Noam Chomksy: ‘We’re approaching the most dangerous point in human hory’
Renowned author, lingu and philosopher Noam Chomsky in a recent interview warned that the world is “approaching the most dangerous point in human hory” while speaking about the climate crisis and the threat of a nuclear war.
Presenting a grim reality of the state of affairs, the 93-year-old professor in an interview with the British magazine New Statesman said, “We are now facing the prospect of the destruction of organised human life on Earth from environmental destruction. And not in the remote future… we are approaching irreversible turning points which cannot be dealt with any longer. It doesn’t mean everyone is going to die but it does mean moving to a future in which the lucky ones will be those who die quickly.”
Chomsky termed the ongoing war in Ukraine as “monstrous”. Condemning Russian President Vladimir Putin’s actions in Ukraine, he said, “Why did he do it? There are two ways of looking at this question. One way, the fashionable way in the West, is to plumb the recesses of Putin’s twed mind and try to determine what’s happening in his deep psyche.”
In a wide-ranging interview, Noam Chomsky, speaks to @georgeeaton about Brexit, the war in Ukraine and the return of Donald Trump. pic.twitter.com/DxFzYcSlBd
— The New Statesman (@NewStatesman) April 6, 2022
The other way, he said, was to look at the actions of the United States. “…in September 2021, the US came out with a strong policy statement, calling for enhanced military cooperation with Ukraine, further sending of advanced military weapons, all part of the enhancement programme of Ukraine joining Nato. You can take your choice, we don’t know which is right.”
He added that with Ukraine’s ‘devastation’, “we may move on to terminal nuclear war if we do not pursue the opportunities that ex for a negotiated settlement.”
Chomsky asserted that it was right to “have a moral outrage against Putin”, but also called for outrage against other “horrible atrocities” that the US was behind. Speaking about the people starving in Afghanan, Chomsky held the US responsible for the situation, saying that it has “kept Afghanan’s funds in New York banks and will not release them.”
Painting a bleak picture of former US president Donald Trump’s possible return, the US professor said, “I can remember lening to Hitler’s speeches on the radio. I didn’t understand the words, I was six years old. But I understood the mood. And it was frightening and terrifying. And when you watch one of Trump’s rallies that can’t fail to come to mind. That’s what we’re facing.”
He also critiqued the Republican Party’s disregard for climate change as a “death warrant to the species.”
However, Chomsky maintained there was still hope for the future, with those of the younger generation “dedicated to trying to stop this madness before it consumes us all.”
