1 Introduction:
This paper intends to analyze the speech delivered by American president George W. Bush on March 17, 2003 in which he gives ultimatum to Saddam Hussein to leave Iraq or be prepared to face military attack. President Bush delivered this speech from Cross Hall at the White House just two days before American troops commenced war on Iraq. This speech was delivered not only with the purpose of giving Saddam an ultimatum; this was also delivered to inform the American public and the US allies why USA was going to fight this war.
The main aim of my essay is to find out, how Bush, through his speech projects enemy image of Iraqi regime as an imminent threat to the United States and its allies. To achieve the aim of the essay, two operational questions listed under will be accessed.
How does Bush create the enemy image of Iraqi regime?
How is upcoming application of power justified through rhetorical persuasion?
The body of my essay will constitute two parts. First part will include the concepts and theories regarding the enemy images. First part will deal with the understanding of enemy images with reference to the views of different scholars. Basically, concepts of good “we” and the evil “others” will be explained in this section. For deeper understanding the concepts, focus will be given on the re-occurring patterns of creating enemy images based on different theories and viewpoints to find out either these patterns are seen in the speech in the analysis part. This will be followed by the consequences of enemy images where I will try to explain how the life and behavior of people are affected by synthesizing these created images of enemy.
Using these concepts mentioned in the first part I will proceed to the analytical part of the essay. In this analysis section I will try to analyze speech in terms of the concepts of enemy images. I will try to investigate the patterns which are being used in the speech to create an enemy. I will try to motive myself to make an analysis according to the operational questions I have come up with so that it will lead me to achieve the main aim of this essay.
At last the conclusion part of my essay will include the comprehensive analysis of my findings during the analysis of the essay.
2 Theory and Method
In this part I will explain the concept of enemy images, their creating patterns and their consequences with reference to the course literature.
2.1 CONCEPT OF ENEMY IMAGES
Enemy images are created is the process of describing “other” as threat, sometimes imminent. These images are constructed on the psychological foundation of the concept of enemy. According to Zur, the concept of enemy images derives from the psychological and socio-psychological studies where they are defined, by and large, as commonly held stereotypical, dehumanized images of the out group (Zur, 1991: 350). Here, the out group is the group of “other” who is supposed to be fundamentally different from “us”. The main purpose of creating the “other” is because without the existence of the “other” one is unable to define himself and experience his identity. But being “other” does not necessarily require to be an enemy. Sometimes the “other” can be neutral or positive, possessing some social function (Harle, 2000:11). So, enemy is always the “other” but all others are not enemies. To become an enemy the “other” needs to fulfill special conditions because enemy is supposed to have many images, needs attention almost all the time and is responsible for creating disorders in the society. In this regard, this “other” is to be blamed for bad things and is totally different from us because “we” are the ones who defend justice, law, rights and morality (Harle, 2000: 13). This borderline between “we” and the “other” is created through a psychological process in which every human beings tend to include or exclude on the basis of individual, ideological or other differences between each other (Kelly and Michela, 1980; Ross, 1977: cited in Ottosen, 1995: 98).
Human nature always tries to project the own evilness and bad properties towards others, so, the enemy is created to blame for all our difficulties (Post, 1999: 340). In this way, the creation of enemy image starts with an assumption that “we” represent and fight for good and our opponents or the “other” represent and fight for evil (Harle, 2000: 187). Once the enemy is created we tend to dehumanize it with all the negative attributes we need to disown. As Sam Keen explains: “The enemy is always singular, a limbolike category to which we may assign any threat about which we do not wish to think properly” (Keen, 2004: 25). In addition to this, the out group is said to be static who is always against societal progress and maintaining peace. In this regard, Steiner gives an example of how Islam is perceived in Swedish Radical Christian Press as: “The fundamental problem in Islam is that it cannot be modernized but they do try to Islamize modernity” (Steiner, 2012: 216).
If the states are in enmity, enemy images can be understood as the clear pictures of the actual conflict between them (Ottosen, 1995: 98). Ottosen further tries to explain enemy images as not only the hypothetical enmity but the representation of concrete hostility. He defines enemy images as negative stereotypes of the “other” which can be expressed in the form of some linguistic metaphors, visuals or graphical effects that is able to dehumanize the opponent (Ottosen, 1995: 101).
According to scholar Ofer Zur, the knowledge of creating enemies is not achieved genetically. Instead enemy images are the results of affective or cognitive processes and these images are constructed through individual perceptions and by studying the actions of the enemy (Zur: 1991: 350). The enemy is understood as the agent who tries to occupy our boarders and destroy our ideologies. So, enemy has to be feared, hated and even destroyed if the threat is really imminent (Zur, 1991: 348). Hence, the “other” is the enemy because this “other” does not respect our values and norms and is an immediate threat to our belief system (Ahnaf, 2006: 17).
2.2 Creating Patterns of Enemy Images
The process of creating enemy images starts with the split between us and them. While splitting, all the undesirable and negative qualities are disowned and projected towards the out group (Zur, 1991: 353). Now, people tend to believe that their group is superior and assign it with the higher level of humanity than the out group. So, the out group becomes “bad other” or “dangerous other” and it becomes the focus for externalization of fears and threats. Then the out group is assigned with the name of “enemy” which has to be feared, hated and defended against from now on. This enemy image is published through propaganda (Zur, 1991: 350-352).
As zur explains, various patterns of creating enemy images has been noticed throughout the history. In a survey, Soviets were seen as enemies by the American students. Older people tend to visualize other nationals like Vietnams, Iraqis etc. as enemies as per their involvement in the war against these states or from their life experiences (Zur, 1991: 350). Ottosen describes these patterns of enemy images give rise to situational enemies. These enemy images do not refer to any hypothetical conflict imagined but they tend to reflect the solid hostility. He further describes another type of enemy termed as “dispositional enemy” in which some hostile actions are expected immediately or in the near future. These patterns help to stereotype the out group in a negative way from whom only destruction is expected which in return demands the necessity of defending or eliminating such enemy groups (Ottosen,1995: 101).
According to Post, enemy images are created manipulating the psychological foundation manipulating fear and hatred among the people (Post, 1999: 339). The creation of enemy images is the result of the relationship between malignant leaders and vulnerable followers. Leaders try to convince their followers to believe that some external group is responsible for their difficulties which in a way justifies hatred and mass violence (Post, 1999: 337). He further explains, universal readiness to follow the paranoid path during chaos is a human quality which ultimately leads the ingroup members to distrust and fear the outsider (Post, 1999: 338).
Moreover, the group in validating the leaders’ construction of reality magnifies the leader’s influence further weakening the individuals hold on reality an easing individual doubts by providing an “objective” external focus for his anxiety. Although an individual might be wary of conspiracy theory, his doubts are assured by the group’s validation of the existence of the enemy (Post, 1999: 342)
Ahnaf discusses how differences in religious ideologies help in formation of enemy images. These images are constructed by stereotyping the followers of other religious backgrounds in group’s publications and speeches, to be the immediate threat to our belief system. These stereotypes are created based upon the teachings of religious books and they are verified by using the references from the historical conflicts which promotes antagonistic attitudes like fear, hatred, envy and hostility between the groups (Ahnaf, 2006: 12-18).
Journalism is another way of creating enemy images. Entman describes how framing can be used to create an enemy through journalism. Frames are generally used to examine problems in order to find out its causes and to suggest the counteracting measures towards it. Frames can also be manipulated to create one sided opinion by repetitive embedding of one aspect of news neglecting the opposite part of it. The repetition of the bits of information or assigning some cultural symbols makes it easy for the viewer to save it in the memory. So, frames are able to produce one sided opinion which is very useful in creating stereotypes, propagating propagandas and develop a public support towards it (Entman, 1993: 53, 54). When an enemy image is created the enemy is perceived as an ideal type of enemy and any types of information which are in contradiction to this image are either ignored or given a very little attention (Lindsey, 1996: 26).
Similarly, the news and image pattern in the media can play a role in developing and maintaining stereotype of a group (Entman, 1994: 516). Carruthers (2000) projects the similar view which says media is responsible for the creation of enemy through reports and cartoons which predisposes society towards war. In addition to this, media is also responsible to embed propagandas in public’s mind to narrow down the options towards war (Carruthers, 2000: 25-33).
Steiner (Forthcoming) explains another pattern of enemy images in which the darkness of the other is expressed in linguistics in order to stereotype and demonize ultimately creating an enemy image. In this process discourse helps to distort the way people understand and interpret the social reality (Steiner, 2012: 193).
2.3 Consequences of the Enemy Images
According to Ofer Zur, the violent behavior of human beings is not developed genetically. Rather they become violent when they perceive some sort of threat from others. The enemy images absorbed with propagandas helps the human mind to justify the necessity of eliminating the enemy (Zur, 1991: 346). Enemies portrayed as very inhumane, harmful and dangerous creates a need of strong bond among the group members and the behaviors and attitudes towards the enemy are justified. This also makes a psychological demand of killing enemies which legitimizes violence against the enemy and people tend to kill the enemy without mercy. This act of killing people can be later justified as self-defense (Zur, 1991: 353-363).
Post discusses that the fear of the enemy is biologically rooted and identification of friends and enemies is socially conditioned. He argues that enemy images do not only disintegrate societies but they tend to unite people of different groups for the sake of collective security and to defend against another powerful opponent (Post, 1999: 339, 340).
Ahnaf gives a different perspective of the consequences of enemy images. He explains, although the construction of enemy images may result in harboring distrust and suspicion about the outer groups but it does not necessarily imply physical violence but it may give rise to symbolic violence. He puts this issue as follows:
Examination of fundamentalist’s construction of image of enemy and their attitudes towards the other calls to mind Pierre Bourdeu’s theory of symbolic violence. ..Symbolic violence occurs when the dominated class accepts distorted symbols (concepts, ideas, percepts, beliefs etc.) so that domination over them becomes permanent (Ahnaf, 2006: 44).
Snyder (1977) argues that enemy images are responsible for creating stereotypes in our minds. Once these stereotypes about the out group are established in our mind, we tend to evaluate the actions of this out group with these preset negative beliefs which will ultimately harm our ability to make evaluations of that group probably throughout the life (Snyder, 1977: 656-658).
On the other hand, Blanton discusses that the created enemy images may influence the psychology of policy-makers while making decisions to some extent (Lindsey, 1996: 24). In contrary, Murray argues that the belief system of the political elites is dominated more by political ideologies than the enemy images (Murray and Cowden, 1999: 455).
Galtung (1990) discusses how our culture plays role in justifying the evil acts of a person. He argues that cultural violence provides a base for direct and structural violence. People tend to stereotype, and discriminate the other groups because of the values and norms of the culture they follow. So, it is culture which helps to create stereotypes, legitimizes our evil deeds and finally promotes othering (Galtung, 1990: 91-92).
3 Speech Analysis
The speech delivered by then American president George W. Bush on 17th of March, 2003 from the Cross Hall in White House as an ultimatum to Iraqi regime has an explicit use of enemy making patterns. In the speech, the notions of good “we” and evil “them” are clearly pictured. The speech seems to be framed in such a way that the targeted audience will feel a sense of immediate threat which will propagate fear among the American population. He has used possible linguistics to denote the Iraqi regime as evil which should be destroyed immediately in order to feel the sense of security. Spreading fear about the Iraqi regime and its manipulation seems to be the main discourse of the speech.
The starting of Bush’s speech follows the pattern as discussed by Carruthers where he seems to be exhausted by a long and unsuccessful peaceful attempts made to disarm Iraqi regime. In the very first, he tries to narrow the options towards war. This pattern is supported later by saying, “…the American people can know that every measure has been taken to avoid war (Bush, 2003)”. Bush has repetitively emphasized the immediate attack upon the Iraqi regime can only prevent the probable dangers in futures from the Iraqi regime.
Bush denotes “us” as patient and peaceful people trying to act with honorable efforts. His speech claims that United States and its allies are peace loving and defender of humanity and the Iraqi regime as “dictator”, “thugs”, “killers”, “tyrant” and “lawless men” who threatens, bugs, deceives, kills etc. In addition to this, he accuses the Iraqi regime for aiding terrorist organizations, killing own people, raping women and making weapons of mass destruction. The notions he has used to describe the character and actions of the Iraqi regime are all negative. In this way he is trying to establish cruel and inhuman nature of the Iraqi regime. On the other hand, he has attributed the US and its allies as kind people who try to liberate the foreign people from a dictatorial rule, who will give them food and medicine and help them to build their own free and prosperous country. According to Sam Keen such negative attributes are given to the enemy to dehumanize it (Keen, 2004: 16-40). In addition to this the creation of enemy images follows the next step of showing ingroup superior than the outer group. He says, “We are a peaceful people, yet we are not a fragile people. And we will not be intimidated by thugs and killers (Bush, 2003).” This statement not only denotes that although “we” are superior, “they” are dominant in this moment and they are posing threat against humanity.
The pattern of enemy making as explained by Post can be seen in the speech. As Post describes creation of enemy involves the paradigm of spreading fear of the stranger and projection of the hatred towards the out group (Post, 1999: 339-340). This pattern can be noticed in many statements in the speech where Bush tries inform the American people and its allies that Iraqi regime is an imminent threat.
The danger is clear: using chemical, biological or, one day, nuclear weapons obtained with the help of Iraq, the terrorists could fulfil their stated ambitions and kill thousands or hundreds of thousands of innocent people in our country or any other (Bush, 2003).
The main aim of this statement seems to be spreading fear among the American people and its allies so that the fear can later be manipulated to justify the war.
In addition to this, he accuses the Iraqi regime for helping the terrorist organizations including Al Queada. He further adds that if Saddam is not disarmed now, then he and his terrorist allies will grow stronger with time and they can attack the United States when they are strongest. So, the preemptive war is now a necessity or the United States and its allies may have to face severe consequences. Similarly, he says that Iraqi regime has a deep hatred upon US and its allies. This statement helps to make the threat clearer.
As explained by Ahnaf, construction of the enemy images is done by promoting antagonistic attitudes like anger, hatred, suspicion, resentment, envy and hostility towards the “other” and these enemy images are verified by presenting the picked up events from the history (Ahnaf, 2006: 18). This pattern also seems to be included in the speech. For instance, he says: “The regime has a history of reckless aggression in the Middle East (Bush 2003).” Giving the historical reference he tries to revive the stereotype of the Iraqi regime in the minds of American population.
The patterns of creating dispositional enemy also re-occurs in different parts of the speech. Like Ottosen (1995) defines dispositional enemy as a created stereotype from whom evil actions are to be expected and obviously this enemy has to be feared (Ottosen, 1995: 101). The spreading of fear is seen as the major discourse in this speech where Bush says, “… he will remain a deadly foe until the end”, and “These attacks are not inevitable”. Using these statements, he pretends to uncover possible threats America and its allies have to face in the near future. These types of statements help to accelerate fear in the public and get a unbiased opinions which are supportive for preemptive intervention.
The speech also has the use of frames. Bush repetitively tries to convince the US public that Iraqi regime is the biggest threat to the United States and its allies and no any peaceful methods have been successful to disarm Iraqi regime. He is regularly focusing on the necessity of the war to resolve the issue. For instance, he says: “The terrorist threat to America and the World will be diminished the moment that Saddam Hussein is disarmed” (Bush, 2003).
Furthermore, he tries to establish to what extent the US government is morally bounded and to what extent the Iraqi regime’s behavior is inhuman and animalistic. The theme of his statement can be understood as the government of USA does not ever neglect the values of humanity and morality and Iraqi regime is the worst government in the world which is responsible for genocides and killings of its own population. To explain this Bush addresses to the Iraqi population as:
…we will deliver food and medicine you need. We will tear down the apparatus of terror and we will help you to build a new Iraq that is prosperous and free. In a free Iraq, there will be no more torture chambers and rape rooms. The tyrant will soon be gone. The day of your liberation is near (Bush, 2003).
With these statements he tries to justify the upcoming war on Iraq by denoting this war not projected towards the Iraqi people but towards the tyrant regime which is ruling Iraq. United States is actually going to start war on Iraq just to liberate the people from the dictatorial regime of Saddam Hussein and to establish a free and democratic Iraq.
To justify the upcoming war he explains in the beginning of the speech that Iraq is guilty of not following the international law. He accuses Iraq of using the diplomacy just to gain advantages and deceived the international society in return. He explains this as:
The Iraqi regime has used diplomacy as a ploy to gain time and advantage. It has uniformly defied Security Council resolutions demanding full disarmament (Bush, 2003).
This type of negative reflection of the “other” is done to derogate the enemy which helps to polarize and gain a supportive votes for the war.
The use of the word “disarm” can be found all over the speech. The use of this word convinces the listener that certainly there are chemical and biological weapons in Iraq. The question either the weapons explained by Bush really exist becomes automatically faded to some extent.
He further explains that an unseen threat is behind the faces of Iraqi regime. This threat will not notify us before it falls upon us. So an immediate action is now a compulsion to be taken because if it is not faced now then it will be like waiting for the death.
Terrorists and terror states do not reveal these threats with fair notice, in formal declarations –and responding to such enemies only after they have struck first is not self-defense, it is suicide. The security of the world requires disarming Saddam Hussein now (Bush, 2003).
Here the possible threat is explained and the only way to face it is said to be war to be disarmament of Saddam Hussein.
4 Conclusion:
After analysis of the speech, it is concluded that Bush has used quite a number of patterns of creating enemy images in which he has tried to stereotype the Iraqi regime with all possible measures. His speech contains different classical frames for the negative representation of the Saddam regime and has tried to convince that the war is only option left as a final way to get rid of it.
He first starts with the negative portrayal of Saddam regime giving it different evil attributes and on the other hand he has put himself in the light of humanity to create the enemy image. The repetition of bad attributes assigned to Iraqi regime has tried to convince the listener or the reader that Iraqi regime is an imminent threat and something should be done to avoid this threat.
He has manipulated the linguistic discourse both to dehumanize the “other” and at the same time he is using the same tool to denote the United and its allies as defender of humanity. He has also tried to establish the superiority of Americans by saying that the United States and its allies accept the responsibility of liberating Iraq.
5. References:
5.1 Books and Articles
Ahnaf, Muhammad Iqbal. The Image of the Other as Enemy: Radical Discourse in Indonesia. Chiang Mai, Thailand: Asian Muslim Action Network, 2006. Print.
Carruthers, Susan L. The Media at War: Communication and Conflict in the Twentieth Century. New York: St. Martin's, 2000. Print.
Entman, Robert M. "Framing: Toward Clarification of a Fractured Paradigm." Journal of Communication 43.4 (1993): 51-58. Print.
Entman, Robert M. "Representation and Reality in the Portrayal of Blacks on Network Television News." Journalism Quarterly 71 (1994): 291-305. Print.
Galtung, J. "Cultural Violence." Journal of Peace Research 27.3 (1990): 291-305. Print.
Harle, Vilho. The Enemy with a Thousand Faces: The Tradition of the Other in Western Political Thought and History. Westport, CT: Praeger, 2000. Print.
Keen, Sam. Faces of the Enemy, Reflections of the Hostile Imagination. 3rd ed. Sanfransisco: Hypersanfransisco, n.d. Print.
Lindsey, Blantan Shanon. "Images in Conflict, The Case of Ronald Regan and El Salvador." International Studies Quarterly 40.1 (1996): 23-44. Print.
Murray, Shoon Kathleen, and Jonathan A. Cowden. "The Role of "Enemy Images" and Ideology of Elite Belief Systems." International Studies Quarterly 43.3 (1999): 455-81. Print.
Ottosen, Rune. "Enemy Images and the Journalistic Process." International Studies Quarterly 43 (1995): 97-112. Print.
Post, Jerrold M. "The Psychopolitics of Hatred: Commentary on Ervin Staub's Article." Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology 5.4 (1999): 337-44. Print.
Snyder, Mark, Elizabeth Decker Tanke, and Ellen Berscheid. "Social Perceptions and Interpersonal Behaviour: On Self-Fulfilling Nature of Social Stereotypes." Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 35.9 (1977): 656-66. Print.
Steiner, Kristian. "The Image of Islam and Muslims in Swedish Radical Christian Press." Journal of Religion in Europe 5 (2012): 192-222. Print.
Zur, Ofer. "The Love of Hating: The Psychology of Enmity." History of European Ideas 13.4 (1991): 345-69. Print.
5.2 Websites
George W. Bush speech on 17 March 2003
http://www.gurdian.co.uk/world/2003/mar/18/usa.iraq
