Saturday, February 5, 2011

THE ENEMY OF MY ENEMY...

Since the end of World War II, the foreign policy of the United States differed little from that of the Soviet Union. Despite radically different national principles, we talked about freedom and democracy while they had little interest in civil liberties; both nations sought out and supported any dictator and oppressive regime willing to align with them. We wanted freedom and liberty within this country, but showed passing interest in establishing it in a good portion of the rest of the world. We have an unerring record on picking sides. We have always been wrong.

The United States consistently supported oligarchies, military rulers, family dynasties and showed little to no interest in what the people of a given country were concerned about, nor did we concern ourselves with their freedom to determine their own destiny. We supported immoral, corrupt, evil national leaders and justified it with the old line, "...the enemy of my enemy is my friend." We also liked, "...he may be a son of a bitch but at least he is our son of a bitch." The end result has been disaster after disaster and years of unnecessary hatred and enmity directed at this country by people victimized by our neglect.

The current crisis in Egypt is a classic example of this failed policy. For 30 years, we have sent hundreds of billions of tax dollars to Hosni Mubarek because he has kept Egypt "stable". Stable meant he would pretend to be an honest broker between Israel and the Palestinians. Stable meant he would fight extreme forms of Islam while at the same time using the Arab press to demonize and vilify both Israel and the United States and allowing some of the most virulent anti-Semitism to be spread throughout the region. The price of this stability was the steady, crushing, repression of his own people, the reality is America was seen invading Moslem nations to "spread democracy" while spending billions propping up dictator after dictator. We armed these same despots with American weapons, not for defense, but to control their own populations and make a nice buck for the military industrial complex. So, now the United States sits and watches the people of Egypt and Tunisia rise up against their corrupt oppressors faced with a Hobson's choice. Do we support democracy and the overthrow of our "friends" knowing it will wreck our shaky credibility with other Arab regimes? If we side with the people, it is possible any new leadership could be much more anti American, not interested in our need for stability or our security needs.

The list of wrong choices made by Democratic and Republican presidents is long and the results consistent. We knew Chiang Kai-shek was corrupt, represented the rich elite and was hated by the people, we propped him up anyway paving the way for Mao's sweep to power. We backed Bautista in Cuba opening the door to Castro. When the Iranian people democratically elected a leader, the CIA overthrew him paving the way for the Shah and eventually the rise of the Ayatollah. We back Franco in Spain and the military junta in Greece. The Vietnamese fought for independence from the French and won in 1954 only to see the United States step in and support a corrupt and repressive government. Ho Chi Minh was ours for the taking in the early fifties and the disaster that became the Viet Nam war was totally unnecessary. Few national leaders were more corrupt than Ferdinand Marcos, yet he was our guy and at the same time Reagan, Cheney and the rest attacked Nelson Mandela as a terrorist and supported the corrupt and morally bankrupt system of apartheid in South Africa. In the Congo, the CIA assassinated Patrice Lumumba condemning that nation to 50 years of terror, repression and death. In Chile, we arranged for the fall of Salvador Allende replacing him with Augusto Pinochet who murdered tens of thousands of his people to maintain control. Papa Doc and Baby Doc Duvalier ransacked Haiti and enjoyed support in Washington. We backed Somoza in Nicaragua making it easy for the Sandinistas to rise to power. In El Salvador, over 70,000 people died in a civil war we financed, killed by the government we supported, in order to keep in power a political party, the Arena party, who killed and tortured nuns, priests and assassinated Archbishop Oscar Romero while he was saying Mass. The reality the rest of the world knows is fighting for freedom and democracy will rarely get you the support of the United States. Fight to protect the elite business and moneyed interests against the average citizen and we will rush to your aid. The people of Egypt know the key roll we played in keeping Mubarak in power and how we have looked the other way for 30 years as he crushed his own people. Now, we are worried what will happen if he goes. Talk about the barn door being closed after the horse has gotten out.

The very existence of Al Qaeda can be directly linked to American support for the repressive and corrupt regimes in Egypt and Saudi Arabia. The appeal of extreme fundamentalist Islam is linked to the poverty in these countries, the lack of jobs and economic progress and the knowledge the United States is responsible for keeping people like Mubarak in power. Our policies have led to direct threats against Americans in this country even as we justified supporting dictators because the stability was good for American security. Even when someone does what we want we turn it into something that further erodes our credibility. We called on the Palestinians to have free and fair elections, but when Hamas won, we immediately refused to recognize the results and poured money into Fatah's coffers igniting a civil war in the territories.

I have been listening to regressive talk radio and reading op-eds in the corporate media bemoaning our lack of support for Mubarak. If we had just stuck by the Shah in Iran, there would have been no Islamic revolution and no rise of fundamentalist Islam. They raise the specter of a similar occurrence in Egypt. We should continue this history of disastrous foreign policy and side with Mubarak no matter what he has to do to wipe out his opposition and ride out the storm. The hypocrisy is extraordinary and the result would be to destroy what little credibility America might have left in the region. Hanbaugh and the Weiner and the rest also seem to be more concerned about Israel's security than they are our principles. This cold war policy has resulted in anti-American movements all over the world and yet they still cling to it like Linus to his blanket.

Is it possible things could be worse under a new government than they are now under Mubarak? Yes. The Muslim Brotherhood could seize power and try to impose an Iranian-style Islamic nation on Egypt. Even if they don't, the new government could be more sympathetic to Iran and less willing to do US bidding and Israel could find itself with a much less secure border situation. Goods could flow more easily into Gaza, and Egypt could shift into being an advocate for the Palestinians. Any of these scenarios is possible and the United States will find its influence diminished because we have so little cache left in the region. We supported and support oppression in the name of our national interest despite its effect on the people and their dreams and aspirations and every time we do we come out with the short end of the stick. Stay tuned.

3 comments:

  1. I agree wholeheartedly with Bernie, yet don't know whom to support, or even what to say. Suggestions, please?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Carole, you ask important questions.
    Whom to support? What to say?

    It is important to re-read Bernie's paragraphs about the his-story of a foreign policy that maintains in power repressive regimes on every continent ["Tomorrow the Antarctica!"].

    Let me share with you part of an article in today's issue of Consortium News on the matter of what Ronald Reagan REALLY accomplished.
    So without further adieu, here 'tis:
    ...
    After all, the true measure of a president shouldn’t be his style or how he made us feel but rather what he did with his extraordinary power, what were the consequences for real people, either for good or ill.

    Yet, even as the United States celebrates Reagan’s centennial birthday and lavishes praise on his supposed accomplishments, very little time has been spent reflecting on the unnecessary bloodbaths that Reagan enabled in many parts of the world.

    Those grisly deaths and ugly tortures get whisked away as if they were just small necessities in Reagan’s larger success “winning the Cold War” – even though the competition between the United States and the Soviet Union was already winding down before Reagan arrived on the national scene.
    [See Consortiumnews.com’s “Reagan’s ‘Tear Down This Wall’ Myth.”]

    Yet, Reagan’s Cold War obsessions helped unleash right-wing “death squads” and murderous militaries on the common people in many parts of the Third World, but nowhere worse than in Latin America.
    ____________________________
    Learning Coach here. Just let me add that the same policies that worked in Latin America also worked in the nations of the Middle East.
    The strategy was identical: American Monopolies Win. The TACTICS differed.
    For more on this, please see John Perkins: CONFESSIONS OF AN ECONOMIC HIT MAN.

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  3. Now for my reply to Carole’s two questions:

    Carole, so follow the links and inform yourself well. Then go out and use your own words to let everyone close to you know. You will be surprised how many of them already suspect the truth about what WE are doing to others everywhere in the world.

    After all, weren’t we brought up with an Article of Faith to the effect that our country is always right and making sure that God’s Will is Being Done on Earth as it is in Heaven?
    So how dare you hold for a minute any Possibility that would negate that?

    People like Van Jones need to lose their jobs in programs like Green Jobs because he had the audacity / foolishness to sign a Petition [back in 2004] asking for a reopening of the 9/11 cOmmission.
    [Fascinating that exercise of the Right to petition the government causes the government to fire you -- even tho you are the best one around to lead the country in the direction of green jobs ... but that is unimportant, of course, because you aligned yourself once with those terrorist-types we call 911 troothers by signing their _____ Petition!!!]

    I mean , really , false flag events were done by Adolf Hitler and other very terrible people.
    Right?
    RIGHT???

    So you see, Carole, we are up against a ton of mind control. I got a lot out of Steven Jacobson’s work at www.mindcontrolinamerica.com and recommend you go there. I bought his two CDs and found them valuable, worth sharing with others … especially with people who are unable to look at evidence objectively.

    My chiropractor, a Vietnam veteran, when I opened the matter of 9/11, told me: "I know it couldn’t have happened the way they said it did. I know who really did it.”

    No, he didn’t say Who, and that is OK, because the first step is to look at what really happened. After that, we’ll take on the other questions!
    In the beginning, all those other questions are simply a blanket for Linus to cling to, lest he have to look at the evidence of sight and sound and feeling (of explosions).
    That Linus blanket bit is a good metaphor, Bernie!

    Carole, let me refer you to some other resources:
    www.wanttoknow.info and join PEERS there and click on everything!

    Deanna's website: www.spingola.com

    Join me and communicate back and forth with the people in one of the groups I started: yeshallknowthetruth@googlegroups.com
    To find us, search google groups, and there search yeshallknowthetruth.
    Type that word again; makes the fingers feel good ... yeshallknowthetruth
    has a rhythm to it

    ReplyDelete