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March 19, 2005
Billmon: Strategy of the Weak – plus plus
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This is crazy talk, betraying a simplistic, paranoid mindset that sees the whole world in terms of “us (strong, need abide by no rules at all) versus “them” (weak, but devious and sneaky). Crazy also in the total denial of the rule of law. Needless to say, they vastly overestimate their relative strength, except in terms of capacity to kill us all.
As a European, I take note that any sort of working together or compromise with these madmen would be futile.
Posted by: European | Mar 19 2005 14:54 utc | 1
I need to bear it in mind that Wolfowitz and Feith have been deemed unequal to their respective tasks. They dropped the pot on the floor of that famous Barn, and so they’ve been sent away to the Outer Darkness. And heir recent appointments and pronouncements, read in this light of this fact, can only mean that they’ve learned nothing from anything at all over the past four years. This is not news, I’ll bet, to their Pentagonian peers.
Posted by: alabama | Mar 19 2005 15:30 utc | 2
“The business of America is war!” as I was told in mocking terms by a Philippine General, in response to my silly utterance of the old Calvin Collidge homily “the business of America is business”.
There are not too many people in the world who buy all this War on Terror crap, and there really is a deep fear, loathing and contempt underlying ordinary people’s perceptions of America (not even considering what the Muslim world think).
This puerile SWOT analysis is not going to help very much. It sounds to me as thought it was put together by a group of naive powerpoint-semi-educated 20-somethings. Scarry stuff.
Is this document part of the same wet dream ? New Undeclared Arms Race
The Pentagon has released the summary of a top secret Pentagon document, which sketches America’s agenda for global military domination.
… not a word has been mentioned in the US media … there has been no press coverage concerning this mysterious military blueprint.
It’s becoming pretty obvious that the inmates of the USA are spinning out of control. American total global domination just ain’t gonna happen. America doesn’t have the mettle. Not smart enough. Not tough enough. But if they keep spoiling for a fight – one day they will end up with a bloody nose.
Posted by: DM | Mar 19 2005 17:11 utc | 4
Personally, I think it is an excellent strategy (although you must be crazy to see it as a nefarious, coordinated plot) and one that eventually brought down the downfall of the USSR.
I’d certainly support any legitimate non-violent efforts to thwart, obstruct, impede and otherwise defeat the objectives of Bush’s evil regime and bring about a sorely needed humbling of America.
Posted by: Lupin | Mar 19 2005 18:39 utc | 5
perfect definition of ::
rogue state – axis of evil – terrorist state – undemocratic – supports terror – the periphery – is producing WMD – armed for bio warfare – problem state – corrupt regime – poisons its own citizens (slowly: DU)
(( kicking in open doors on a sunny day ))
Posted by: Blackie | Mar 19 2005 19:07 utc | 6
I just read the twenty-five page report. As far as I understand, it seems like more of the same that we’ve seen in the last four + years…and more of the same that was the Reagan-era defense industry pay off and contra strategy justifications for doing whatever the hell we want where ever we want.
now that the cold war is over, they have to change the name to the WOT. other than that…what’s different?
how did central america pose a real threat to the u.s.? nevertheless, that didn’t stop the military and intel agencies from training the contras, or helping them fund their activities via drug money, or restrain them from killing nuns and priests who opposed the contras.
so, what’s different now?
maybe the difference now is that there is a group that actually poses a threat of attack in the U.S.
but since this group was also funded, trained, armed and coddled by the same people who are now calling for this same sort of activity, I find it hard to believe this strategy is a solution to the problem of terrorist attacks…we’ll just create a new group with the training, arms and hatred of our hubris.
as far as the second article noted here from global research…I don’t know what to think about that analysis…hasn’t Europe been dealing with terrorism for decades without resorting to the U.S. approach?
wouldn’t it make more sense for other nations to benefit from the U.S. paranoia by siphoning off talent for industries other than defense?
…and, Lupin, again, as noted above…this is the same strategy as the Reagan-era military build up…and you have to wonder if certain players who are now on the other side of the field didn’t see the tactic in Afghanistan vis a vis Russia…this document would seem to play into that strategy used upon the U.S….and the U.S. is falling right into the trap.
maybe the U.S. thinks they’re pulling others into the trap, but, especially considering current U.S. economic issues, is this the document that will prove to be the tipping point?
btw, Bernhard posted an excellent link to Stephen Roach that goes with this issue, AND
B. had a birthday…so belated happy birthday, B!!!
(and the ides of March are one day before your birthday…but close enough…between Roach’s “tipping point” and the fact that this document is dated March 11, you have to wonder about Caesar-like moments.)
on the other hand, maybe we’ll all be too busy dealing with Florida becoming submerged by rising sea levels, along with who knows where else in the world, to continue this “arm yourself to the teeth” philosophy of “peace.”
Posted by: fauxreal | Mar 19 2005 19:09 utc | 7
It is unacceptable for regimes to use the principle of sovereignty as a shield behind which they claim to be free to engage in activities that pose enormous threats to their citizens, neighbors, or the rest of the international community.
(Natl Def Strat USA, p. 5., PDF linked by Billmon.)
Pre-emptively blaming one’s adversary or enemy for precisely the characteristics, intentions and acts one is oneself guilty of has become a conventional strategy of the US, as it imitates Israel (and bitchy rich Victorian ladies) by adopting a hysterical, terrified, agressive victim stance – to justify lashing out at will.
That the US has been using the strategy ‘of the weak’: “using international fora, judicidal processes and terrorism” (from doc) is very evident.
The US has used its clout to manipulate and coerce practically every international forum, has subverted many judicial processes (internally, externally) and has been able, because of its powerful military position and cultural control (media, etc.) to implement its own brand of terrorism, that is, the kidnapping, torturing (sometimes murder) of thousands of people who are basically innocent bystanders.
(The Amerikan Gulag is already a legend in many places, such as here.)
That ‘terrorism’ is new, or at least innovative in its scope and public visibility.
Classical State terrorism used to squash dissidents (see e.g Argentina, ex USSR…), is now more or less openly practised by the US on an international, world, stage. It is partly acknowledged, through leaks, manipulation of laws, strident justifications.
Other countries (allies, key states, etc.) are supposed to follow suit, endorse. They do, up to a point – they exploit the ‘terror’ card for their own ends (e.g. Russia -> Chechnya); and/or appease the US by imprisoning Arabs or Muslims without justification, sometimes for many years (Britain) or for many months (Switzerland), or they just go mad after one murder (Holland) and start burning Mosques, as that, finally, is a legtimate thing to do.
The creation of so much disorder – the globalisation of “terrorism” , along with other globalisation mechanisms (gutting manufacturing in the US for example) – is related to the ‘mirroring’.
The US desires – nay requires – that everyone act in the same lawless bullying mode as they do. Their enemies must be seen as ‘weak’ (using illegal means etc.) as they are also ‘weak’, use those methods.
Why?
Because that is the only way they think they can win. Only escalation, chaos, confusion, lawlessness will permit –
will legitimise –
will excuse –
will be shown to be necessary –
for…
yup.
And the EU (also Japan, Australia) prefers to shut up and wait and see how the spear head, the leader, manages. They hope to reap benefits, make claims, or condemn, play innocent, change sides.
Posted by: Blackie | Mar 19 2005 20:19 utc | 8
Apparently, the miestro of “you’re either with us or against us” needs to expand his vision and to fill the atmosphere so replete with dots, that any picture of threat can be illustrated within a stroke. A pastiche of connivance could now be construed a masterpiece within every glance, every sound, every word, every thought.
Posted by: anna missed | Mar 19 2005 20:40 utc | 9
Apparently, the miestro of “you’re either with us or against us” needs to expand…
Call me an enemy of the State then, cause I am damn well AGAINST THE UNITED SNAKES OF MURICA! The U.S.Government declaired war on “the people” OF THE UNITED STATES 40 yrs ago.
Posted by: Anonymous | Mar 19 2005 21:43 utc | 10
Apparently, the miestro of “you’re either with us or against us” needs to expand…
Call me an enemy of the State then, cause I am damn well AGAINST THE UNITED SNAKES OF MURICA! The U.S.Government declaired war on “the people” OF THE UNITED STATES 40 yrs ago.
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Mar 19 2005 21:43 utc | 11
What’s scary here is not that some damn fool will think this way; many do. It’s not even that this particular damn fool is in a position of power; ship happens. What worries me is that he found an environment in which he can say such things and feel good about it; and, most of all, that many Americans today – perhaps the majority – would probably see nothing wrong about putting terrorism, international law & diplomacy in the same basket. Sometimes I wonder if that mild and mostly benign American weirdness hasn’t turned into something pathological.
Posted by: pedro | Mar 19 2005 23:51 utc | 12
Unca $cam:
“The U.S.Government declaired war on “the people” OF THE UNITED STATES 40 yrs ago.”
Do you have a particular event in mind that happened 40 yrs. ago? I would argue that the period of hysterical Capitalist-Counter-Reformation began w/the issuance of the rpt/bk./blueprint Commissioned by the CFR by Huntington “Crisis of Democracy”.
By the way, no one seems to be discussing the HORRIFYING Call last week for the actual beginning of the merger of xUS w/Canada & Mexico, marking a new step in turning us both into Third World Nations. No one around here cares???????
Posted by: jj | Mar 20 2005 3:32 utc | 13
In Nuremberg in September 1934, Shirer wrote that “when Hitler finally appeared on the balcony for a moment [the faces in the audience] reminded me of the crazed expressions I saw once in the back country of Louisiana on the faces of some Holy Rollers . . . They looked up to him as if he were a Messiah . . .” and went on to record Hitler’s shriek that “We are strong and we will get stronger!”
… Bush said exactly the same thing: “We are strong, and we will get stronger.” And there was rapturous applause, just as at Hitler’s Nuremberg. ” . . . you know where I stand and where I intend to lead this country.” [Applause.] Audience: “Four more years! Four more years! Four more years!”, just as Hitler was greeted with the adoring mass chant of ‘Sieg Heil!, Sieg Heil!, Sieg Heil!’
From Brian Cloughley’s article in Counterpunch.
We’ll see how far America can go. I don’t think little thugs can run an empire.
Posted by: DM | Mar 20 2005 3:52 utc | 14
JJ try the Warren Commission
Where was George Herbert Walker Bush at noon 11-22-63?
Posted by: Uncle $cam | Mar 20 2005 5:31 utc | 15
$cam, do you listen to KPFA Wed. @2:00. If not, I recommend it. The week before last I heard something most instructive on it. From talk I think by Peter Dale Scott. He said he’s spoken to retired military folks who said that on 11/22/63: 1)Navy SEALS were off-shore Cuba waiting to land. 2)Army was loading troops onto planes ready to invade. This was Operation Northwoods in Action. I believe that GHWB was in Fla. at the time – heading it up on the ground perhaps for the CIA?- and I KNOW he was the first person JEdgar called w/the news of JFK’s assasination.
JFK was the Only person opposed to Northwoods. So, they apparently decided to knock him off,blame it on “Cuban agent Lee Harvey Oswald” & use that as pretext for invasion. Scott said they had to call it off when they failed to assasinate Oswald at the theater that afternoon. Guess the timing got snarled.
Posted by: jj | Mar 20 2005 6:46 utc | 17
The US press has been all Schiavo, all the time in the two days since the NDS came out. It’s terrifying that I had to learn of this document from a blog.
The US government conflates the instruments of international law with the instruments of international terrorism, and the mainstream media can’t take a moment to tell the citizenry?
Saturation-samizdat is the only remedy. Information currently well known only to active information-seekers must be thrust in the faces of the far more vast numbers of passive information consumers.
Posted by: ralphbon | Mar 20 2005 21:18 utc | 18
ralphbon, since I haven’t watched any tv news since the Supreme Court awarded the 2000 election to Bush, I’ve tended to be blindsided by things like the Schiavo episode–a price I’m happy to pay, since our blogs can keep me up to date in the ways that count. And blogs allow us to concentrate on a few elementary issues, of which the chief, for the moment, is as follows: if the GOP has to work so hard to preserve the support of the far right, can ever hope to prosper as a party? Perhaps it has no program, no mission, that isn’t dictated by fascists from Oklahoma, Texas and Kansas; Republicans can only run errands for the far, far right. I’m not sure why this is so, but I suspect that the disaster in Iraq, and the looming disaster of the GOP position on Social Security, may have something to do with the problem. The world may just be too complex for Republicans, which doesn’t speak well for their prospects in the longer-range processes of natural selection.
Posted by: alabama | Mar 20 2005 23:02 utc | 19
Hey Jerome or whoever–
I was just thinking about stuff I read long ago about the coming of the French Revolution, and didn’t Louis also get up to his still attached neck in debt (partially by financing the American Revolution) and Necker tried to keep it going, but finally the aristocrats had had it and called the estates general?
…so that the fall of the French monarchy was, finally, precipitated by a financial crisis?
Posted by: fauxreal | Mar 21 2005 4:03 utc | 20
fauxreal – the short answer would be yes.
Louis XV was actually a lot worse than Louis XVI in that respect. He waged a number of wars that he lost and spent tons. He was ruling when the infamous “Law” run on money happened (in 1720 if memory serves right).
Posted by: Jérôme | Mar 21 2005 21:57 utc | 21