This
poll from the Financial Times shows that Europe now sees the U.S. as the biggest threat to world peace.
Now, President Bush and his Administration have always portrayed the U.S. as some kind of defender against a nebulous evil that threatens the world, so it might seem odd to Republicans that these people we are "defending" think that we are the big problem. Actually, I'm sure they dismiss it with a few terms they picked up from Fox News; something about "weakness" or Old Europe, perhaps. The upshot is, in the Republican view, that the rest of the world doesn't really matter because they don't have the guts to do what needs to be done, so we have to defend them out of our noble sense of superpower responsibilty, even if they are ungrateful. This is a lot like how
Japan played up its imperial role in WW2. The empire was
obliged to evict the Western powers from Asia, liberating the countries there, because
they were too weak to do the job on their own. And certainly some governments did not welcome their imperial Japanese liberators, but this was because they were beholden to Western interests and they would learn in time to love their Japanese "protectors". It wasn't simply because the Emperor decreed this or that -- the Japanese honestly felt they were
doing the world a favour. Of course, after the war turned sour for Japan, these noble goals fell by the wayside. It then became about control rather than liberation and about extracting resources from weaker nations by military force.
So, if you will, let's look at the scenario today. There is currently a nation that fits this description:
- Has a larger military budget than all of the other countries in the world combined.
- Has military bases all over the planet, and projects massive naval and air power in virtually every theatre.
- Has a history of replacing governments who refuse to show adequate deference with a government that is a puppet, even if it means democracy goes away in the process.
- Has a stated military policy that it says it's okay for that country to invade any other country in the world. The target of invasion does not even have to
threaten the nation we are discussing. All it has to do is show
potential for a threat sometime in the future, and the nation we are discussing gets to decide what constitutes a "threat".
- Has fabricated 'threats" and "potential threats" to justify this stated military policy.
Okay, that nation that seems so dangerous is, of course, the U.S.
In a world where any country that has a
brewery could conceivably produce biological weapons, where any country willing to accept the nuclear waste of another country has the means to produce a "dirty bomb", or where any country that has laboratory facilities on the level of most high schools in the U.S. can produce a chemical weapon, then we have to admit that this policy says nothing less than the U.S. has openly stated it's willingness to invade any country in the world. In practical terms, however, it seems we are only concerned with "threats" from
countries that have oil. Countries that
don't have oil are somehow mysteriously harmless.
So, you would think that the vast majority of American foreign aid would go to countries that have oil, since this criteria seems to be paramount in our military threat calculations. Hmmm...
no. Israel, Egypt, and Colombia take the vast majority of our aid, and they are not known for oil or even democracy. Israel is a country where 15% of the country is not allowed to vote due to laws that make Jim Crow look lenient. If you practise the wrong religion, you can't vote. In Egypt, soldiers will ask you who you intend to vote for before you can enter the polling place. If you give the "wrong" answer, you can't go inside. And Colombia is a country that is struggling with the painful issue of whether or not to
openly admit that you think it's okay to simply use
death squads to wipe out the political opposition or whether you should simply keep these massacres
secret. The rest of the world gets very little money compared to what Europe gives, and even then it comes with so many strings attached it's not effective.
Our noble "liberation" of Iraq has resulted in a whole lot of Iraqi oil disappearing, and our comittment to Iraq's stability seems more and more to depend on whether the
Hydrocarbon Law is signed. This jewel basically says that
Iraq's oil belongs not to the U.S. or Iraqis, but to
multinational oil companies, and promises that these oil companies will throw whatever scraps of their profits to Iraqis that the companies deem appropriate. Who could possibly turn down a deal like that? If the Hydrocarbon Law is not signed, watch for Bush's determination to "stay the course" in Iraq to fade away, regardless of any fictional Al-Qaeda threat.
Afghanistan, the
real terror threat, has increasingly been handled by Europe (those weak, irrelevant countries that don't have the guts, etc...), and Europe isn't too happy about that, either. Bush sold Afghanistan as a situation that was largely under control to the Europeans, and as an easy way to "help out" along with vague hintings at America's appreciation if they did this simple task.
Instead, the situation was not as (the ever-optimistic) Bush had pitched it, but rather a hornet's nest, a quagmire, and a nightmare all rolled into one. In November, Smiley Bush turned into Grim Bush overnight and the Decider told Europe that it was just going to get worse and that it basically was
Europe's fault that it was taking so long to do whatever the hell it was they were trying to do in Afghanistan.
The Grim Bush persona gives the Decider the ability to appear wise and powerful in either success or setback. If things go badly, Grim Bush can, in effect, say "I told you so" while this apparent 'wisdom' makes his lack of a strategy appear credible to the gullible. If things somehow manage to improve, Grim Bush can solemnly declare that the 'corner' has been 'turned' due to his brilliant and courageous leadership.
As Europe struggles to handle the steaming turd Bush has handed it, The Decider is busy looking for more "threats" in oil-producing countries that might need "liberation". Maybe the Venezuelan media
should be allowed to call for a foreign country to
overthrow its government. While we wouldn't allow that
here in the U.S, goshdarnit, it's just the type of thing that needs someone to stand up for. Yep, treason is an unalienable right,
unless it's against a government we have in our pocket, at least. It's not about the oil, no sir, it's about those oppressed multibillion television networks being able to ask for
an invasion of their own country without some domestic government getting on their case. I hear they even wiretap without warrants in Venezuela, and people who plant bombs in public places to overthrow the government actually go to jail. And the people who have been losing the elections there are mad because they can't win. It looks like a job for...
SUPERPOWER!
Yeah, we're all about defending the world from tyranny nowadays. At least until we're bankrupt, that is.
