A New Perpetual Enemy

This past weekend, the NYTimes reported that our incursion into Iraq has actually made us LESS safe, because of the creation and radicalization of jihadists in the Arab world, who are opposed to our illegal occupation and our plans for further global hegemony. In my view, this radicalization and creation of a new enemy, is exactly what special interests in the US wanted, to replace the loss of the threats from the Soviet Union. They believe we must have a perpetual enemy to justify the maintenance and growth of the Military Industrial Complex, which is composed of defense, oil, media, chemicals, and a host of other related industries. Without a war (currently on 'terror') or threat of war with an 'enemy', it's hard to rally our people behind their hegemonic plans. In my view, two primary objectives necessitated the U.S. invasion of Iraq; Oil, and our support for Israel, who has her own regional hegemonic plans. The CIA estimates China's and India's surging, oil-hungry economies will cause world oil shortages by 2030 - or sooner. Accordingly, the Bushites moved to assure America's global hegemony by seizing Mideast and Central Asian oil before the impending crisis. Doing so required occupying Iraq and Afghanistan. Any other reasons offered, such as 'spreading democracy', 'weapons of mass destruction' etc., are pure fiction and should be ignored and disregarded.

What If We'd Turned The Other Cheek Instead?

Considering we have already spent a third of a trillion dollars since 9/11, and have suffered thousands of dead and injured of our own, plus hundreds of thousands of our enemies (mostly civilians), how successful has our 'war on terror' been? Being a 'Christian' country, would we have been better off following the teachings of Christ to 'turn the other cheek' instead of the 'shock and awe' insanity of the Bushites rush to war? Wouldn't it have been better to follow the examples of Gandhi, or Mandela, or King? What if we had taken a hundred billion of what we have wasted, and instead spent it for schools, hospitals and social services all over the Middle East, in the name of, and in memorial to the 3,000 souls lost on 9/11? How about if we had spent another hundred billion for universal healthcare and a free college education for every American? Lastly, it would have cost us only a fraction of the remaining money to catch the perpetrators of 9/11 and bring them to justice, as the Clinton administration did to those who attacked the World Trade Towers in 1993. What was left could then have been spent on alternative energy sources to free us from dependency on fossil fuels, particularly from the Middle East. So much goodwill has been lost, so much money has been squandered, and five years later we are further from winning the 'war on terror', than on 9/12/01.

The Hubris of Supremacy

In listening to the talking heads on the various talk shows today, whether they were on the left or right, they all missed talking about the supremacist component of our occupation of Iraq in response to the attack on 9/11. Instead of talking about the immorality and illegality of preemptively attacking another sovereign country who had not attacked us, they all were talking as if our attacks were justified, but so far, unsuccessful due to a lack of sufficient troops sent in to fight. Why are we so caviler about our aggression in the Middle East? Is this another manifestation of 'manifest destiny' or 'conquest for oil and empire' or 'he who has the most bombs, gets to rule'? Are not the feelings and the sensitivities of these 'darker' more ancient cultures, worth considering and respecting? Would we not have resisted with all our might, if we had been similarly attacked and occupied by them? Is our military supremacy the free ticket to steal and control the resources of the rest of the world? Given the all-out invasion, insurgency and resistance which has resulted in the tremendous toll of death and destruction in Iraq, are we now sorry that we violated the golden rule of "doing unto others as we would have them do unto us"? Are we so deluded with our 'whiteness and rightness' that we could imagine we would be greeted as liberators and saviours by the Iraqis?
On the anniversary of 9/11, what lessons have we learned these past five years - or, have we learned NOTHING at all? I say we have learned nothin at all !
On yesterday, in a TV interview, V.P. Chaney said, that not only was the Iraq invasion the right thing to do, "if we had to do it over again, we'd do exactly the same thing"......... I rest my case!