“Now, under the very confused circumstances of KAL 007, if that was the worst atrocity in human history, well, what about the freedom fighters that we support along with South Africa, who did something much worse?”

— Noam Chomsky

Quotes 1960s-1980s, 1980s, Talk at University of California, Berkeley, 1984
Context: On September 1st of last year, the Soviet Union shot down Korean KAL 007, killing 269 people, and the immediate response here was that this proves that the Russians are the most barbaric people since Attila the Hun or something, and therefore we have to step up the attack against Nicaragua, set in MX missiles, put Pershings in West Germany, and increase the military system.… The story was given unbelievable coverage. Not only the story, but the American government interpretation of it, which is roughly what I've just said, was given the kind of coverage that I doubt has ever been given to any story in history.… Right in the middle of all of this furor about the Korean airliner, on November 11th in fact, there was a 100 word item in the New York Times devoted to the interesting fact that UNITA—which is a group that we call "freedom fighters", supported by us and South Africa, in Angola—they took credit for shooting down a civilian Angolan jet, killing 126 people.… Now, under the very confused circumstances of KAL 007, if that was the worst atrocity in human history, well, what about the freedom fighters that we support along with South Africa, who did something much worse?

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Noam Chomsky 334

american linguist, philosopher and activist 1928

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“Of course [the opposition] can be supported! I mean, for God’s sake, from Solidarity in Poland to the ANC in South Africa… there was a great degree of support. But they [the Poles and South Africans] did it. It was not some foreign country doing it.”

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“We did so, and I think not without some success. Gradually we have seen emerging out of these discordant elements the lineaments of a new South Africa. We have not yet the whole, we have not yet a really unified South Africa, we have not yet attained to the unity which is our ideal. There is still too much of the old division and separation in our national elements, but still the effort has been made, and you see today in South Africa the biggest problem facing us being solved along holistic lines.”

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“I find that what is happening here [in Palestine] is ten times worse than what I had experienced in South Africa. This is Apartheid.”

Arun Gandhi (1934) Indian activist

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“The Republic of South Africa has a new formula under the National Party's leadership: black nations can get freedom without firing shots or revolution.”

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2010

“Now, under the very confused circumstances of KAL 007, if that was the worst atrocity in human history, well, what about the freedom fighters that we support along with South Africa, who did something much worse?”

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Noam Chomsky 334

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