The Great Wars of the American Empire: The Philippine Mamasapano ‘Operation Exodus’ Debacle

This post by retired Professor Michael Rozeff at the Lew Rockwell looks very relevant applied to the Philippines today: (bold mine)

Looking at a map of current American military engagements overseas, one cannot help but notice their wide geographical spread and their seemingly interminable nature. Battles have raged in Europe (Yugoslavia and Ukraine), in Africa, in the Middle East, and in central Asia. The American Empire has launched this country into a series of battles that have no end in sight and no location that may not become a focal point of military force. These battles, each a war in its own right, have drawn in forces and resources from U.S. allies in Europe through NATO and even drawn in Japan. The scope of this war is global. In fact, one part of this war has been called the Global War on Terror. To understand this war and grasp its meaning, in the hope of bringing it to an end, a descriptive name is needed that tells us what this war is about. The name suggested here is the “Great War of the American Empire”. Since World War I, another disastrous war that American joined, is called the Great War, we can refer to the Great War of the American Empire also as Great War II.

Great War II comprises a number of sub-wars. The American Empire is the common element and the most important driver in all the sub-wars mentioned below. American involvement has never been necessary in these sub-wars, but the decisions to make them America’s business have come from the Empire’s leaders. The name “Great War of the American Empire” emphasizes the continuity of all the sub-wars to produce one Great War, and the responsibility of the American Empire in choosing to participate in and create this Great War. Had America’s leaders chosen the radically different path of non-intervention and true defense of this continent, rather than overseas interventions, Great War II would not have occurred and not still be occurring.

The Great War of the American Empire began 25 years ago. It began on August 2, 1990 with the Gulf War against Iraq and continues to the present. Earlier wars involving Israel and America sowed the seeds of this Great War. So did American involvements in Iran, the 1977-1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran, and the Iran-Iraq War (1980-1988). Even earlier American actions also set the stage, such as the recognition of Israel, the protection of Saudi Arabia as an oil supplier, the 1949 CIA involvement in the coup in Syria, and the American involvement in Lebanon in 1958. Poor (hostile) relations between the U.S. and Libya (1979-1986) also contributed to a major sub-war in what has turned out to be the Great War of the American Empire.

The inception of Great War II may, if one likes, be moved back to 1988 and 1989 without objection because those years also saw the American Empire coming into its own in the invasion of Panama to dislodge Noriega, operations in South America associated with the war on drugs, and an operation in the Philippines to protect the Aquino government. Turmoil in the Soviet Union was already being reflected in a more military-oriented foreign policy of the U.S.

Following the Gulf War, the U.S. government engages America and Americans non-stop in one substantial military operation or war after another. In the 1990s, these include Iraq no-fly zones, Somalia, Bosnia, Macedonia, Haiti, Zaire, Sierra Leone, Central African Republic, Liberia, Albania, Afghanistan, Sudan, and Serbia. In the 2000s, the Empire begins wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya, and gets into serious military engagements in Yemen, Pakistan, and Syria. It has numerous other smaller military missions in Uganda, Jordan, Turkey, Chad, Mali, and Somalia. Some of these sub-wars and situations of involvement wax and wane and wax again. The latest occasion of American Empire intervention is Ukraine where, among other things, the U.S. military is slated to be training Ukrainian soldiers.

Terror and terrorism are invoked to rationalize some operations. Vague threats to national security are mentioned for others. Protection of Americans and American interests sometimes is made into a rationale. Terrorism and drugs are sometimes linked, and sometimes drug interdiction alone is used to justify an action that becomes part of the Great War of the American Empire. On several occasions, war has been justified because of purported ethnic cleansing or supposed mass killings directed by or threatened by a government.

Upon close inspection, all of these rationales fall apart. None is satisfactory. The interventions are too widespread, too long-lasting and too unsuccessful at what they supposedly accomplish to lend support to any of the common justifications. Is “good” being done when it involves endless killing, frequently of innocent bystanders, that elicits more and more anti-American sentiment from those on the receiving end who see Americans as invaders? Has the Great War II accomplished even one of its supposed objectives?

The Great War of the American Empire encompasses several sub-wars, continual warfare, continual excuses for continual warfare, and continual military engagements that promise Americans more of the same indefinitely. There is a web site called “The Long War Journal”that catalogs events all over the globe that are part of the Great War II, what the site calls the Long War. This site is a project of the “Foundation for Defense of Democracies”, which is a neocon organization that is promoting the Great War of the American Empire.

What they see, and accurately see, as a Long War is a portion of what is here called the Great War of the American Empire. The difference is that all the interventions and sub-wars of the past 25 years and all the military outposts of the U.S. government that provide the seeds of future wars and interventions are included in the Great War II. They all spring from the same source, even though each one has a different specific character.

"Several sub-wars, continual warfare, continual excuses for continual warfare, and continual military engagements…" For “the latest occasion of American Empire intervention” Professor Rozeff should now include the Philippines.

In 2012 I posted here of a US drone strike against supposed domestic  terrorists that cost many civilian lives. The event had been sparsely covered by international media and appears to have existed in a vacuum in domestic media.

Apparently that has been an appetizer for things to come…

The latest fiasco from the anti terrorism operations conducted  by the Philippine government at Mamasapano Maguindanao last January 25, which claimed lives of 44 government SAF (Special Action Force) at least 18 from the Moro International Liberation Front (MILF), 5 from the Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters  and several civilians, appears to have the US government’s imperial fingerprints all over it.

And many of these accounts have been been covered by both domestic and international media.

Drones had reportedly been active during the pre-operations surveillance “Drones ‘twinkled at night’” (Inquirer) and during the operations: “US drone watched Mamasapano debacle” (Inquirer). 

Malaysian bomb expert Zulkifli Abdhir or nicknamed “Marwan”, one of the targets of the operations, reportedly wrote to his brother via email, just prior to his death, to detail on the US involvement in the campaign against Muslim rebels by the use of Orion spy planes and Predator drones (Philstar/MSN)

There was even reports that an American had been killed during the operations but has been (naturally) denied by the US embassy (Rappler). 

Low intensity operations-conflicts (LICs) are frequently considered “classified information”, thus will be denied…until exposed or declassified after several years.

Curiously, headlines over the past few days has been buzzing with accounts of direct US government involvement in Philippine affairs. 

A Philippine politician reported of ‘secret embassy cables’ that was exposed by Wikileaks in 2010 of how the US government had funded and planned counterterrorism measures in the south that may have led to the clash (Philstar)

Yesterday’s headlines showed that based on testimony of an insider or an anonymous SAF officer, who reportedly said “Americans dictated every move”, the US was behind Oplan Exodus (Inquirer).

Today’s headlines shows that there have been ‘8 Americans sighted monitoring Oplan Exodus’ (Inquirer) where American officials monitored the execution of plan that went awry.

This reminds me of the infamous Bay of Pigs. The Bay of Pigs operations according to wikipedia.org was “a failed military invasion of Cuba undertaken by the CIA-sponsored paramilitary group Brigade 2506 on 17 April 1961.  A counter-revolutionary military, trained and funded by the United States government's Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Brigade 2506 fronted the armed wing of the Democratic Revolutionary Front (DRF) and intended to overthrow the Communist government of Fidel Castro. Launched from Guatemala, the invading force was defeated within three days by the Cuban armed forces, under the direct command of Prime Minister of Cuba Fidel Castro.”

The modern day equivalent of the CIA-sponsored paramilitary group then has been the Philippine SAF. Instead of an invasion in the name of anti-communism then, today has been about assassinations in the name of war on terror. 

The Bay of Pigs was initially denied by officials (History Channel) but later admitted to by the late US President John F Kennedy (JFK). Eventually chain of events from the Bay of Pigs led to the assassination of JFK

Back to the Mamasapano blunder.

Has this been the quid pro quo from all the credit rating upgrades the Philippine government has received from the US credit ratings?  For the Philippine government to fight the American empire's ‘Great Wars’ here, as a vassal state and or as proxy?

You see credit ratings has embedded political colors too.

For instance, the US government’s economic sanctions against Russia (due to their Ukraine standoff) has indirectly incited downgrades on Russia’s debt by the major western credit ratings. Reasons for downgrades seems founded on infirm grounds according to Sprott Money analysis. So having interpreted political dimension for such actions, in response, the governments of China and Russia have been working to establish their own credit rating agencies to rival or to counter the western peers (Reuters, RT.com)

In other words, in today's financialization of the global economy, credit ratings can serve as instruments of political control (carrot and stick) or even psychological warfare

What seems as, hasn’t been what really is. 

These are just examples of possible asymmetric non-linear linkages in a complex world.

Very interesting developments.

Geopolitical Risk Theater Links: Russian Bombers Threaten Guam, ISIS Success Story?, Japan’s War Hawks, the Ukraine Freedom Support Act and more…

1 It’s a bird. It’s a plane. It’s a UFO? Or has it been a Russian military experiment? Watch mystery explosion that lit up Russian night sky - but nobody knows what caused it Mirror.co.uk November 19, 2014

2 Like stocks, ISIS bullish momentum keeps going: Report: ISIS Takes Control of a Libyan City Time.com November 19, 2014

3 Like stocks, could the bandwagon effect be the secret formula behind the ISIS successful streak? : Why ISIS is spreading across Muslim world CNN.com November 19, 2014

4 Potential peace between US-Iran? : 5 DETAILS TO BE WORKED OUT BY NOV. 24 DEADLINE FOR IRAN NUCLEAR TALKS Wall Street Journal November 19, 2014

5 Doubling down on policy errors: Abenomics PLUS brinkmanship politics;

a) Japan’s War Hawks And Imperial Apologists Are Antagonizing Everyone; Japan's war hawks and imperial apologists are alienating the country’s allies and making a confrontation with its rivals more likely. Foreign Policy in Focus Business Insider November 19, 2014

b) Japan's Military Is Revving Up To Meet China's Growing Regional Ambitions Business Insider November 19, 2014

For a long time, Japan's military force was an exercise in contradiction. The country has ranked among the world's top military spenders, at almost $50 billion in 2013 — despite a constitution that explicitly forbids war (and even the maintenance of "land, sea, and air forces").

But in July, the cabinet of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe approved a reinterpretation of the pacifist clause called Article 9.

Without changing the constitution's wording, Abe made clear that Japan intended to step up its military prerogative in the region, allowing it to come to the aid of an attacked ally, for instance.

The country spends the equivalent of 1% of its GDP on defense, a figure that could grow after a decade of flat-lining; last year Abe's cabinet approved a five-year spending plan on a laundry list of military hardware: Three surveillance drones, stealth aircraft, 52 amphibious troop carriers, 28 next-generation fighter planes (the F-35) and 17 Osprey aircraft units.

The total expenditure from the plan is estimated to reach $232 billion to $240 billion.

Poor Japanese taxpayers, yen holders and uniformed pawns. If a regional war materializes, poor Asians. :(

6 Soliciting for money the geopolitical way: North Korea Is Making New Threats Aimed At The US Business Insider November 19, 2014

7 Reading current performance into the future? Why China won't be Asia's dominant power CNBC.com November 19, 2014

China may be Asia's economic powerhouse but it won't become the region's dominant power, according to a new report.

"In examining the factors that go towards the development of Chinese national power-and its ability to use it to achieve national objectives-predictions about a Chinese superpower with the ability to dominate Asia would be premature, if not improbable," said Paul Dibb and John Lee, authors of the report published by Australian think tank Kokoda Foundation.

The argument that China is already Asia's pre-eminent power based on its growing economic and military capacities is weak, the authors say. They expect the limitations of China's economic might, a lack of close bilateral relationships and weak military capability to keep the country from becoming an advanced political-economy that wields influence in the region anytime soon.

How about financing? After all, military might depends on resources.

8 More arms flexing by Putin: Russian Bombers Threaten Guam Four Tu-95 Bears circumnavigate Pacific island, site of major U.S. base Freebeacon.com November 19, 2014

9 During the latest US inspired revolt in Ukraine, who took the Ukraine government’s gold? Ukraine Admits Its Gold Is Gone: "There Is Almost No Gold Left In The Central Bank Vault" Zero Hedge November 18, 2014

10 Russia’s Putin attempts to defuse strains with the US; Putin: Mutual respect, non-interference will improve relations with US RT.com November 19, 2014 (italics original)

Putin said that Russia and the US share responsibility for ensuring safety and stability around the globe, and reiterated that Moscow was willing to work with the US following strained relations between the two countries.

Underlining the importance of the two countries’ roles around the world, Putin said, “Russia and the US have a particular responsibility to support safety and stability in the world and to counter global challenges and threats,” according to a transcript of his remarks reported by RIA Novosti.

11 With neocons back in power, so has the risk of World War III been raised. An evolving legal tit for tat by US-Russia on Ukraine that could send both parties to war.

a) Michael Rozeff Ukraine Freedom Support Act of 2014 Lew Rockwell Blog November 19, 2014

Writes Mr. Rozeff (bold mine)

This proposed act is here. Its current co-sponsors are here. Among other provisions that sanction Russia, this Act commits America to reestablish the territorial integrity of Ukraine by providing advanced weapons to Ukraine’s government. This sets America against Russia, which supports Crimea as a Russian federal district. Russia also respects the eastern Ukraine Donbass republics whereas the U.S. does not. 

The U.S. already has committed America to Ukraine in substantial ways. 

A few days ago, President Poroshenko of Ukraine said 

“We are prepared for a scenario of total war… We don’t want war, we want peace and we are fighting for European values. But Russia does not respect any agreement.” 

The proposed legislation deepens the American commitment to Ukraine. It places America a significant step closer to direct confrontation with Russia. It places advanced weapons in the hands of a government that has attacked its own people and whose current leader is more than willing to conduct a “total war”. He sees the earlier fighting in Donbass as a prelude and warmup. He tells us that he has in mind a much deeper and more destructive application of force. The bill before Congress proposes to support him.

b) Michael Rozeff U.S. Is Creating A New Enemy: Russia Lew Rockwell Blog November 19, 2014

The Russian response, writes Mr. Rozeff (bold mine)

Russia will soon publish a revamped military doctrine. Rumor has it that the U.S. and NATO will be designated as threats or adversaries or enemies. This speculation is bolstered by the statements of a senior Russian Defense Ministry General.

Even without an official document having yet been published, we can say now that the U.S. and NATO policies, especially as they have transpired over Ukraine, have caused this hardening of the Russian position. The U.S. is creating a new enemy: Russia. This is purposeful. Only a big enemy like Russia can get Americans to accept the costs of the American military levied upon them. Only a big enemy like Russia can be used to justify a big military establishment. The war on terror no longer provides enough of a justification for a people tired of such losing propositions.

Although Obama conceives that he is in the right over Ukraine and Russia in the wrong, and although he conceives of sanctions as justifiable and measured, he has still nonetheless made Russia into an enemy. Russia is responding in kind. Obama’s sanctions came along with strong NATO rhetoric and a history of broken promises or betrayed understandings about the expansion of NATO. What Obama has done didn’t occur in a vacuum. The anti-Russian policy stance goes back to the end of the Cold War. If Obama wanted a friendly or cooperative Russia, he certainly didn’t achieve it.

13 Chart of the day: from Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative-Center for Strategic and International Studies AMTI.CSIS.org

Michael Rozeff: US Implements the Wolfowitz Doctrine

Retired Professor and author Michael Rozeff on the undeclared "Wolfowitz Doctrine" as blueprint to US imperial foreign policy.

From the Lew Rockwell Blog (bold mine)

The U.S. is implementing the Wolfowitz Doctrine. It aims to maintain the U.S. as the sole superpower and to preclude any regional powers. It wants no rivals such as Russia, Iran and China. This agenda is primary for the U.S. Other purported goals of foreign policy such as anti-terrorism, furthering democracy, advancing human rights, and the self-determination of peoples are useful only insofar as they advance the superpower status of the U.S. and the elimination of rivals. Whenever the Wolfowitz Doctrine can be implemented by sacrificing anti-terrorism, democracy, human rights and self-determination, the U.S. does not hesitate to sacrifice them. This is why the U.S. appears to be so hypocritical.

Here is an example out of today’s news. The U.S. condemns separatism in Ukraine and aids Kiev in attacking its own people with heavy and advanced weapons of all kinds. This is because the superpower agenda is served by steering Ukraine into the Western camp. At the very same time, the U.S. condemns China for indicting a professor who is a vocal separatist and critical of Chinese policy in Xinjiang. Hence, we observe the U.S. against separatism in Ukraine but supporting it in China. This is because the U.S. is applying pressure on China wherever it thinks this will succeed in diminishing China as a power. If China has to contend with breakaway movements, the U.S. agenda is advanced.

Numerous other instances of U.S. hypocrisy can be understood in this way. The U.S. will support democracy but then ignore elections and support dictators. It will bemoan the deaths of children in some instances but support their being killed in others. It will condemn interfering in domestic politics in some countries but approve of it in other instances. It will condemn terrorism and then arm terrorists. This is because the overriding agenda is the Wolfowitz Doctrine.

The U.S. supplies the Israeli military with aid and ammunition so as to maintain Israel in the region and prevent regional powers like Iran from growing in strength. When Israel attacks Gaza, the U.S. approves a certain amount of death and destruction. However, if Israel’s killing becomes so excessive that it promises to cause a backlash that weakens Israel or gives rise to an anti-Israel movement that is more radical than Hamas, then the U.S. will switch and disapprove of Israel’s attack and seek to stop it. The criterion being used is that of the supremacy of U.S. power in a worldwide game of power.

This is not to say that the different divisions in Washington are united in this goal or united in how to play this game. It’s not to say that the Wolfowitz Doctrine is sensible. It’s not to say that important leaders are playing this game effectively. In most instances, they are playing it foolishly, rashly, dangerously and in a very costly way that results in diminishing U.S. power. This exclusive superpower goal and game generally reduces American well-being in numerous ways. From that standpoint, the Wolfowitz Doctrine is deeply flawed.

Daniel Adams also at the Lew Rockwell Blog also reveals that the US government just gave a green light to the Israeli government for the use armaments from a US government owned US $ 1 billion cache or “War Reserves Stocks Allies-Israel (WRSA-I) in the ghastly war with the Hamas at the Gaza. Reportedly 80% of the fatalities have been civilians as the military industrial complex benefits from sale of arms.

Sad to see how political (and politically based economic) greed has led to senseless slaughter of innocent lives.

Quote of the Day: Why Was Iran Named in Bush’s Axis of Evil?

Washington included Iran in the axis of evil because Iran had the audacity, and to Washington the impudence and gall, to have a revolution that threw out Washington’s hand-picked ruler of Iran. Iran defied Washington. It sought to be its own power and to have its independence. It withdrew from Washington’s orbit of control. Iran sought to have its own policies. It was Iran’s defiance that Bush could not forget or forgive, because that was a direct challenge to the boss of all bosses, to the number one man. Washington’s the top dog and it has to show it’s the top dog. It can’t let some upstart country challenge it. And in the years following its 1979 revolution, Iran mounted some definite challenges to Washington’s blueprint for it and for the Middle East.

Every item in the Frontline list, be it real or imagined, important or unimportant in and of itself, represents a challenge to Washington’s power and view of the world. Every item is therefore an act of defiance as Washington sees and experiences it. This is why Bush included Iran in his axis of evil.

Washington hates defiance. This explains much of its behavior such as with respect to Assange, Manning, Snowden, whistleblowers, journalists, and others.

This is from retired finance and economic professor Michael S. Rozeff at the Lew Rockwell Blog

Quote of the Day: The ISIS as evidence to theories of the state’s origins

How does ISIS spend the money it collects? This too sheds light on how a state embeds itself with a population and creates its own particular equation of sources and uses of funds. Every state (and organization of any kind) by definition has this equation: sources of funds = uses of funds.

“‘It’s assumed that ISIS pays the foreign fighters in its ranks, but perhaps it pays all its troops,’ according to Charles Lister. ‘In the areas under ISIS control, the organization subsidizes bread, water, and fuel, and also finances the maintenance and operation of basic public services. All that costs money.’”

ISIS has three main uses of funds: military + goods to the population + support of government administration. The “population goods” keep its subjects quiet. The military provides the force and threat to be able to extract the taxes and other resources from looting. The support of government pays for the government officials, tax collectors and bureaucracies. Every state, not only ISIS, is the same. The equation, in simplified terms as exemplified by ISIS, looks like this:

TAXES = MILITARY SPENDING + GOODS TO THE POPULATION + GOVERNMENT ADMINISTRATION

(TAXES includes all forms of looting, and I’ve omitted charitable giving as a source because it is typically not a continuing major source for states. It can be a significant startup source.)

Since taxes are necessarily higher than goods returned to the population, the subjects of any state continually incur a loss. They supply the funds that go to the military that keeps them under the rule of the state. That and the resources that go to government administration are a deadweight monetary loss. (There are other losses. There is a loss in utility or happiness because the taxes do not go to goods that the citizens want. There are losses from the disincentive effects of taxes and government rules.)

ISIS, now a proto-state and seeking to become a state, began in violence and conquest. This is how states begin according to Franz Oppenheimer and Albert Jay Nock, among others. ISIS provides further evidence consistent with their theories of the state’s origins.

This excerpt is from former economics and finance Professor Michael S. Rozeff at the lewrockwell Blog

Quote of the Day: Individual Freedom versus Democracy

The democratic process allows people certain freedoms. People do not have freedom to start with. But because people are allowed certain freedoms by the collective process, they think they are free by the individual freedom process of free association. This is not so. That it is not so is evident by the fact that the collective decision-making process takes away freedoms and gives freedoms; and the individual has no say over this except through the voting process. The other road to confusion is historical. The system used to be one of relatively large individual freedom and the scope of collective decision-making was limited constitutionally and by habit, custom and practice. The mythology grew up that the system was one of individual freedom, since voting played so small a role in decisions being made. As time passed and the democratic collectivism became entrenched, people kept right on thinking they had the system of individual freedom, which by then was long gone. And since they possessed a number of what are called personal freedoms still allowed by the collective they thought they still had individual freedom. But they didn’t because the collective had amassed so much power to make laws that any of these freedoms was at the will of the elected representatives, not individual freedoms arising from a system of free association.

To understand the actual system we live by, we cannot start with the set of our observed freedoms and then infer the system’s type. We can’t do this because under both systems, there may be a substantial amount of freedom left in individual hands. Instead, we have to inquire as to the origins of what freedoms we have, that is, the kind of legal system we have, who has the ultimate decision rights, who decides on the freedoms and whether or not we have freedom of association. Freedom of association distinguishes the system of individual freedom from a collective system like democracy or any comparable system of state. If freedoms are decided by individuals, that is not the same as their being decided by voting, which is a collective process. In addition, voting is by citizens many of whom are involuntarily bound into a state, so that the process itself, not only its outcomes, is collective and forcible.

This is from retired finance and economic professor Michael S. Rozeff at the LewRockwell.com

Quote of the Day: State democracy is a limited monopolistic democracy

Today's democracy is a qualified democracy. Let us call it "state democracy". It is a democracy entirely linked to and emanating from the concept of a single state as the sole sovereign political unit. All the rights just mentioned have to do with the "citizen" of a state and a political system equated with that state and its machinery. A citizen is not a person with free choice of a social-political-legal system. A citizen is a designation of a state-limited and state-defined set of rights that each person finds he has, whether he likes it or not…

State democracy is based on the principle of state sovereignty. The state’s power prevails. The citizens as a group and linked by particular political arrangements are associated with this sovereignty. Whatever the basis of this sovereignty is, nothing can stand in its way when a law or rule is formulated, passed and enforced. There is no check and balance from outside the system. One can only exercise the limited rights of protest, voting, moving and running for office that the state allows. State democracy is a limited democracy. It is a monopolistic democracy.

The incentive for individuals living in state democracy is to gain control over the machinery of government and to use it to one’s personal advantage by forming coalitions that pass laws that one wants

This is from retired finance pofessor Michael Rozeff at the lewrockwell.com

Quote of the Day: The Idea of a Strong Man Rule

The IDEA of a STRONG MAN, a czar and a dictator, appeals to many people, and this directly supports the STATE. Those people who become disenchanted with democracy or with Congress or with partisan politics and debates, and of course the potential czars and dictators, like this idea. Add this notion to the other supports, such as the "public good", "nationalism", and the communistic ideas that are in the Communist Manifesto and have already been enacted into law. The strong man concept might be invoked as an independent means of efficient government, or else as a support to the nation, or society, or the people, or the public good, i.e., as a complementary means to these. However the strong man idea is evoked, it too invades susceptible minds. This leads directly into the virus of STATISM and the STATE.

This is from Professor Michael Rozeff at the Lewrockwell.com. 

Populist state worship or what Mises would call Statolatry frequently leads to dictatorship, which eventually backfires.

The Philippines has been no stranger to this.

Quote of the Day: End the Empire

The empire has put in place the pseudo-legal "laws" that it needs to repress dissidents within America. It will use these "laws" and executive orders in order to quell restiveness and resistance among Americans. The reason for the domestic suppression is because the empire cannot expand overseas if its domestic population is not under firm control. The driving force in domestic suppression is the goal of world empire. This is why lovers and supporters of liberty should strongly condemn all of the many U.S. actions to expand empire.

The idea that I've just expressed is not widely known, much less accepted. So I'll repeat it again. The U.S. wants a world empire and is actively trying to achieve that aim. That's its number one priority. In order to achieve that, it needs a cooperative, compliant, and productive population and one that does not resist that aim. That is why the government has been putting measures in place that are repressive and destroy judicial rights.

According to an Iranian analyst who specializes in Russia, the Russians now understand what the U.S. is after. It has taken them a while for this to penetrate. He writes of the Russians

"Russian analysts maintain that the current foreign policy of the United States is based on two theories: 'ultimate realism,' and 'new liberalism.' As a result, the Americans actually believe that world countries are simply divided into the United States’ friends and enemies. Hostile countries, therefore, should be weakened and their presence in global and regional strategic arenas should be limited and even suppressed in political, economic and cultural terms.

"The new liberalism also claims that all wars break out between non-democratic states. Therefore, all countries should go through an American style democratization process and if needed, military means such as preventive war, can be used to achieve that purpose.

"As a result of the above arguments, Russia believes that the current political developments in the Middle East and North Africa are steered by the United States. Moscow firmly believes that a new wave of the world order has been initiated by the United States in order to create a new version of the past unipolar world system. The main targets of this wave, Moscow maintains, include North Africa, the Middle East, Iran, Eurasia, and finally China and Russia."

This is from Michael S. Rozeff at the Lew Rockwell Blog

Quote of the Day: Failed and Failing States

Professor Michael S. Rozeff at the lewrockwell.com writes,

I like to use the ammunition provided by the statists themselves (or those who take states for granted) that discredits their own statism. For example, there is the "Failed States Index".

How many states are there in the world, and how many are failures or leaning toward failure, according to the people who devised this index? They assess 177 states. Of these, 124 are in the troubled categories (ALERT and WARNING). That's 70 percent! Here we have a great experiment at one point in time. We have 177 trials of the state as a way to organize, and we have 124 failed or failing or approaching failure. Among the Moderate and Sustainable categories (non-failed states) we have such wonderful states as Greece and Spain.

If instead we look at the performance of states across time, a century or two, we find huge and endemic failures almost everywhere we look in major countries: Russia, Japan, Germany, Italy, France, China, many eastern European countries, and even the United States (if we count, for example, the civil war as evidence of a gigantic failure). The U.S. has held together by force, not law. Is that what a non-failed state is supposed to mean? Many European states have failed time and again, as several world wars and hyperinflations demonstrate. Their current financial manipulations are new evidence of their failure, as are their high rates of unemployment.

70% of the world nations are considered as at the risk of becoming a ‘failed state’. That’s a great measure of political success.

Prof. Rozeff rightly points out that the today’s crisis affected EU nations have been categorized as moderate (non-failed states) which has not accurately reflect been on the failed state index (as this was based on 2011)

Yet, the increasingly dysfunctional political institutions of Greece would almost qualify her as a ‘failed state’.

As I recently wrote,

Instead, what a “failed state” means is that there is no standing government or that imposed government will mostly likely be ignored by society or what could be called “stateless society”.

I am not sure if Greece will technically become a failed state.

What is certain is that we are witnessing the accelerating collapse of a parasitical relationship anchored upon the spendthrift welfare and bureaucratic state.

Nonetheless this should be good news as Greece’s political economy would be compelled by nature to face economic realities; regardless of the outcome of today’s elections.

Oh by the way, despite all the cheering, drum beating and exaltation by media over the supposed political progress in the Philippines, the nation remains a candidate of becoming a failed state.

The Philippines has been ranked 51^st and classified as in “warning” conditions.

I’d say that the Philippines has more characteristics of a failed state: 40+% of the domestic economy are considered as informal. OFWs, whom has been labeled as heroes, are in reality symptoms government failure due to the lack of economic opportunities and depressed standards of living. Yet these combined forces which operates outside of government spectrum, has been delivering the real progress, but whose credit has been usurped by politicians and by mainstream media and institutions.

Yes, there have marginal improvements from 2010, but this could be seen on a relative perspective—perhaps more states have been performing far worst than the Philippines than the Philippines doing better.

Who Benefits from a US-Iran War?

Writes Professor Michael Rozeff at the lew Rockwell Blog

Which state, the U.S. or Iran, more likely wants a war with the other? It's the side that thinks it benefits from such a war. That side is the U.S. If this war begins, it will be entirely because the U.S. wants it and has decided that the time is right to instigate it or elicit actions from Iran that provide excuses for instigating it. Any U.S.-Iran war will be entirely the doing of the U.S.

Here's how we know this. Iran has nothing to gain because it will lose such a war, its power being so much less than the U.S. This is why Iran has tolerated, so far and to a remarkable degree, the intrusions of U.S. subversions and covert activities in Iran, the assassinations of scientists, the computer disruptions, the embargos, the sanctions, the U.S. warships, the U.S. threats, and the U.S. troops being placed nearby. By contrast, the U.S., in the view of the neoconservatives who are running foreign policy, stands to gain quite a lot, namely, undisputed hegemony over the Middle East, control of a country perched on central Asia, control of oil, support for Israel, and a rise in global dominance more generally. Therefore, when and if such a war starts, no matter by what incidents it is triggered, we can be 100% certain that the U.S. has caused and precipitated this war because it, not Iran, is the state that foresees the benefits of such a war.

There are costs, however, and these are restraining the U.S. from instigating this war at this time. These include war costs of several kinds, since Iran is not a pushover. Iran, if pushed into a war by the U.S., can respond in nearby regions, such as Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, Saudia Arabia, and the Persian Gulf. It can conceivably draw Russia into the war, or perhaps Pakistan. The U.S. will win a war with Iran, but it does not expect an easy win. If it did, it would already have started the war. The war on Libya was a recent warm-up exercise that shows what air power can do in this day and age, but Iran's forces are more formidable.

Like the Iraq war, developments won’t turn out as planned (e.g. Iraq war was thought to be short) and there could be unintended consequences such as more terror activities.

And so when might war break out between the U.S. and Iran? It depends on this balance of costs that the U.S. bears and that depends on actions by Iran. But this is all assuming rationality in the war-making process. It is possible at any time that a leader in Washington or in Israel will cast aside rational calculation and decide that now is the time or the time has come, or make a decision based on some trivial detail or happenstance or incident whose significance he or she mis-estimates. Similarly, it is possible that Iran's leadership will miscalculate or perceive themselves as being backed into a corner where war is the only way out.

The U.S. keeps raising the ante, and that dashes hopes for an eventual peaceful resolution. There is no way that Iran can appease the U.S. If it gives in on one thing, the U.S. will simply demand more and then more and more. The U.S. behavior toward Gaddafi shows what happens when a weak state attempts to cooperate with the U.S. Iran will not do likewise. Its leaders are on record as recognizing U.S. behavior going back for decades. They will not back down. The only hope for a continued standoff is, ironically, that Iran make itself strong enough to deter the U.S. and Israel.

I may add that a war with Iran benefits the US politicians by diverting people’s attention from the problems spawned by present interventionist policies, by rallying people to patriotism in order to get elected, justify the imposition of domestic fascist policies by expanding control over economy, rationalize higher taxation and protectionism, and most importantly, justify inflationary policies for the benefit of both the welfare-warfare state and their cronies.

The seeds to the war on Iran have already been sown. The economic sanctions imposed by Europe, possibly as part of the bailout package with the US, have provoked retaliatory economic policy response from Iran. And upping the ante may just be a trigger away (Middle East version of the Gulf of Tonkin Incident) from unleashing of a full scale war.

Quote of the Day: The Myth of the Beneficial Bureaucracy

From Professor Michael Rozeff (bold emphasis mine)

As a rule, the regulatory agencies all produce abominable regulations, and it doesn't matter who is heading them. They are all bureaucratic. They all create an impossible administrative law apparatus that lacks justice. They all are out of control of their creators, the Congress. There is no such thing as a beneficial regulatory agency. They are a fourth branch of government that combines legislative, executive, and judicial functions, and that's worse than even the ordinary government, if such a thing is possible.

There is no one to "take a good look" at regulators and their regulations on an ongoing basis. Congressmen certainly can't do it and don't do it unless there is such a big squawk that they have to.

It's a near certainty that a close look at any agency will uncover all sorts of cozy and corrupt relations with those whom they regulate. It will uncover cushy and protected jobs. There is probably a library of books written by ex-bureaucrats that provide gory details of the agency blunders and poor organizations.

It is pointless to "look into" these bureaucracies. They need to be completely eliminated but if that is too radical, then I always have the other radical suggestion, which is that all those Americans who want to be regulated by these agencies volunteer to be so controlled; and those of us who do not want to be run by these agencies gain our freedom to live our lives free from their regulations.

To add to this stirring quote, the above reminds me of the frequent investigations conducted by the local congress/senate mostly on corruption charges or on controversial issues that draws much of the public’s attention.

Yet these public sessions are held hardly because of the pronounced intent of “in aid of legislation" to cleanse or reform an innately and incorrigibly corrupt system but for the opportunity to grandstand to the public, generate votes to prolong their tenures and their hold on political privileges, and most importantly, to expand their stranglehold over society with even more arbitrary rules which comes with more diversion of resources from the economy to fund the relentless expansions of regulatory agencies or the bureaucracy to enforce these feckless and corruption enhancing laws. This is another example of political insanity—doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results—except that these web of controls expand to cover different facets of our social life.

The public’s attention are always being diverted or framed to where the political establishment wants them to look at. To analogize, in a sports game, we cheer at the game itself but hardly examine the process from which the game came about.

It’s a wonder how these supposed investigators with all their unchecked hold over humongous amounts of pork barrels will be able to exorcise corruption. This would seem like the proverbial pot calling the kettle black.

The unfortunate nature of politics is that credit is usually gained from the degree of sensationalism extracted from the blaming of personalities than from the system.

And it is why the framework of the incumbent political institutions represents “an impossible administrative law apparatus that lacks justice” as Professor Rozeff writes. Corrupt laws which empowers corrupt political enforcement agencies will never deliver justice.

All the rest is public relations travesty.