The decline of the American Century
11 September, 2002 Atimes

 

"When there is a general change of conditions, it is as if the entire creation had been changed and the whole world been altered." - Ibn Khaldun

"History is but glorification of murderers, criminals and robbers." - Karl Popper

 

It is the afternoon sun that dazzles onlookers though it is past its prime. That sums up the height of US power before last September 11. If the US nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki without fear of retaliation was the acme of the American Century, then the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, symbols of economic and military might, could be termed the beginning of the end of the American Century.

 [The limitations of US's colossal powers of destruction have been exposed by Iraqi freedom fighters . US is now in fast decline]

US President George W Bush's spontaneous call for a "crusade" and "Infinite Justice" neatly expressed the reality better than the later slogans, "war on terrorism" and "Enduring Freedom".

[Most Muslims believe that it is a Crusade]

After having thoughtlessly helped create the monster of Islamic fundamentalism, the United States has now succeeded in arousing it, ranging the might of Islamic people and their faith against itself. Earlier, the poor and the deprived could find solace and action in communist and leftist ideologies and programs, but after the dismantling of the Soviet Union, many in the Islamic world have taken to extreme religious movements.

[US & Western powers, Arab and Muslim nations, China and even Israel helped create the monster of Islamic fundamentalism to fight against USSR in Afghanistan, spending many billions of US dollars. Pakistan is most seriously infected with the virus of terrorism. ]

For the first time in history, war has been brought to US territory, making it dar ul harab (the house of war). Even a normal air accident now shatters the jangled nerves and morale of New Yorkers. Apart from bearding the Western lion in its den, inflicting direct and collateral economic damage that may amount to as much as US$95 billion, September 11 globalized the feeling of insecurity and terror from which the United States had felt immune.

[US administration has used the fear of attacks to get re-elected, help Military industry complex and rich friends , while reducing freedoms at home ]

The US spends a staggering amount of money to defend itself. But the innovative guerrilla air attacks that stunned the US pierced forever the myth of homeland inviolability. Those who live in glass houses cannot be immune from stones. The tens of billions of dollars spent by the US government on agencies such as the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) could not protect Americans. And there is no guarantee that they can in the future. Apart from killing ill-trained Taliban and bombing to death thousands of innocent civilians, the combined special forces of the United States, United Kingdom and other allies have not been able to catch the main leaders of al-Qaeda and the Taliban. Rather, a war scare is being created in order to pour trillions of dollars into national missile defense (NMD) and other defense projects, which will only fatten the pockets of the military-industrial complex and the corporate interests behind it.

Throughout history, there have always been asymmetrical wars, with the only recourse of the weak to sacrifice his life against a powerful tyrant. Among Muslims, Caliph Ali's son Imam Hussein, his forces outnumbered, is revered for his sacrifice at Kerbala for his principles. Today, nations send their soldiers to die for country or corporate interests in exchange for Purple Hearts and Distinguished Service Medals.

With the United States replacing Europe as the new focus of Western power, it believes there is nothing superior to human knowledge. In Greek philosophy, from which Western civilization derives, the idea of unwritten laws exists - which "live always and forever, and no man knows from where they have arisen". Western belief in an external moral universe to which men owe obedience has been changed to a rational secular alternative. The late English social historian, philosopher, and essayist Isaiah Berlin's advice that "solutions to the central problems existed, that one could discover them and, with sufficient selfless effort, realize them on Earth" has been lost. Popular religious belief in the West still remains strong, but since the mid-20 century its elites have become secularized with radical autonomy and absolute freedom to do whatever one chooses .

By now there is enough evidence to believe that US authorities let Pearl Harbor happen. US president Franklin Roosevelt's son and confidant, talking of people "scorched and boiled and baked to death", said that the atomic bombing should continue "until we have destroyed about half the Japanese civilian population". General Leslie Groves, military director of the Manhattan Project, hastily reassured congressmen that radiation caused no "undue suffering" and that "in fact, they say it is a very pleasant way to die". In 1946 a US strategic bombing survey concluded that "Japan would have surrendered even if atomic bombs had not been dropped".

 [ No wonder there are theories of US Administration's conspiracy in 911 attacks. Also look at US view of others' suffering. No 'body counts' of Iraqis .USA has used in Iraq  all weapons of destruction ,even forbidden ones , except for nuclear bombs]

By the end of the 20th century US corporate interests had acquired almost full control of world finance and power. The nominees of the armaments, energy and other sectors become presidents who promote their interests at home and abroad. Corporate interests bid for their candidate and the highest bidder gets his man in the White House. But even with a blind opening bid of nearly US$65 million, only legal jiggery-pokery, possible only in the US, could get George W Bush into the White House.

[US judicial system and the rampant corruption in its political elite lies exposed.

In his discussions at the University of Freiburg in Switzerland, as reported by Newsweek ,US Supreme Court Justice Scalia said terror suspects did not deserve the right to a trial, adding "I had a son on that battlefield ( in Iraq) and they were shooting at my son, and I'm not about to give this man who was captured in a war a full jury trial. I mean it's crazy."]

While the American people were confused, scared and panicky after September 11, the Bush administration did not miss the chance to enrich its masters. As US economist Paul Krugman pointed out at the end of last year, the US Congress voted $15 billion in aid to airline companies but nothing for laid-off airline workers. Also there was almost nothing for the unemployed but $25 billion in retroactive corporate tax cuts, mostly to highly profitable companies.

Abroad, the charade of globalization, a distorted version of capitalism, enforces rapid capital movements for quick profits with no accountability, leaving weak national economies in disarray and shattered. It has played havoc around the world. The weapons used are the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, the United Nations, the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and now the World Trade Organization (WTO).

US leadership and lessons from history
An astute analyst blamed the US debacle in Vietnam on a lack of moral and integrated leadership. The war was run like a managerial enterprise. There was no holistic or long-term planning. Leaders from the corporate and legal professions, sometimes ruthless and insensitive academics such as Henry Kissinger and Madeleine Albright, came in for a few years to manage Washington.

[Madeleine Albright to General Colin Powell: "What's the point of having this superb military you're always talking about if we can't use it?" Peter Cheney, when queried by Prince Hassan  of Jordan why choose Iraq when similar regimes existed elsewhere,replied "Iraq is doable ". ]

In history, when societies become rich and flabby they are reluctant to engage in bloody fights. The desert Arabs whose swords carved an empire became soft after lapping up luxuries from the conquered Byzantine and Persian empires.

By the mid-9th century the caliphs started recruiting Turkish nomad slaves from Central Asia for fighting. It was only a matter of time before the slaves took over and upgraded the minor office of sultan to the protector of hapless Arab caliphs.

US and European leaders are reluctant to risk soldiers in conflicts and wars, even for human intelligence. Fear of body bags - and what they would do to their popularity - sends shivers down their spines. Hence the use of missiles and stealth bombers.

Both George W Bush and his predecessor as US commander-in-chief, Bill Clinton, avoided military service in Vietnam - much like the Arab caliphs. When the draft became unpopular among whites, it was abolished; now more blacks join the US armed forces. They may not repeat what Alawites have done in Syria or the slaves in Islamic history, but this nevertheless has future ramifications for the white US political elite and polity.

[Claims of a brilliant US victory over Iraqi forces by US writers are nauseating .US spent nearly US $ 500.billions, compared to Iraq's a few billions , which also faced 12 years of sanctions ,and intermittent bombing by US-K planes]

Inequities of the current economic order
The current international finance architecture is founded on the US dollar as the dominant reserve currency, accounting for 68 percent of global currency reserves, up from 51 percent a decade ago. Yet in 2000, the US share of global exports ($781.1 billion out of a world total of $6.2 trillion) was only 12.3 percent and its share of global imports ($1.257 trillion out of a world total of $6.65 trillion) was 18.9 percent.

Ever since 1971, when US president Richard Nixon arbitrarily took the dollar off the gold standard ($35 per ounce) in force since the Bretton Woods Conference at the end of World War II, the dollar has become the global monetary instrument that the United States, and only the United States, can produce by fiat, despite record US current-account deficits and the US as the leading debtor nation. The US national debt as of April 4 was $6.021 trillion against a GDP of $9 trillion.

India has to maintain ample foreign-exchange reserves, which have now reached $60 billion. Most of this must be kept in low-interest US securities, which US companies like Enron can then invest in India and force governments to guarantee 15 percent returns. Thus US companies earn billions of dollars by investing Indian savings in India.

One of the casus belli for the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990 was the latter's insistence that Iraq must return $10 billion granted by Kuwait to fight Iran. Kuwait finally ended up paying more than $50 billion (as did the Saudis). The US, meanwhile, collected a cool $150 billion or more for basically protecting its own interests.

[US is now financing the Iraq war by reckless borrowings. The foreign debt has now mounted to over $ 8 trillion ,with current account deficit of nearly US$ 700 billion]

Globalization, much heralded since the early 1990s as a panacea has turned out to be a gliblization of the economic and social problems of the masses wallowing in misery in developing countries. In the former socialist countries, so-called shock therapy has reduced millions to penury. The middle classes have been decimated while wealth and power are concentrated in the hands of a few, ironically mostly former communist leaders or apparatchiks or their friends. Western media rarely write about it. Nearly $200 billion has been transferred from former socialist countries to the banks and other institutions in the West and become a national debt. No wonder a current joke in Moscow is: "What the communists said about communism was all wrong but what they said about capitalism is all true."

 [ There is little trickle down effect , instead it is trickle up effect as Forbes report annually increase in the number of billionaires and their wealth]

Transparency
If developing countries must have "transparency", so should developed nations. Most corrupt deals in the energy, raw-materials and commodities sectors are controlled by corporate interests and their servants in high decision-making positions. The kickbacks taken by former senior US officials from energy deals in the new Central Asian republics or by others in Angola or Congo and money given to the dictators runs into billions of dollars, which has further impoverished these poor nations

Most African dictators are creatures of multinational organizations and diamond dealers and the cause of ethnic fighting, mayhem, genocide and unashamed exploitation. The whole system is designed to exploit the poorest of the poor.

The leaders and people of the United States delude themselves that other people are envious. Yes, they admire US dynamism and the rule of law and democracy, but these apply only inside the US. But the rage is against injustice perpetrated by naked US financial clout backed by coercive military power all over the world.

The US: A law unto itself
Bush's threat of war against Iraq for defying international law is absurd. Since coming into office, he has torn up more international treaties and disregarded more UN conventions than the rest of the world in past 20 years.

The list is familiar, including but not limited to the withdrawal from the Kyoto Protocol on global warming, failure to ratify the Rio Pact on biodiversity, withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and the pursuit of National Missile Defense. It appears ready to violate the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. It opposed the ban on land mines and has sought to immobilize the UN convention against torture so that it could keep foreign observers out of its prison camp in Guantanamo Bay and hide its treatment of al-Qaeda prisoners. It has sabotaged the small-arms treaty and is opposed to new provisions of the biological-warfare convention. It experiments with biological weapons of its own and has refused chemical-weapons inspectors full access to its laboratories. It is opposed to the International Criminal Court and is coercing other countries to sign separate agreements not to charge US citizens. It has permitted CIA hit squads to recommence covert operations of the kind that included, in the past, the assassination of foreign heads of state. Even its threat to go to war with Iraq without a mandate from the UN Security Council is a defiance of international law.

The Bush administration's foreign policy has undermined the fragile structure of international law and conventions built up during the past three centuries, to which the United States made important contributions. Former president Billy Carter, a respected elder statesman frequently invited as an observer to elections, wrote in the Washington Post on September 6 that, "formerly admired almost universally as the pre-eminent champion of human rights, our country has become the foremost target of respected international organizations concerned about these basic principles of democratic life". He added that statements on Israel by US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld indicate "a radical departure from policies of every administration since 1967, always based on the withdrawal of Israel from occupied territories and a genuine peace between Israelis and their neighbors".

 [ With over 100 nuclear bombs in its arsenal ,Israel is grabbing Palestinian land illegally by building a concrete Wall against international law . Do Israelis envisage a Green Zone in the Middle East  Red Zone ! ]

Look how the energy interests are trying to rule the United States and the rest of the world. Zalmay Khalilzad, whom the Bush administration appointed as its envoy to Afghanistan after the fall of the Taliban, was a Unocal consultant, as was, according to some reports, Karzai himself -It is well known that the Bush family acquired its wealth through oil; former president George Bush Sr still works with the Carlyle Group that specializes in huge oil investments abroad. His son's commerce secretary, Dale Evans, was chairman and chief executive officer of an oil company. National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice was on the board of Chevron before going to Washington. (The oil company even named a giant tanker after her, although the ship has reportedly been quietly renamed the Altair Voyager.) Dick Cheney, before becoming vice president, worked for the giant oil conglomerate Halliburton.

[ US Energy corporate interests remain predominant  while the military –industry complex gets fatter every day , now with the so called 'never ending war against terrorism' .]

Dangers from within :: Article nr. 22147 sent on 01-apr-2006 14:59 ECT