It is interesting that Americans do not invoke Malcolm X the way they invoke other civil rights leaders. Where ideas about American militarism go, X’s contributions were piercingly insightful but lamentably overlooked when the man lived. For that they deserve greater attention today. <\/p>\n
But first a word on X’s sporadic anti-Semitism and anti-white fulminations, both of which lead some people to ignore everything else X had to say. If we believe it fair to judge historical figures on the basis of their most contemptible sympathies alone, then X is indeed irredeemable. But then, so too are Gandhi<\/a>, Plato<\/a>, and Aristotle<\/a> irredeemable for some of their nefarious beliefs. For that matter, the ideas of four<\/a> of the United States\u2019 first five presidents are worthless, and for much greater reason than X\u2019s are; after all, Washington, Jefferson, Madison and Monroe all owned human beings, whereas X did nothing so barbaric.<\/p>\n If we instead opt to examine X in his nuanced totality, we find not a kook but a winsome human rights activist with a lot of wisdom to share. As a black nationalist during the Cold War, he took no stock whatever in American militarists\u2019 humanitarian pretensions. When many others did not, X questioned the \u201cintegrity<\/a>\u201d and \u201csincerity\u201d of leaders who tackled problems that were not theirs to solve. Even \u201cliberal\u201d interventionists who genuinely desired progress in foreign lands were not heroes in X\u2019s book. The American meddlers \u201cminding<\/a> somebody else’s business way over in South Vietnam,\u201d X declaimed, were unhelpful at best and dangerous at worst. <\/p>\n Malcolm saved his admiration for Africans vying to \u201cestablish<\/a> their own independent nations\u201d and working to \u201ccreate a future for their people\u201d without the involvement of intruders. He noted positively that when \u201cthe people<\/a> in Africa and Asia get some power of their own, they get a mind of their own. They start seeing with their own eyes and listening with their own ears and speaking with their own mouth.\u201d He admired leaders like Patrice Lumumba of the Congo, a CIA target<\/a> whose anti-colonial disposition disturbed the departing Belgians in 1960. X went so far as to call Lumumba \u201cthe greatest<\/a> black man who ever walked the African continent,\u201d for Lumumba \u201cdidn\u2019t fear anybody. He had those people so scared they had to kill him.\u201d X also commended members of the Organization of African Unity for trying to extinguish colonial \u201cvestiges<\/a> of oppression and exploitation being suffered by African people.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Nearly 40 years after X\u2019s death, the Organization of African Unity gave way to the African Union<\/a>, a Pan-African organization at one point chaired by the Libyan Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. As we know, that same Gaddafi fell prey to NATO fighters who decided to \u201crescue\u201d Libya during the 2011 uprising. Malcolm certainly would have bemoaned that development. America and her allies had no more of a right to dethrone the despot Gaddafi and to deliver Libya to Jihadists<\/a> than Gaddafi would have had to bomb the United States and to unseat an American president for the political benefit of domestic terrorists. <\/p>\n But Malcolm knew how \u201cPax Americana\u201d operated, and he probably would have taken recent interventions in Libya, Somalia and Yemen as par for the course. As he understood, and as Randolph Bourne<\/a> before him indicated, habits of American imperialism can thrive among Democrats, Republicans, \u201cliberals\u201d and \u201cconservatives\u201d who here manage to find common cause. Truculent jingoists relish the opportunity to consolidate their country\u2019s power overseas, and self-styled humanitarians jump aboard in hopes of saving foreigners from tyranny. Civilian casualties, devastated infrastructure, lawlessness, and exploitation generally follow. <\/p>\n To be sure, Malcolm made some unpalatable choices of his own. Some of his language was caustic, some of his tangents were bizarre, and some of his comrades were vulgar. But whatever X’s flaws, one must savor the temerity of a man who, in the face of hegemonic calls for Western militarism \u2013 to \u201csave\u201d Vietnam, to assassinate Fidel Castro, to protect the Congo from Communism, to civilize Kenya \u2013 called bogus on the whole enterprise. \u201cAthwart history,\u201d as William F. Buckley might put it, Malcolm unabashedly denounced the imperial doctoring, maceration, and dubious \u201cimprovement\u201d of foreign societies. He repudiated the American government for its \u201ccriminal activity<\/a>\u201d and took note of the United States\u2019 \u201cignorance, her blindness, her lack of foresight and hindsight\u201d in foreign affairs. Many people labeled X an \u201cextremist\u201d for that, and surely he was <\/i><\/a><\/i>an extremist. Malcolm was extremely<\/i> opposed to governments that pay lip service to other people\u2019s freedom but ultimately promote authoritarianism and bloodshed throughout the world. <\/p>\n Tommy Raskin is a contributor to the Good Men Project and Foreign Policy in Focus. He is also an intern at Antiwar.com.<\/i><\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It is interesting that Americans do not invoke Malcolm X the way they invoke other civil rights leaders. Where ideas about American militarism go, X’s contributions were piercingly insightful but lamentably overlooked when the man lived. For that they deserve greater attention today. 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