Guerre du Golfe de 1991

Guerre du Golfe de 1991 appears in Noam Chomsky’s discussion less as a military history than as a revealing point of comparison: it was openly called a war, while later uses of force could be presented as humanitarian intervention or as a campaign against terrorism. Its importance lies in how those labels, and the public response accompanying them, help frame state violence and its purposes.

Naming and political language

Chomsky contrasts the language used for different military actions. The 1991 Gulf War was called a war, whereas the NATO bombing of Serbia was presented as humanitarian intervention. He places these terms within a broader argument about how governments describe force: labels can make an action appear exceptional or benevolent, while leaving its political character open to scrutiny. In this comparison, the Gulf War supplies a familiar name against which the newer vocabulary of intervention is made conspicuous.

The contrast also sharpens Chomsky’s criticism of the phrase “war against terrorism.” He argues that calling a campaign a war against terrorism is propaganda unless it actually targets terrorism according to the official definitions used by Western powers. His point is that states’ own definitions could implicate their conduct and that of their clients. The 1991 war therefore belongs to a discussion not simply about military terminology, but about who gets to apply labels and whose actions those labels place beyond examination.

Media response in a crisis

Chomsky also invokes the Gulf War when describing a recurring response by major media and intellectual circles. In moments of crisis, he says, they tend to rally behind political power and encourage the public to mobilize in support of its cause. He notes that this pattern was especially intense during the bombing of Serbia, and adds that the Gulf War was no exception. The reference makes the war part of a repeated political and media pattern rather than an isolated case.

That comparison sits beside his account of public feeling after the attacks on the United States. Chomsky distinguishes a broad desire to identify and punish those responsible from support for an indiscriminate military response that could kill many innocents. The Gulf War reference helps locate his concern within a wider claim: elite and media support for state policy during crises does not necessarily represent the full range of public opinion.

Retrospective significance

Later in the book, Chomsky places the Gulf War in a discussion of military reach and strategic signaling. He describes a U.S. network of bases directed toward the Persian Gulf, extending from the Pacific to the Azores, and identifies Diego Garcia as the most secure base before the war in Afghanistan. He argues that the establishment of major U.S. bases in Central Asia improved the capacity for intervention. In this account, the Gulf War is part of the strategic setting against which those later changes are measured.

Chomsky further connects the Afghan bombings to the demonstration of U.S. military power. He suggests that one purpose was to warn the world about the consequences of failing to follow U.S. rules, and compares this interpretation with his account of the NATO bombing of Serbia, which he says was justified in terms of preserving NATO’s credibility. The Gulf War provides a point of reference in this argument about military capacity and credibility, while the book’s final emphasis is that the September 11 attacks altered some conditions without displacing the underlying international problems.