So it would seem in the question of which set of neocons are more sane--those in Tel Aviv or the ones on Pennsylvania Ave--the latter has won out. The NY Times is reporting that in at least three known incidents, the Bush administration denied Israeli pleas to launch a military attack on Iran. More below.
According to a NY Times article, "President Bush deflected a secret request by Israel last year for specialized bunker-busting bombs it wanted for an attack on Iran’s main nuclear complex." As US officials tell it, the Israelis--lacking the US weapons needed to attack Iran's underground complexes--"backed off their plans, at least temporarily." What was it then that stopped the US from agreeing to the Israeli plans? It seems, in a rare bit of good sense and judgment, the Bush administration actually decided that Israel's plan would be--*reckless.*
As cited by the Times, The interviews also indicate that Mr. Bush was convinced by top administration officials, led by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, that any overt attack on Iran would probably prove ineffective, lead to the expulsion of international inspectors and drive Iran’s nuclear effort further out of view. Mr. Bush and his aides also discussed the possibility that an airstrike could ignite a broad Middle East war in which America’s 140,000 troops in Iraq would inevitably become involved.
More interesting, it turns out that one of the key reasons the Bush administration began backing away from any outright attack on Iran had to do with that pesky NIE report released in Dec. 2007. According to the National Intelligence Estimate, Iran had in fact stopped its attempts at building a nuclear bomb as far back as 2003.
Officials stated that "the Israelis responded angrily and rebutted the American report," providing their own evidence of Iran working on a nuclear weapon. The Bush administration reacted to their own NIE report with similar scoffing. Secretary Robert Gates, the very one kept on by the Obama administration, was "highly critical" of the NIE report. Gates stated the NIE had "presented the evidence poorly, underemphasizing the importance of Iran’s enrichment activity and overemphasizing the suspension of a weapons-design effort that could easily be turned back on." In other words, Gates was laying the ground for the ideology of pre-emption--in which intelligence should be used to predict worst case scenarios rather than current reality. Nevertheless, the much ballyhooed NIE still seemed to be enough to put a speed bump in any Iran attack plans.
The undaunted Israelis however, intent on remaining the only undeclared nuclear power in the neighborhood, was insistent however on attacking Iran. On two occassions in early 2008, they made requests for weapons and other aid from the US in order to strike Iran. And, in what was called "alarming" to US officials, they wanted to do it via Iraq.
In an unmitigated bit of chutzpah, the Israelis asked the US to allow its bombing run on Iran to take place by overflights through Iraq. "Mr. Bush deflected the first two requests, pushing the issue off," the NY Times said, citing a US official, "but 'we said 'hell no’ to the overflights." Concerned that the uproar in Iraq over such a military operation could turn the country into a cauldron of discontent, the Bush administration rebuffed the Israelis. Disagreement over Iran even led some to worry that tensions could arise between the two allies.
As a White House official told the Times, Israeli intentions on striking Iran via Iraq "really spooked a lot of people." White House officials openly fretted that the Israelis might fly over Iraq without American permission. Some pondered whether American military would be ordered to shoot them down or be accused of being complicit in an attack on Iran.
In order to pacify the Israelis, the Times states the US settled on starting up a covert operation meant to deter Iranian attempts at nuclear enrichment. As stated by the Times, this operation, mostly involving sabotage, is "aimed at the entire industrial infrastructure that supports the Iranian nuclear program."
Thus far the Israelis have determined that without US help they cannot carry out an attack on Iran. However, as the Israelis press a popular "war" in Gaza and flex their muscle, whether the next administration can keep the most powerful military in the Middle East from sparking a regional conflict remains to be seen.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
US Rejected Israeli Request to Attack Iran--Thrice
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
F is For Failure- The Tragic Comedy of the Bush Doctrine
Although Sarah Palin may not know what the Bush Doctrine is, the rest of us who have watched the growth of American Empire are well aware. While the current junta in the White House didn't originate this era of American exceptionalism, they have taken the US down a road of unchecked militarism that has threatened to cause even further global instability. Wrapped up in ideologies long voiced in such groups as the Project for a New American Century, the neoconservative underpinnings of the Bush Doctrine's notion of pre-emption have been as doomed as the costly adventure in Iraq.
Tom Engelhardt over at TomDispatch has written an illuminating piece called "F is for Failure," describing the follies of the Bush Doctrine--a strategic policy that has not only been ruinous, but that has ironically brought about precisely what it claimed it was attempting to prevent.
A brief bit of the article and a link are provided below.
You can also listen to it discussed by Tom here.
F Is for Failure: The Bush Doctrine in Ruins
Oct. 21, 2008
by Tom Engelhardt
TomDispatch.com
On the brief occasions when the President now appears in the Rose Garden to "comfort" or "reassure" a shock-and-awed nation, you can almost hear those legions of ducks quacking lamely in the background. Once upon a time, George W. Bush, along with his top officials and advisors, hoped to preside over a global Pax Americana and a domestic Pax Republicana -- a legacy for the generations. More recently, their highest hope seems to have been to slip out of town in January before the you-know-what hits the fan. No such luck.
Of course, what they feared most was that the you-know-what would hit in Iraq, and so put their efforts into sweeping that disaster out of sight. Once again, however, as in September 2001 and August 2005, they were caught predictably flatfooted by a domestic disaster. In this case, they were ambushed by an insurgent stock market heading into chaos, killer squads of credit default swaps, and a hurricane of financial collapse.
At the moment, only 7% of Americans believe the country is "going in the right direction," Bush's job-approval ratings have dropped into the low 20s with no bottom in sight, and North Dakota is "in play" in the presidential election. Think of that as the equivalent of a report card on Bush's economic policies. In other words, the Yale legacy student with the C average has been branded for life with a resounding domestic "F" for failure. (His singular domestic triumph may prove to be paving the way for the first African American president.)
But there's another report card that's not in. Despite a media focus on Bush's wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the record of his Global War on Terror (and the Bush Doctrine that once went with it) has yet to be fully assessed. This is surprising, since administration actions in waging that war in what neoconservatives used to call "the arc of instability" -- a swath of territory running from North Africa to the Chinese border -- add up to a record of failure unprecedented in American history.
Read rest of article here.
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
AHMADINEJAD-A-PHOBIA
Anyone living in NY for the past few days has been treated to one big soap opera, in which a small president from Iran was turned into the incarnate of Satan, the chancellor of a respected University would embarrass himself in the name of not-so-very "free speech" and the image of the 'ugly American' would reverberate around the world.
First off, I think Ahmadinejad is pretty much alot of mouth and a bit of buffoon myself. Holocaust denial is pretty much up there on my idiot-o-meter. And anyone who can respond to the accusation of the execution of homosexuals with a dead pan, "In Iran, we don't have homosexuals" can only be taken so seriously (After all, our ally Saudi Arabia only *flogs* them in public).
All of that being said, Ahmadinejad's rise to power in Iran was directly related to the Bush administration placing a country that had nothing to do with 9/11 in an Axis of Evil--with one country that was their sworn enemy (Iraq) and another on the other side of the world (North Korea). So it is ironic that this beneficiary of boorish and illogical US foreign policy would today become such a great pariah.
Much was made over Ahmadinejad's visit to the US, a routine act during the meeting of the UN's General Assembly; protest over the controversial leader quickly turned into American exceptionalism and jingoism at fever pitch. First you have the US denying his request to place a wreath at the 9/11 memorial. The supposed reason was that they could not secure his security. No one's buying that. So what was the purpose of the snub? Because he's not liked? Iran had nothing to do with 9/11 and Al-Qaeda are Sunni extremists who would love to see Shiite dominated Iran toppled. Perhaps Ahmadinejad was being sincere. Perhaps he was tweaking the US. Whatever the case, the rabid response by NY tabloids and some city officials only helped him solidify his point about the ugly American.
Speaking of ugly Americans, we also had GOP Presidential candidate Mitt Romney writing a letter to the UN Secretary General declaring that the Iranian president shouldn't be allowed to address the assembly. Uh, newsflash Mr. Romney. The Secretary General of the UN has zip/zilch power on restricting the head of state of a
member nation from speaking anywhere. If you don't know this Mr. Romney, it's reason #8790 why you should not be President of *anything.*
The greatest controversy came about over Ahmadinejad's speaking at Columbia University. This was a legitimate debate, as the Iranian president has certainly done enough for many to be offended at his presence. But how did the President of Columbia who steadfastly protected the freedom of speech for Ahmadinejad react once the Iranian leader was there? Well Chancellor Lee Bollinger, after being savaged by right wingers, Iran-o-phobes and local news outlets, showed up and dutifully played the part of the "ugly American," engaging in alot of name-calling and sharp insults of the man he *invited* to speak.
"You, quite simply, [are] ridiculous," Bollinger berated his guest. "You are either brazenly provocative or astonishingly uneducated. . . . I doubt you will have the intellectual courage to answer [our] questions . . . I do expect you to exhibit the fanatical mind-set that characterizes so much of what you say and do. . . . Your preposterous and belligerent statements . . . led to your party's defeat in the [last] elections."
Wow! What a hero! He berated the head of state of an unpopular country in front of a crowd that also despises that country. Such bravery! What's next? Maybe pillorying Bill Clinton in front of a Rush Limbaugh Fan Club Convention?
Embarrassingly, what Bollinger showed was not only unsightly behavior repackaged as "courage," but his own ignorance in calling Ahmadinejad a " petty dictator," as the Iranian government is structured in such a way that while one can argue that it is dictatorial, it puts no such power in one individual. Ahmadinejad is a souped-up spokesman who has to answer to alot of higher-ups and more behind the scenes "Dutch uncles." If Bollinger really wanted to berate actual dictators, he might have looked to the Al-Saud family of Saudi Arabia or Al-Sabah of Kuwait, all key American allies.
And if you were in the NYC area and had a chance to see the daily vitrolic headlines in the Daily News and that other private but state directed venue the NY Post, caricaturing Ahmadinejad as "evil" and "the devil," etc., you saw ugly Americanism at its best---putting itself on an equal moral and journalistic level as any state run Iranian publication that calls the US "The Great Satan." Way to go there folks.
What this entire excerise did show was that for all the touted ideals of American free speech, it can be circumvented and restricted without reaching the heights of jack-booted thugs disappearing dissenters into the night--though that may be forthcoming given time. When you marry journalists with the state, and a specific ideology that forces even university presidents to obediently play the role of belligerent attack-dog, you've already denied free speech and replaced it with a farce.
Ironically, for all Ahmadinejad's foot-in-mouth disease, and Iran's repressive regime, he/they have not invaded anyone in the last 100 years, occupied any territory that is not their own, sent the region they live in spinning into instability or damaged the reputation of the UN or the delicate geopolitical balance of the world. In fact, the last time Iran had a war, it was because an American ally (Saddam's Iraq) attacked them. Much the same cannot be said for the 'land of the free...'
Glass houses and all that...
Below is an article by Juan Cole, which highlights how this entire kicking up of dust over Ahmadinejad's UN visit is a neo-con drumbeat for war. Also see: The Bollinger/Ahmadinejad Farce.
Turning Ahmadinejad into public enemy No. 1
Demonizing the Iranian president and making his visit to New York seem controversial are all part of the neoconservative push for yet another war.
By Juan Cole
Sep. 24, 2007 | Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's visit to New York to address the United Nations General Assembly has become a media circus. But the controversy does not stem from the reasons usually cited.
The media has focused on debating whether he should be allowed to speak at Columbia University on Monday, or whether his request to visit Ground Zero, the site of the Sept. 11 attack in lower Manhattan, should have been honored. His request was rejected, even though Iran expressed sympathy with the United States in the aftermath of those attacks and Iranians held candlelight vigils for the victims. Iran felt that it and other Shiite populations had also suffered at the hands of al-Qaida, and that there might now be an opportunity for a new opening to the United States.
Instead, the U.S. State Department denounced Ahmadinejad as himself little more than a terrorist. Critics have also cited his statements about the Holocaust or his hopes that the Israeli state will collapse. He has been depicted as a Hitler figure intent on killing Israeli Jews, even though he is not commander in chief of the Iranian armed forces, has never invaded any other country, denies he is an anti-Semite, has never called for any Israeli civilians to be killed, and allows Iran's 20,000 Jews to have representation in Parliament.
There is, in fact, remarkably little substance to the debates now raging in the United States about Ahmadinejad. His quirky personality, penchant for outrageous one-liners, and combative populism are hardly serious concerns for foreign policy. Taking potshots at a bantam cock of a populist like Ahmadinejad is actually a way of expressing another, deeper anxiety: fear of Iran's rising position as a regional power and its challenge to the American and Israeli status quo. The real reason his visit is controversial is that the American right has decided the United States needs to go to war against Iran. Ahmadinejad is therefore being configured as an enemy head of state.
The neoconservatives are even claiming that the United States has been at war with Iran since 1979. As Glenn Greenwald points out, this assertion is absurd. In the '80s, the Reagan administration sold substantial numbers of arms to Iran. Some of those beating the war drums most loudly now, like think-tank rat Michael Ledeen, were middlemen in the Reagan administration's unconstitutional weapons sales to Tehran. The sales would have been a form of treason if in fact the United States had been at war with Iran at that time, so Ledeen is apparently accusing himself of treason.
But the right has decided it is at war with Iran, so a routine visit by Iran's ceremonial president to the U.N. General Assembly has generated sparks. The foremost cheerleader for such a view in Congress is Sen. Joseph Lieberman, I-Conn., who recently pressed Gen. David Petraeus on the desirability of bombing Iran in order to forestall weapons smuggling into Iraq from that country (thus cleverly using one war of choice to foment another).
American hawks are beating the war drums loudly because they are increasingly frustrated with the course of events. They are unsatisfied with the lack of enthusiasm among the Europeans and at the United Nations for impeding Tehran's nuclear energy research program. While the Bush administration insists that the program aims at producing a bomb, the Iranian state maintains that it is for peaceful energy purposes. Washington wants tighter sanctions on Iran at the United Nations but is unlikely to get them in the short term because of Russian and Chinese reluctance. The Bush administration may attempt to create a "coalition of the willing" of Iran boycotters outside the U.N. framework.
Washington is also unhappy with Mohammad ElBaradei, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency. He has been unable to find credible evidence that Iran has a weapons program, and he told Italian television this week, "Iran does not constitute a certain and immediate threat for the international community." He stressed that no evidence had been found for underground production sites or hidden radioactive substances, and he urged a three-month waiting period before the U.N. Security Council drew negative conclusions.
ElBaradei intervened to call for calm after French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said last week that if the negotiations over Iran's nuclear research program were unsuccessful, it could lead to war. Kouchner later clarified that he was not calling for an attack on Iran, but his remarks appear to have been taken seriously in Tehran.
Kouchner made the remarks after there had already been substantial speculation in the U.S. press that impatient hawks around U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney were seeking a pretext for a U.S. attack on Iran. Steven Clemons of the New America Foundation probably correctly concluded in Salon last week that President Bush himself has for now decided against launching a war on Iran. But Clemons worries that Cheney and the neoconservatives, with their Israeli allies, are perfectly capable of setting up a provocation that would lead willy-nilly to war.
David Wurmser, until recently a key Cheney advisor on Middle East affairs and the coauthor of the infamous 1996 white paper that urged an Iraq war, revealed to his circle that Cheney had contemplated having Israel strike at Iranian nuclear research facilities and then using the Iranian reaction as a pretext for a U.S. war on that country. Prominent and well-connected Afghanistan specialist Barnett Rubin also revealed that he was told by an administration insider that there would be an "Iran war rollout" by the Cheneyites this fall.
It should also be stressed that some elements in the U.S. officer corps and the Defense Intelligence Agency are clearly spoiling for a fight with Iran because the Iranian-supported Shiite nationalists in Iraq are a major obstacle to U.S. dominance in Iraq. Although very few U.S. troops in Iraq are killed by Shiites, military spokesmen have been attempting to give the impression that Tehran is ordering hits on U.S. troops, a clear casus belli. Disinformation campaigns that accuse Iran of trying to destabilize the Shiite-dominated Iraqi government -- a government Iran actually supports -- could lay the groundwork for a war. Likewise, with the U.S. military now beginning patrols on the Iran-Iraq border, the possibility is enhanced of a hostile incident spinning out of control.
The Iranians have responded to all this bellicosity with some chest-thumping of their own, right up to the final hours before Ahmadinejad's American visit. The Iranian government declared "National Defense Week" on Saturday, kicking it off with a big military parade that showed off Iran's new Qadr-1 missiles, with a range of 1,100 miles. Before he left Iran for New York on Sunday morning, Ahmadinejad inspected three types of Iranian-manufactured jet fighters, noting that it was the anniversary of Iraq's invasion of Iran in 1980 (which the Iranian press attributed to American urging, though that is unlikely).
The display of this military equipment was accompanied by a raft of assurances on the part of the Iranian ayatollahs, politicians and generals that they were entirely prepared to deploy the missiles and planes if they were attacked. A top military advisor to Supreme Jurisprudent Ali Khamenei told the Mehr News Agency on Saturday, "Today, the United States must know that their 200,000 soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan are within the reach of Iran's fire. When the Americans were beyond our shores, they were not within our reach, but today it is very easy for us to deal them blows." Khamenei, the actual commander in chief of the armed forces, weighed in as well, reiterating that Iran would never attack first but pledging: "Those who make threats should know that attack on Iran in the form of hit and run will not be possible, and if any country invades Iran it will face its very serious consequences."
The threat to target U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and the unveiling of the Qadr-1 were not aggressive in intent, but designed to make the point that Iran could also play by Richard M. Nixon's "madman" strategy, whereby you act so wildly as to convince your enemy you are capable of anything. Ordinarily a poor non-nuclear third-world country might be expected to be supine before an attack by a superpower. But as Mohammad Reza Bahonar, the Iranian deputy speaker of Parliament, warned: "Any military attack against Iran will send the region up in flames."
In the end, this is hardly the kind of conflagration the United States should be enabling. If a spark catches, it will not advance any of America's four interests in the Middle East: petroleum, markets, Israel and hegemony.
The Middle East has two-thirds of the world's proven petroleum reserves and nearly half its natural gas, and its fields are much deeper than elsewhere in the world, so that its importance will grow for the United States and its allies. Petro-dollars and other wealth make the region an important market for U.S. industry, especially the arms industry. Israel is important both for reasons of domestic politics and because it is a proxy for U.S. power in the region. By "hegemony," I mean the desire of Washington to dominate political and economic outcomes in the region and to forestall rivals such as China from making it their sphere of influence.
The Iranian government (in which Ahmadinejad has a weak role, analogous to that of U.S. vice presidents before Dick Cheney) poses a challenge to the U.S. program in the Middle East. Iran is, unlike most Middle Eastern countries, large. It is geographically four times the size of France, and it has a population of 70 million (more than France or the United Kingdom). As an oil state, it has done very well from the high petroleum prices of recent years. It has been negotiating long-term energy deals with China and India, much to the dismay of Washington. It provides financial support to the Palestinians and to the Lebanese Shiites who vote for the Hezbollah Party in Lebanon. By overthrowing the Afghanistan and Iraq governments and throwing both countries into chaos, the United States has inadvertently enabled Iran to emerge as a potential regional power, which could challenge Israel and Saudi Arabia and project both soft and hard power in the strategic Persian Gulf and the Levant.
And now the American war party, undeterred by the quagmire in Iraq, convinced that their model of New Empire is working, is eager to go on the offensive again. They may yet find a pretext to plunge the United States into another war. Ahmadinejad's visit to New York this year will not include his visit to Ground Zero, because that is hallowed ground for American patriotism and he is being depicted as not just a critic of the United States but as the leader of an enemy state. His visit may, however, be ground zero for the next big military struggle of the United States in the Middle East, one that really will make Iraq look like a cakewalk.
-- By Juan Cole
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
President Lieberman ?
Joe Lieberman. From supporting the Iraq War, to restricting abortion rights to helping block legislation calling for a vote of no-confidence for Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, the Senator's name is one now hissed in progressive circles with the venom usually reserved for the likes of George Bush or Dick Cheney. Yet it was only 7 years ago that he was hailed as the last line of defense against those same GOP candidates. Who would have thought that the former running mate of Al Gore in 2000 would today become the walking incarnation of neoconservatism--dressed up in Democrat drag. Robert Scheer at The Nation ponders "President Lieberman" and "provides a cautionary tale for folks who talk of backing 'any Democrat' who can win."
President Lieberman: A Cautionary Tale
Robert Scheer
June 13, 2007
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070625/truthdig
What if Al Gore had won the 2000 presidential election but died in office? Would President Joe Lieberman have been worse than George W. Bush? His recent actions suggest that he could have descended even lower in his illogical and immoral responses to the tragedy of 9/11. Although now an independent, Lieberman provides a cautionary tale for folks who talk of backing "any Democrat" who can win.
At a time when even President Bush has recognized the need for negotiations with Iran in order to stabilize Iraq, where disciples of Tehran's ayatollahs have risen to power, thanks to the US occupation he fervently supports, Lieberman urges war with Iran. "I think we've got to be prepared to take aggressive military action against the Iranians to stop them from killing Americans in Iraq," he told CBS on Sunday, "and to me, that would include a strike over the border into Iran."
He never learns. This is the joker who bought the Ahmad Chalabi line that invading Iraq would result in a pro-West and pro-Israel democracy with Chalabi (who later failed to get 1 percent of the vote) playing Iraq's George Washington. For five years before 9/11, Lieberman pushed funding for Chalabi's exile organization to lead the overthrow of Saddam Hussein. Lieberman was also a principal author of the 1998 Iraq Liberation Act, which threw $100 million in Chalabi's direction.
Even as late as June 2004, when Chalabi was exposed by the United States as a spy for Iran, Lieberman continued to profess admiration for the architect of a policy that replaced the secular despot of Iraq with Shiite fundamentalists trained in Iran. "I met Dr. Chalabi and others of the Iraqi National Congress," he said in a speech defending Chalabi after US intelligence uncovered his contacts with Iranian spies. "It's fair to say I found them to be patriotic Iraqis. Their counsel to us was important."
In fact, Chalabi's "counsel" concerning Iraq's WMD program and ties to Al Qaeda turned out to be totally fraudulent and as embarrassing to the United States as it was convenient to Iran's plans to overthrow Hussein. Lieberman's statement in support of Chalabi came two months after the National Security Agency reported that Chalabi informed Iranian agents that the United States had broken Tehran's encryption code. At the time of the revelation, Chalabi traveled freely within Iran, where he maintained a residence. Despite Lieberman's warm endorsement of Chalabi, "a person of strength, principle and real commitment," the Bush Administration ended his monthly $340,000 stipend.
Having fallen for the Iranian plot to gain control over Iraq, Lieberman now seeks to undo the damage by invading Iran. He is apparently unaware of public warnings that key Shiite leaders in Iraq would take up arms again in support of their co-religionists across the border. Indeed, the Iranian arms being smuggled into Iraq that Lieberman complains about are going to the Shiite militias dominating America's surrogate government in Baghdad.
Bush seems to grasp this reality, which is why the United States is now negotiating with the Iranian ambassador in Baghdad, leaving Lieberman to play the role of a hawkish critic of an Administration he apparently feels has lost its enthusiasm for yet another disastrous invasion. This is a man whom leading Democrats, including Bill Clinton, supported in his primary campaign against an intelligent Democrat who sought to end the Iraq nightmare.
But, as those "any Democrat is better" apologists will likely argue, Lieberman, as President, would have conducted the occupation in a more measured manner, sensitive to civil liberties and other enlightened concerns. That conceit was also smashed on Monday, when Lieberman voted against holding Attorney General Alberto Gonzales accountable for sabotaging the federal judiciary. At a time when Arlen Specter and six other Republicans voted to advance a no-confidence vote, Lieberman supported the attorney general, who may well be remembered most for his consistent support of torture.
No surprise there, given Lieberman's previous apologies for this Administration's assault on the rule of law. Indeed, even after the revelations of torture at Abu Ghraib, Lieberman was able to find a bright spot, noting that "those who were responsible for killing 3,000 Americans on Sept. 11, 2001, never apologized."
Great. So we are now to be comforted by exceeding the standard set by Osama bin Laden. Lieberman also failed to acknowledge in his statement that the perpetrators of 9/11 had nothing whatsoever to do with Iraq before the invasion. The same can be said for Iran--but that does not quiet Lieberman's cry for wider war.
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
Robert Zoellick: Bush's New Man at the Death Star
So looks like the Empire will soon have a new head at the Death Star. This week President George Bush the Younger nominated Robert Zoellick to the top position at the World Bank--to replace the outgoing Paul Wolfowitz. Zoellick, a former U.S. Trade Representative, is more than likely to be confirmed as the next World Bank president sometime this month. And since his nomination, praise has poured in for his roles in global trade talks, the crisis in Darfur and relations with China. But, we heard much the same praise given to Paul Wolfowitz when he first got the job. Is Robert Zoellick really that different from his predecessor? Here's a hint... he was nominated by *George Bush.* That should be just about enough to sow doubts, but in case you need more....
So who is Robert Zoellick? Well turns out he's one of the gang. Like Paul Wolfowitz, Zoellick is a member of the Project for a New American Century (PNAC). As discussed in a previous article, PNAC adheres to an ideology that America's military strength should be used to bring order to the world and unchallenged global supremacy; the conservative think tank endorses the notion of a Pax Americana. It is a vision of an America for the 21st century, which would "extend its position of global leadership by maintaining the preeminence of U.S. military forces." In 1997 Zoellick, along with Wolfowitz and other notable necons, would sign his name to a letter to then President Bill Clinton urging "regime change" in Iraq as a stepping stone towards global American dominance.
While there has been praise for his involvement in Sudan's Darfur crisis, there has also been criticism. In 2005, Africa Action angrily denounced Zoellick for his admittance that the U.S. was engaged in intelligence sharing with the government in Khartoum:Africa Action today expressed outrage at U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick’s testimony before Congress, in which he acknowledged that the Bush Administration is maintaining an intelligence-sharing partnership with the government of Sudan, even as it continues its genocidal campaign against the people of Darfur and prepares for more violence against the people in eastern Sudan, who are also rebelling against Khartoum. Zoellick also failed to describe any new and urgent U.S. action designed to stop the genocide and protect civilians in Darfur.
When it comes to globalization and trade, Zoellick has hardly been a friend of the impoverished. In a 2003 article titled Robert Zoellick's Free Trade Evangelism, the transnational advocacy network CorpWatch detailed his "bullying" tactics against smaller nations that did not fall in line fast enough with American economic policies:...in Central America there are mixed feelings about Zoellick who moved aggressively to target the countries that joined the G-21: Costa Rica and Guatemala, by threatening their membership in a proposed Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA).
The global justice network 50 Years is Enough notes much the same:
"I told them that the emergence of the G-21 might pose a big problem to this agreement since our Congress resents the fact that members of CAFTA are also in the G-21," he said. "If we want to construct a common future with them, resistance and protest do not constitute an effective strategy. In my talks with some of these countries, I sense that they are drawing the right conclusions."
In addition Zoellick warned Costa Rica in early October that it must open its services market and privatize its telecommunications, electricity and insurance industries if it wants to join CAFTA.Zoellick served as the U.S.’s chief trade negotiator for Bush’s first term. . “He earned a reputation as a powerful bully in middle- and low- income countries,” said Jessica Walker Beaumont of the American Friends Service Committee. “His condescending lectures about ‘can-do and won’t-do nations’ at the 2003 WTO summit in Cancun, when the US didn’t get its way, became notorious. It’s hard to imagine that, after defending US corporate profits so zealously, this is the person who is going to champion development on behalf of the world’s poor.”
They go on to say:“While no one could be as outrageous as Wolfowitz, the architect of the Iraq war, Zoellick is a full-fledged neo-conservative too, a supporter of invading Iraq since 1998. The best that can be said for him is that, like Wolfowitz, he’ll be an appropriate symbol of what the World Bank has become – an agency dedicated to entrenching U.S. economic domination.”
So, in the end, Zoellick and his supporters may attempt to paint his appointment to the World Bank as a new start, but it seems mostly like more of the same. This supposed "changing of the guard" will hardly reflect any changes in policy.
Sunday, May 20, 2007
PAUL WOLFOWITZ RESIGNS FROM WORLD BANK! or DARTH VADER LEAVES DEATH STAR!
This week Paul Wolfowitz was forced to announce his resignation from the World Bank in the midst of an investigation into a corruption scandal. Many people—including myself—indulged a good bit of schadenfreude to see the Bush appointee go down. And while I'm all for enjoying this moment, I'd urge we pull back on popping open the bubbly just yet. In the larger scheme, Paul Wolfowitz's exit from the World Bank should be greeted with as much joy as watching Darth Vader ousted from the Death Star. And I'll tell you why…
Much as Anakin Skywalker was no minor player in the events that caused the downfall of the Galactic Republic, Paul Wolfowitz wasn't just any member of the current White House junta. As Deputy of Secretary of Defense under Donald Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz was a major powerbroker. He was one of the elite members of the old guard brought in under the first term of George Bush the Younger and a key proponent of the now infamous ideology known as neo-conservatism. Like Anakin Skywalker's turn towards the power hungry Sith, Wolfowitz and numerous other neoconservatives had traveled down a twisted road before going over to the "Dark Side." A motley group made up of self-described "liberal Cold War warriors," disaffected radical leftists turned reactionaries, right-wing advocates of American hegemony and adherents of authoritarian philosophers like Leo Strauss, neoconservatives arose under their own Sith patriarchs like Irvin Kristol and Norman Podhoretz. Wolfowitz worked his way through the Pentagon and even the administration of President Jimmy Carter, to finally hone his emergent ideology under the Reagan Administration and especially under George Bush the Elder.
In 1997, along with such neocon ideologues as Richard Perle, Dick and Lynne Cheney, Jeb Bush, William Kristol and others, Wolfowitz would become a charter member of the Project for the New American Century (PNAC), the preeminent neoconservative think tank. Like the policies of Chancellor Palpatine, PNAC adheres to an ideology that the Republic's military strength should be used to bring order to the world and unchallenged supremacy. Where Palpatine and his apprentice Darth Vader would eventually turn the Republic into an Empire, PNAC speaks of something similar—a Pax Americana of the 21st century, which would "extend its position of global leadership by maintaining the preeminence of U.S. military forces." To this end, in 1992, following the first Oil War of the Gulf, Wolfowitz would co-author a 1992 draft Defense Planning Guidance which, among other fantastic goals, "called for US military dominance over Eurasia;" the refashioning of the US military into a global police force; and the use of "preemptive strikes" against any nation that threatened American supremacy. When it was leaked to the media, the draft guide was so radical it caused global outrage and was immediately disavowed by George Bush the Elder, who ordered it rewritten—by none other than then Secretary of Defense, Dick Cheney. In 1997 Wolfowitz would sign his name to another infamous letter, this time to then President Bill Clinton urging "regime change" in Iraq as a stepping stone towards global American dominance. In 2000 Wolfowitz would help author and endorse what some have called one of the most "chilling" blueprints for American Empire— Rebuilding America's Defenses: Strategies, Forces, and Resources For A New Century.
Wolfowitz's time to shine however would come in 2001, after the attacks of September 11th. Having found his way back into the halls of power with the administration of Bush the Younger, Wolfowitz and compatriot Richard Perle would become two of the leading advocates in the Administration for an invasion of Iraq—hijacking the catastrophe of 9/11 for a war long planned. Wolfowitz is in fact recognized as a "key architect" of the Iraq War. Along with Perle, the administration, former cohorts at PNAC and others, Wolfowitz was not only a key planner of the war, but used the cowered mainstream press to help sell the American public on false claims of Iraqi WMDs. Wolfowitz would most famously claim that the war would be easy, cost something "under $50 billion" and that oil revenues from "liberated" Iraq would foot the bill. Today the cost of the war, simply in monetary terms, is over $400 billion and rises every second. When the war turned sour however, and visions of the Pax Americana came slamming against global reality, Wolfowitz and his neoconservative allies slowly began jumping ship, retreating to the shadows or turning on each other in a bizarre blame game, rather than answer for their heinous plans that have ruined a country, left hundreds of thousands mutilated, maimed, traumatized or dead, inflamed radical extremists and thrown the global security of the world into chaos. (Architects of the Iraqi War- Where Are They Now?) Wolfowitz however somehow managed to wrangle out a reward for such utter failure; and instead of simply retiring to some think tank or other private position, was given none other than a seat at the helm of the Death Star—the World Bank.
In the Star Wars universe, the Death Star is described as "the code name of an unspeakably powerful and horrific weapon developed by the Empire… an instrument of terror, meant to cow treasonous worlds with the threat of annihilation." Some have argued that the World Bank, is little different. The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (World Bank) was founded in 1946 as a way to finance reconstruction projects in World War II-ravaged countries, primarily Europe, who had poor creditworthiness. Today its purported reason for existence is to help nations, especially the more impoverished, in their development and economic policies. But instead, along with complimentary world bodies like the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank has spread more terror among the world's impoverished than anything approaching development.
The transnational advocacy group 50 Years is Enough, which monitors the World Bank and IMF, points out how these detrimental policies take hold:"Structural adjustment—the standard IMF/World Bank policy package which calls for slashing government spending, privatization, and opening up countries to exploitative foreign investment, among other measures—has deepened poverty around the world. In the two regions with the most structural adjustment experience, per capita income has stagnated (Latin America) or plummeted (Africa)."
Like the Death Star, the World Bank and IMF are owned and run by a powerful empire—this one made up of international banks and the elite brokers of the neoliberal global political economy that convene at such events as the G8 Summit or WTO Conference. Though a diversity of nationalities work at the World Bank, its head is always an American, usually chosen by the sitting President. The IMF in turn is always led by a member of a powerful European state. Together, along with the interconnected trade policies that govern the world, the World Bank operates as one of the forces that keeps poor nations poor, helping ruin their economies with disastrous neoliberal reforms, laying their markets open bare for rich nations to loot and maraud and strangles entire regions in stifling debt out of which they can never climb. It is a system that helps to engender a world where a few have and the masses of the global population live in poverty or die due to lack of food, medicines and more.
It was only fitting that Paul Wolfowitz, like Darth Vader, would be placed in charge of the weapon of mass destruction the World Bank has become. That an architect of war attempted to pass himself off as a humanitarian was the first bit of folly—and is part of the creepy perversity that is neconservatism: saving the world by, as Michael Franti crooned, attempting to "bomb it into peace." That Wolfowitz's fall came out of corruption is also a bit of sweet irony, as his vision of the organization upon take-over of its helm caused upheaval among the staff as he attempted to ram in his own specialized reforms to "fight corruption." And yet for all the seeming "oil and water" mix many in the mainstream press have tried to spin the Wolfowitz-World Bank scandal as, their joining was in many ways a proverbial match made in heaven—or that other place.
Journalist John Nichols notes as much in an article for The Nation, quoting from the poet, anti-apartheid activist and African development campaigner, Dennis Brutus:"Wolfowitz's arrogance, his insistence that any problems were the result of his colleagues' actions, never his own, were a perfect match for the World Bank, which has always refused to take responsibility for its own disastrous policies and projects, laying blame instead with the borrowing country, even though the common denominator in so many botched projects, violations of human rights, and failed policy packages has been the presence of the World Bank. The combination of war and economic crimes for which he was responsible, made Wolfowitz an appropriate symbol for the institution."
Thus with the fall of Wolfowitz from the World Bank let us not engage in too much schadenfreude. Darth Vader may be gone, onto who knows what new mischief, but the Death Star remains "fully operational." Now not everyone at the World Bank, its varied workers and staff, may think of their organization as a weapon of mass destruction. And many may actually believe it can serve some good. Even one of its former taskmasters turned critic—economist Joseph Stiglitz—yet believes so. However, willing to risk the crossing of sci fi and fantasy genres in my analogy, the Bank—like the One Ring—serves the interest of the elite and the powerful who govern the finances of the world, and keep most of the world's population impoverished. It serves only one master and has been unable or unwilling to do much good for those who still put faith in it. So let us not get so caught up in the removal of one figure—no matter how powerful—and lose sight of the real threat to millions that yet exists by the very existence of the institution.
Naomi Klein posits her thoughts on the true meaning of the saga of Paul Wolfowitz and the World Bank in her article "Sacrificial Wolfie":"What we should absolutely not do…is participate in the effort to cleanse the Bank's ruinous history by repeating the absurd narrative that the reputation of an otherwise laudable antipoverty organization has been sullied by one man. The Bank understandably wants to throw Wolfowitz overboard. I say, Let the ship go down with the captain."
Indeed. Don't abandon your X-Wing fighters just yet. We've still got a Death Star to take down.
