisome days
we have spent on the billowy ocean”
The Baker cried
“It seems to me
Since we landed in this lonely place
That the sun does shine of its own volition
and this crazy mission isn’t just a wild goose chase
We sailed for years
Til we found ourselves upon a beach
gaining on this beast from the realms of fiction
I’ve a strong conviction it’s a thing we soon may reach.”
“The Baker is shouting!” The Bellman said.
“He is shouting like mad, only hark!
He is waving his hands, he is wagging his head,
he has certainly found a Snark!”
Erect and sublime, for one moment in time
In the next, that wild figure they saw
As if stung by a spasm plunge into a chasm
While they listened and waited in awe.
“It’s a Snark!” was the sound that first came to their ears
And seemed almost too good to be true
Then followed a torrent of laughter and cheers.
Then the ominous words
“It’s a Boo- -”
They hunted til darkness came on but they found
Not a button or feather or mark
By which they could tell that they stood on the Ground
where the baker had met with the Snark.
In the midst of the words he was trying to say
In the midst of his laughter and glee
he had softly and suddenly vanished away
For the Snark was a Boojum, you see.
Note the war veteran John Kerry’s appearance as the Baker’s uncle (and presumably Kim Beazley was the aunt) and Saddam Hussein’s appearance as the Pig facing charges of being a threat (to the West) based on outdated, sensationalistic and fake evidence. Let us pray that Osama bin Laden is indeed a Boojum and that John Howard, Tony Blair and George Bush all softly and suddenly vanish away and never be met with again.