Deception: essence of US foreign policy

A B Shahid

US foreign policy stance over Iraq's alleged accumulation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD), and Iraqi designs to "dominate" the region, are disputed by almost every head of government except, of course, Britain's Tony Blair who relies on his eloquence to make up for the credibility gap in the US approach, but without success. History proves that US policy on Iraq could be yet another case of deception -- the hallmark of US foreign policy since early 1900s.

In 1918, US forces joined the West European coalition that invaded Russia to strangle the Socialist Revolution at its birth because it threatened the future of capitalism. A nation recovering from the trauma of a devastating war, facing chaos arising out of a fundamental change in its social set-up, and grappling with a famine that eventually left millions dead, was invaded on the pretext of lending a "helping hand". The erstwhile US Army Chief of Staff referred to this friendly invasion as "an expedition that affords one of the finest examples in history of honourable, unselfish dealings ...to be helpful to a people struggling to achieve a new liberty." It was a case of killing the Russians with "kindness".

In 1945, for dropping A-bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the official rationale given by the US was "eliminating the need for a land invasion that could endanger the lives of American soldiers". Tragically, not many Americans know till today that, months before the A-bombs were dropped, Japan had offered to surrender but the US government consistently ignored that request. The truth is that the bombs were dropped, not to intimidate the already shattered Japanese, but to put the fear of America into the Russians who were perceived to be the biggest challenge to face up to in the post-war world. This was the first lethal shot of the Cold War.

During the Cold War, repeated Soviet offers to dissolve the Warsaw Pact if NATO did the same, were rebuffed each time by the US to sustain its war mongering about the "Soviet threat". An editorial in the Los Angeles Times pointed out that accepting such an offer "increases the difficulty faced by US policy-makers in persuading Western public opinion to continue expensive and often unpopular military programs." This fear prompted deception on a continuing basis, and a series of requests by the Soviet Union for minimising the risk of accidental war by establishing a direct dialogue with senior NATO officials were also rejected as "inappropriate" and potentially "divisive" [for NATO].

Throughout the Cold War era, the actual level of Soviet military and economic strength were magnified, data and events were falsified to exaggerate the Soviet threat, and worst-case scenarios were touted feverishly as if these were imminent because they provided the justification for creation of NATO. Among the British documents declassified in 1999, an analysis by Foreign Office Joint Intelligence Committee dating back to 1968 states that Soviet Union had no intention of invading the West. The Committee recorded its frustration with anti-Soviet stance of the politicians because, even during the Vietnam War, Warsaw Pact states made regular contacts with the West to sustain a political dialogue.

Robert Blum, a former US State Department staffer believes that "US cherishes its enemies; without enemies, it would be a nation without a purpose. The various components of the state need enemies to justify their swollen budgets, to aggrandise their work, to protect their jobs, to give themselves a mission". This is corroborated by no less than retired Gen Douglas McArthur in his book "American Caesar" wherein he says "our government has kept us in a perpetual state of fear, in a continuous stampede of patriotic fervour, with the cry of grave national emergency. Always there has been some terrible evil..... to gobble us up if we did not blindly rally behind it by furnishing the exorbitant funds demanded. Yet, in retrospect, these disasters seem never to have happened, seem never to have been quite real."


In a 1998 interview, Zbigniew Brzezinski, National Security Adviser to Jimmy Carter admitted that the State Department version that the US armed fundamentalist Afghan Mujahideen groups after the Soviet invasion was a lie. Arming the fundamentalist Afghans started six months before the Russians made their move because the fundamentalist insurgency was a trap to induce Soviet intervention. Quite unashamedly, Brzezinski went on to add that the day the Soviets crossed the border he wrote to Jimmy Carter "We now have the opportunity of giving to the USSR its Vietnam."

Over the next decade, USSR remained entangled in a conflict that demoralised it beyond repair. The US-inspired insurgency served to decimate America's enemy number one. Interestingly enough, this was done in the name of saving the Afghans whom the US later condemned to self-destruction. Author Garry Wills believes "it is when America is in her most altruistic mood that other nations better get behind their bunkers" because deception is now the name of the foreign policy game. Even after a decade of the demolition of the Berlin Wall, America -- the saviour -- is busy saving governments and peoples from each other. Altruism remains the hallmark of America's love affair with itself.

Since 1945 until the end of the last century, various US governments attempted to overthrow over 40 foreign governments, and crushed over 30 popular nationalist movements against tyrant (usually US-sponsored) regimes. In the process, it ended the lives of several million people, and condemned millions more to a life of poverty, despair and chaos. Americans continue to delude themselves with the idea that their altruism covers up the real face of their foreign policy. The US government wants the world to believe that the Iraqi regime must be overthrown to save the Iraqis from themselves. The difference is that instead of abandoning Iraq after the invasion, it plans to rule the oil-rich country for an indefinite period. Pity the abandoned Afghanis: they didn't have oil!

With the Soviet Union obliterated, the US continues its war mongering touting new threats: it keeps telling its citizens about the pressing need for waging wars against proliferation of WMD, espionage, drugs trafficking, organised crime, but more often, terrorism. It wants them to believe in lethality of these threats although the corner stone of the US foreign policy remains its insatiable desire to extend political, economic, and military hegemony over as much of the globe as possible, to prevent the rise of any regional power that might challenge American supremacy, and to create a world order in America's image, as befits the world's only superpower.

So, the Cold War continues under new names but, in essence, it is now a "North-South" struggle -- an effort to prevent the rise of any society that may set a credible example of an alternative to the capitalist model, and to prevent the rise of any power that might challenge American supremacy. The US Defence Department continues to believe that its "first objective is to prevent the re-emergence of a new rival"...that it "must maintain the mechanisms for deterring potential competitors from even aspiring to a larger regional or global role." What a shocking world we live in courtesy US governments! This is without the slightest disrespect to the common Americans, who are as much the target of this deception as any other people. But, there will be no sanity in this world unless they stop this juggernaut from rolling on.

The writer is a freelance contributor

This Leftist writer discussed US conduct, both real and imaginary, in a complete vacuum.

Is there one mention of WHY we fought the cold war? No. Reading this article, one would think the US simply had some psychotic antipathy towards the kind hearted Soviets and other socialists.

The Left very politely ignores the reality of its own policies: 30 million Soviets killed by their own government, 40 million Chinese (including 10 million in one year alone), millions more in Cambodia, Cuba, N. Korea, Vietnam, etc. Billions enslaved in the name of a twisted utopian vision.

The writer is right about one thing -- the war on terror is an extension of the cold war. That is because the Islamists we fight today are the heirs to the legacy of oppression handed down to them by Stalin, Mao and their friends on the Left.

Must comment on title -- "patriots and other fascists".

The Left seriously believes that anyone who loves America is a fascist!

Such a pitiful waste of human potential each and every Leftist is. . .

No wonder there is an ehco of history...
FYI
Investigative reporter Christopher Simpson says in BLOWBACK that after World War II, Nazi émigrés were given CIA subsidies to build a far-right-wing power base in the U.S. These Nazis assumed prominent positions in the Republican Party's "ethnic outreach committees." Simpson documents the fact that these Nazis did not come to America as individuals but as part of organized groups with fascist political agendas.
The Nazi agenda did not die along with Adolf Hitler. It moved to America (or a part of it did) and joined the far
right of the Republican Party.
http://www.bartcop.com/nazigop.htm

Republicans elected Dwight Eisenhower, the man who commanded the army that destroyed the 3d Reich, as president for two terms. . .

Not.

I don't know Mr. Simpson. . . but he has a very creative imagination.

Just relax, pop another beer and drool at your TV

I am left wondering. . . is that some kind of retort?

Pop a beer and drool at your TV?

Is that like some clever way of saying "you're a big smelly stupid head"?

Seriously, I see a response like that and I just think: "This guy just lost it. He's been checkmated and he wants to throw the chessboard over."

C'mon. . . you've probably got a degree in political science from a prestigous university. . . I know you can do better than "pop a beer and drool at your TV".

I'll never read again! I'm so sorry!

A couple of problems:

In 1918 the United States sent a small detachment of soldiers to Archangelsk in an attempt to bolster the White Russian forces which were battling the Bolshevik Reds. The expedition was a failure (in large part because the Whites were so disorganized) and the detachment went home without strangling the author’s precious ‘Socialist Revolution’. The Reds went on to consolidate their hold on power, slaughter those who didn’t hold with their view of a worker’s paradise, starved millions of Ukrainians, and then invaded Poland. Nice track record.

Oh, and what exactly was the net effect of this American invasion? Zip.

In 1945 the United States was in a war with the Empire of Japan. This war (for the Americans) was started by the Japanese four years earlier when they bombed the American Pacific Fleet in Hawaii, simultaneously invading the Philippines, Singapore, and a host of other Pacific Rim countries. As the war turned inevitably against the Japanese, they turned to more desperate measures to deter the Americans. Suicide submarines and planes were used to great effect. Despite being soundly defeated militarily, the Japanese still refused to surrender UNCONDITIONALLY to the allies. They decided to try to cut a deal with the RUSSIANS but were rebuffed by Stalin who knew that the Americans wouldn’t tolerate double-dealing on the UNCONDITIONAL bit. He was also happily cataloging the tens of millions of new serfs he had just been bequeathed in Eastern Europe, and probably wasn’t about to press his luck. There is no question that the Japanese would defend their homeland fanatically, and that there would be horrendous American casualties. The atomic bomb program had just been completed and the go-ahead was given for dropping them. This decision saved the life of thousands if not tens of thousands of American servicemen. It is interesting to note that the casualty production of the atomic bombs was inferior to that of incendiary raids conducted earlier in the war. If the real goal of the Americans was to kill as many as possible without regard to ending the war, they would have just used incendiary bombs.

I wonder if the author ever heard about Berlin and the Berlin airlift. His peace-loving Soviet buddies walled in and attempted to starve a city of millions in violation of the post-war agreements on power sharing. Or how about Hungary in 1956? Russian tanks roll into Hungary to keep it in the Warsaw Pact. Strange behavior from a country that was so eager to give up its foreign empire. Czechoslovakia 1968: Those lovers-not-fighters of Mother Russia machine-gunning university students in Prague must have been just performance art, right?

The above statement about the author is incorrect. The author is a jackass. And wrong about much.

American Apologists like T-mex and his patriotic ilk regurgitate all the pro-American lies about US foreign policy better than a CNN spindoctor.

"Is there one mention of WHY we fought the cold war? No. Reading this article, one would think the US simply had some psychotic antipathy towards the kind hearted Soviets and other socialists."

You mutherfuckers fought the Cold War to make the World safe for American corporate plunder and exploitation just as you do today--all the while disguising yourselves as self-appointed champions of Democracy and Freedom.

"The writer is right about one thing -- the war on terror is an extension of the cold war. That is because the Islamists we fight today are the heirs to the legacy of oppression handed down to them by Stalin, Mao and their friends on the Left. "

The true legacy of Oppression is one wrapped in an American Flag and hidden by Patriotic Lies that Americans spew from their spittle flecked mouths. The Slave Trade, Native American Genocide, Jim Crow Apartheid, and now the new American techno police state all bear eloquent testimony to all the Hundreds of millions of its own citizens (and others) that America has killed throughout its history--from George Washington to George Bush.

The Islamists America fights today were appropriately enough created by ... America itself . It is highly appropriate that the USA must now confront its own misbegotten spawn, who apparently have learned their Terror tactics from the Masters of Terror themselves: the USA

American Patriots and other fascists is right on the mark...

What exactly is your solution then, Ms. Manners? You assert that the Islamists that we face today are our Frankenstein's monster; that we created them and that they have now turned on us. Rather than whither this rediculous notion I will take it on face value and ask what if you are right? What if these Islamic Fascists are indeed our creation and are turning on us?

What do you propose to do to stop them?

I have a rediculous notion.
Let's FIRE the CIA,FBI and all our other terrorists.
Then prosecute them.
For criminal incompetence and murder.

As heard on Pacifica recently, here's one of the right's, and corporate globalization's, champions, saying it best. It doesn't get any clearer than this, and this is coming straight from one of their own:

"The hidden hand of the market will never work without a hidden fist. McDonald's cannot flourish without McDonnell Douglas... And the hidden fist that keeps the world safe for Silicon Valley's technologies to flourish is called the U.S. Army, Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps."
-- Thomas Friedman, The Lexus and the Olive Tree

What? What does that solve? Your answer to a bunch of bloodthirsty maniacs banging on the door who want to kill you or die trying is to arrest and try the doorkeeper? Brilliant. I'm surprised you're not the President of your class.

A couple of problems, though;

First; what effect do you think the removal of the intelligence services will have on the protection of American citizens from the very real threat they face?

Second; you still haven't answered the question. THERE ARE PEOPLE COMING TO KILL YOU. WHAT DO YOU DO?

Third; I love the idea of the Left 'arresting' anyone. In this country the Left is composed of ivory tower 'intellectuals' and the spotty-faced legions of suburban spawn that they have converted. They are opposed to the death penalty, so that's out. Maybe if everyone you arrest says their really sorry and won't do it again you'll just let them go home with a good talking to.

-what effect do you think the removal of the intelligence services will have on the protection of American citizens from the very real threat they face?-
Well, for one thing we sure would have a LOT less
enemies who hate us and would kill us to address the
terror we have funded in their land.

How many enemies do you think it takes to kill you? If we follow your program and we eradicate our intelligence services we will make our country more succeptable to attack by terrorists. They will be able to organize, strike with impunity and vanish without the possibility of prevention or punishment. You would sell the American people to slaughter.

Perhaps you think your new Islamist masters would be good to you. Forced to wear distinctive garb, forbidden to worship or even to look a Muslim in the eye. Such is the fate of those non-believers who live amongst the wonderful Islamists.

Don't blow smoke up my ass!
The CIA is the world foremost terrorist organization.


The people here are well armed. I know I am.
Without the CIA none would mess with us even with a
military one tenth the size it is now.

So, without the CIA they never would have rammed a plane into the WTC?

What sort of bizarro world are you inhabiting?

The Imams of radical Islam preach daily about smiting the infidel and refer to the Jews as 'apes and pigs'. They should be taken at their word. They want to kill us, they have already killed thousands right here in our own country, and you want to dismantle the CIA. Brilliant.

Particularly because the CIA either let it happen or
did it directly or through their proxies.

So... the CIA is operating the mouths of all the radical Islamist Priests. Right. Got it.

I was discussing Islamic terrorism to which the CIA had
their arms up to the elbows in.
-Besides tossing billions of dollars into the conflict, the CIA transferred sensitive weapons technology to fanatical Muslim extremists, with consequences that will haunt the US for years to come. One notable veteran of the Afghan operation is Sheik Abdel Rahman, famous for his
role in the World Trade Center bombing.-
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/CIA%20Hits/Afghanistan_CIAHits.html

Simple Simon is appropriately named. He has the IQ of a chimpanzee.

This idiot forgets to mention the fact the USA and the CIA in particular armed, trained, and sponsored the Islamcists (including Usama Bin Laden) during the 1980s anti-Soviet Jihad.

Even the mainstream media in American cannot bury this little inconvenient fact down the Orwellian American Memory Hole. American Patriots like Simple Simon will deny, lie, and distort all they want but they cannot wash this history away.

Ahem.

Let us recap, shall we?

There is precious little we can do about the historical fact that past administrations saw fit to arm a bunch of religious fundamentalist wackjobs. The fact remains that these wackjobs are armed, and are turning their arms on us. And 'us' includes you, you Lefty bed-wetters. I want to know what you plan to do about this situation. I have so far gotten the suggestion that we should arrest and incarcerate our own intelligence services. Perhaps one of you Leftists can come up with something a little more sound?

As to the Islamic Fascists that oppose us, I doubt that the majority or even a signifigant minority of them were either armed or trained by the United States. You people seem to conveniently forget that these radicals are very wealthy and receive enormous amounts of money from their associates in the Persian Gulf. You also shut your ears and eyes to the fact that the leaders of the Arab world and the priests of the Islamic faith daily call for the eradication of Israel and those who support her (wanna guess who that is?), that the population of this region have turned Mein Kampf into a best seller, that the Egyptians are preparing to launch their mini series of "The Protocols of Zion", that racist hate is Islamic faith. That to live as a Christian or Jew among them is to be in perpetual servatude, and to practice your religion in their countries would mean your death. In short, you ignore any evidence that might prove that the enemy we face hates us and believes we would be better dead. Instead, you dig and scrape and claw and cling to the smallest shreds to prove that somehow the government of the United States is to blame.

So spin away Lefties, and do nothing. It's what you always do.

Deny, obscure, avoid and lie.

To address one of the items in the simple post.
-As to the Islamic Fascists that oppose us, I doubt that the majority or even a significant minority of them were either armed or trained by the United States-
Don't read or remember much do you?
It's common knowledge that the CIA was involved in one of the most heavily funded projects arming and training these factions. I come back later with links for everyone if you wish. Capitulate indeed.

I'm not a leftist, but leftists want to change too many things and the Conservatives want things to remain the same or so they say?
So Simple Simon how do you suggest the leftists 'change' things when there is no money because George W. blew the entire surplus that the democrats had saved up?
The unemplotyment rate is 5.7% for October
Is that what we can call a Bush 'October Surprise'?

bluesluver@3email.com

Of which goes to the military and is not taken from the really wealthy or corporations could be better spent and
far less of it. Less government?!?! Fuck that; the government is in MAJOR expansion now that that smirking stupid little coke snorting asshole has taken power.

The government spends considerably less on military expenditures then on 'entitlements'. Nice euphamism. The dole. Whereas we need the military, we don't need to feed and clothe and shelter the bums.

And why is it when a person from the right has expirmented with drugs he's a coke-snorting asshole, but when a person of the left has spent a lifetime doing drugs, selling drugs, and otherwise behaving as an irresponsible schmuck they are to be sympathized with or even celebrated?

Just wondering.

SimpleMinded: "The government spends considerably less on military expenditures then on 'entitlements'. Nice euphamism. The dole."

Bullshit!

http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2003/bud34.html

"The government spends considerably less on military expenditures then on 'entitlements'. Nice euphamism. The dole."

Now, from your own hyperlink my hyperventilating little friend:

2002

Descretionary Spending:
Defense: 336
Non-Defense: 382

Mandatory Spending:
Social Security: 456
Medicare: 223
Medicaid: 145
Other Mandatory: 310

Now, 336 is considerably less than 382, isn't it junior? And if you were to take into account all the 'mandatory' entitlements, we see that defense expenditures are a small amount indeed.

nice try you lying fuck, but here are the facts minus your pathological spin.

Budget 2002 (in billions)

Defense - 348
General Science, Space & Tech - 21.8

Now if you bring your attention to table S-7, there is a breakdown of discretionary expeditures, or "dole" as you called it, it includes;
Legislative Branch - 3.1
Judicial Branch - 4.4
Agriculture - 19.8
HHS & HUD - 89.3

So if you look at what is listed as discretionary, you will see that the most, THE MOST any reasonable person (and I realize this excludes you) could consider "the dole" is 90 Billion.

I don't know what you learned sleeping through school, but 370 is greater that 90, brighteyes.

I exhort all to look at the link for themselves to see how their money is being spent, don't take my word for it, and DEFINITELY don't takes the Simpleton's word for it.

yeah but let's not stop at 90, let's eliminate the whole 348 billion!

You have a unique debating style, KPC. You present a link as a support to your argument, I take the information directly from this link that shows that we spend more on 'the dole' than we do on defense, and you accuse me of lying. Oh, and also display your mastery of the profane. I wonder if you kiss your mother with that mouth.
Election Day is hear. Vote for Bill Simon. All will be well.

You idiot...only to an wingnut like you would refer to spending on the Judicial Branch as "the dole".....with a brain (hence YOUR problem) can read this thread and see how full of shit you are...but, hey what else is new?

Bill Simon!?!?!?! BILL SIMON???? Why would we vote for that crook when we already got one in the gov's mansion???? Boy, you just love those useless rich boys who never worked on a job that Daddy didn't rig for 'em....what a loser....he couldn't get elected dog catcher in Orange County...Republicans are dead in CA for years....

...so, eleven more years before retirement, huh...after the last 14 on "the dole"....

No, what I said is that we spend more on 'the dole' than on defense. One can easily make the argument that Social Security is a form of 'the dole' and that alone is half again as large as the defense budget. Similarly, one could look at Medicare and Medicaid the same way.
So stop your hyperventilating, accept your inferiority, and give up.
Simon for Governor.

...one can easily make the argument that the sky is plaid...but one would look like an idiot, wouldn't one? Similarly, one can assert all kind of idiocy as fact, and see victory in humiliating defeat...all sorts of delusions are possible...

..but that does not make it real. More money is spent, AND WASTED on the military than ANY other discretionary expenditure. Fact. Live with it.

Cute insertion of the word 'discretionary' in your last post. Could it be that even KPC's eyes are open at last to the fact that 'entitlements' make up the majority of 'mandatory' spending?

Oh, and as of right now, the Defense portion of discretionary spending is less than non-defense, as you well know.

Vote Simon.

More money spent and wasted on the Military than any other discretionary spending. What about non-discretionary...well go get a fuckin' dictionary and look it up, Mr. 14 Years and Not Much to Show for It Except How Much Taxpayer Money was Wasted Paying You...how much does a private in the National Guard make, anyway?

As usual your posts are devoid of reason and tact.

To define something as 'mandatory' doesn't make it any less part of the dole. It is 'mandatory' to pay for Medicare. Medicare is free medicines and services for the poor and those who can't pay for it. It is the dole. To deny this is to demonstrate your inability to accept reality.

I await with bated breath your next witicism.

...I was waiting for a train in NYC one day when a man began ranting at me about how he had a device in his head allowing Lee Iaccoca to listen to his thoughts....

...now, I know he really believed what he was saying, but somehow I just could not see the benefit in arguing with him about it...


...you remind me of that guy....

Concede with grace, KPC. It would be more becoming.

OK...I concede that you are a ranting maniac who never had an original thought in your entire life....arguing with you would serve no purpose, as YOU serve no purpose...you exist only to be ridiculed....to provide me with sport...you exist for my whim and entertainment...a mere distraction to pass the time....you are my doggie....