Tariq Ali

by TARIQ ALI & DAVID BARSAMIAN

Tariq Ali (centre), London, 1968. “Pally with Bertrand Russell and Mick Jagger, begging to get on the roof of a house in Hanoi to shoot at the final futile waves of Operation Rolling Thunder, wiping the floor with Henry Kissinger at the Oxford Union, mistaken for Che Guevara’s bodyguard and arrested in Bolivia, nearly breaching the citadel of the US embassy in Grosvenor Square – the writer and activist Tariq Ali had, you might say, a pretty good Cold War. Passion, ferment, rage and the possibility that a savage order might be put to flight: these were the markers of the age, and of Ali’s earlier memoir Street Fighting Years (1987).” IMAGE/TEXT/© Keystone Press/Alamy Stock Photo/Times Literary Supplement

In the following interview, Ali and Barsamian discuss the complex political dynamics between the United States and Pakistan, the historical context of U.S. foreign policy, and the broader implications of the global war on terrorism, emphasizing the manipulation of media narratives and the neglect of historical awareness in shaping public perception. (SOURCE: Ali, Tariq, and David Barsamian. “Tariq Ali.” Progressive 66, no. 1 (January 2002): 31-4.)

[In the following interview, originally conducted in November 2001, Ali discusses the relationship between the United States and Pakistan as well as the worldwide war on terrorism.]

Tariq Ali was born in 1943 in Lahore, in what was then British-controlled India. He was educated in Pakistan and then at Oxford. His opposition to the military dictatorship in Pakistan during the 1960s led to permanent exile in Britain. He was active in the anti-war movement in Europe during the late 1960s.

Ali is a longstanding editor of New Left Review and has written more than a dozen books on history and politics. His forthcoming book is The Clash of Fundamentalism: Crusades, Jihad, and Modernity. He also has been working on two sets of novels. Three novels of the “Islamic Quintet” have been published by Verso: Shadows of the Pomegranate Tree, The Book of Saladin, and The Stone Woman. They portray Islamic civilization in a way that he says “run counter to the standard views.” His “Fall of Communism” trilogy has seen the publication of Redemption and Fear of Mirrors. Ali’s creative output extends to scripts for stage and screen. A short play of his on Iraq was recently performed at Cooper Union in New York. A veritable “all ’rounder,” as they say in South Asia, he is currently working on an opera on Ayatollah Khomeini.

In late October, he was detained at the Munich airport. “The inspector’s eyes fell on a slim volume in German that had been given to me by a local publisher,” he said. “It was still wrapped in cellophane. In a state of some excitement, the inspector rushed it over to an armed policeman. The offending book was an essay by Karl Marx, On Suicide.” Ali said he was rudely instructed to repack his bag, minus the book, and was then taken to police headquarters at the airport. The arresting officer, Ali added, “gave me a triumphant smile and said, ‘After September 11, you can’t travel with books like this.’ At this point, my patience evaporated.”

Ali demanded to call the mayor of Munich, who had earlier interviewed him on the current crisis at a public event in the city. The threat of the call was sufficient, and Ali was allowed to continue on his journey.

Ali lives in London, and I spoke with him in late November by phone.

[Barsamian]: A Pakistani general once told you, “Pakistan was the condom that the Americans needed to enter Afghanistan. We’ve served our purpose and they think we can be just flushed down the toilet.” That was in the 1980s, when the United States and Pakistan funded and armed the mujahedeen to defeat the godless Soviet Union. Is the United States again using Pakistan as a condom?

[Ali]: I think the Americans fished out the same condom but found it had too many holes in it. So they supplied a new one, and they’ve gone in again. But this time they couldn’t go in with the Pakistani army, since the Pakistani army created the Taliban and propelled it to victory. It could hardly be expected to kill its own offspring. The U.S. forced the Pakistani army to withdraw its support, which it did, reluctantly. But it had to. Once Pakistani support was withdrawn from the Taliban, they collapsed like a house of cards, though one hardline faction will probably carry on in the mountains for a bit.

Most Americans may not know the history of Pakistani-U.S. support for the Taliban. In a talk you gave in late September, you said, “People are taught to forget history.” What did you have in mind there?

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