There's a difference between extending an empire and fulfilling an imperial objective: The Romans might occasionally send out a legion or two to punish the barbarians for incursions into Romanized provinces - fulfilling imperial objectives without engaging in conquest. In adddition, there are different definitions of empire, and different theories of empire. To the Marxist-Leninists, the "real" imperial force in the modern world isn't any particular nation-state, but rather the empire of Capital. And NeoCons as well as their critics have spoken of a "soft imperialism" under the US, which doesn't or wouldn't have to take over a country in order to bring it into the American-dominated international system. For a number of historical reasons, the idea of imperialism came in the 20th Century to be identified with racism, oppression, and the expropriation of the resources of weak nations by stronger ones, just as in the previous century it was postively identified with, among other things, the beneficial administration of "uncivilized" and underdeveloped regions of the world. If you want to read an even-handed discussion of the US as an empire, or at least as a world leader undertaking imperial burdens, you really ought to read that New York Times magazine article I've linked on ET a couple of times now. The essay includes numerous illuminating observations about the current geopolitical situation, including the European-American divide. For instance, on the main topic: "Ever since George Washington warned his countrymen against foreign entanglements, empire abroad has been seen as the republic's permanent temptation and its potential nemesis. Yet what word but ''empire'' describes the awesome thing that America is becoming? It is the only nation that polices the world through five global military commands; maintains more than a million men and women at arms on four continents; deploys carrier battle groups on watch in every ocean; guarantees the survival of countries from Israel to South Korea; drives the wheels of global trade and commerce; and fills the hearts and minds of an entire planet with its dreams and desires." Entire essay at : http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/05/magazine/05EMPIRE.html?pagewanted=1&tntemail1
just look at the 5 permanent UN security members: who wants war - brits and us who doesn't - russia,china,france who has oil contracts to pump oil - france, russia and china who doesn't - brits and us how do the france,russia,china get their hands on the oil? UN sanctions have to be lifted by inspectors saying iraq is free of WMD. if a regime change occurs who will get special considerations? and who wont? now add in until 1972 the US and Uk had a 2/3rd partnership deal with iraq on its oil. in 1972 iraq nationalized its oil and kicked out US and UK. someone posted who are the largest oil companies - yeah US companies are not the largest (but your comparing them to nationalized oil) but if you add up 2 largest US oil companies and they alone are 2nd place on the world list. china is fourth. regime change or not this could change who is at the top of oil.
some thoughts/questions: -has anyone considered that oil is a factor because it is a source of revenue for Saddam's WMD dreams. i.e. if Saddam did not have access to oil money, he would not be able to afford weapons labs, nuclear reactors, scientist payoffs etc. So ironically, the notion that "if not for oil we wouldn't be going in" is partially true in a sense, in that if not for oil Saddam would be a poor and scrawny tyrant- and much weaker at that- instead of a bloated and entrenched tyrant with the ways and means to fund armageddon. -much has been said about America wanting to 'steal' Iraq's oil, which is patently ridiculous (and thankfully the left has backed off this charge as common sense was simply too glaring even for them). but has anyone considered the fact that Saddam himself is literally stealing Iraq's oil in every sense of the word, and diverting the revenues exclusively to his own ends? -is it ethical, or indeed even possible, to morally legitimize a brutal dictatorship engaged in mass theft and deprivation, and by extension murder, on a grand scale? (Hate Bush all you want, but he is still an elected leader of a free country.) Are countries like france and russia not implicitly legitimizing a murdering and thieving dictatorship by accepting the status quo of Saddam's rule, and helping him with word and deed (and even cold hard cash)? If yes, then what moral authority can they claim?
-Sticking with the moral authority theme, does anyone out there remember Bosnia ('95) and Kosovo ('99)? More specifically, does anyone remember the arguments put forth in favor of US intervention in both those instances? Consider Clinton's speech below. Keep in mind the democratic party's overall reaction to this speech at the time, and their overall position at the time in regards to human rights, global stability, and preemptive doctrine. Now fast forward a few years, substitute Hussein for Milosovic, Middle East for Europe, add in a credible threat to the United States (as opposed to a regional conflict), and try to tell me there isn't some seriously disgusting hypocrisy coming from the left. Text of Clinton's Kosovo Address March 24, 1999 My fellow Americans, today our armed forces joined our NATO allies in airstrikes against Serbian forces responsible for the brutality in Kosovo. We have acted with resolve for several reasons. We act to protect thousands of innocent people in Kosovo from a mounting military offensive. We act to prevent a wider war, to defuse a powder keg at the heart of Europe, that has exploded twice before in this century with catastrophic results. We act to stand united with our allies for peace. By acting now, we are upholding our values, protecting our interests, and advancing the cause of peace. Tonight I want to speak with you about the tragedy in Kosovo and why it matters to America that we work with our allies to end it. First, let me explain what it is that we are responding to. Kosovo is a province of Serbia, in the middle of south eastern Europe and about 160 miles east of Italy. That's less than the distance between Washington and New York, and only about 70 miles north of Greece. Its people are mostly ethnic Albanian and mostly Muslim. In 1989 Serbia's leader Slobodan Milosevic, the same leader who started the wars in Bosnia and Croatia, and moved against Slovenia in the last decade, stripped Kosovo of the constitutional autonomy it's people enjoyed, thus denying them their right to speak their language, run their schools, shape their daily lives. For years, Kosovar's struggled peacefully to get their rights back. When President Milosevic sent his troops and police to crush them, the struggle grew violent. Last fall, our diplomacy, backed by the threat of force from our NATO alliance, stopped the fighting for awhile, and rescued tens of thousands of people from freezing and starvation in the hills where they had fled to save their lives. And last month, with our allies and Russia, we proposed a peace agreement to end the fighting for good. The Kosovar leaders signed that agreement last week. Even though it does not give them all they want, even though their people were still being savaged, they saw that a just peace is better than a long and unwinable war. The Serbian leaders, on the other hand, refused even to discuss key elements of the peace agreement. As the Kosovars were saying yes to peace, Serbia stationed 40,000 troops in and around Kosovo in preparation for a major offensive and in clear violation of the commitments they had made. Now they've started moving from village to village, shelling civilians and torching their houses. We've seen innocent people taken from their homes, forced to kneel in the dirt and sprayed with bullets. Kosovar men dragged from their families, fathers and sons together, lined up, and shot in cold blood. This is not war in the traditional sense. It is an attack by tanks and artillery on a largely defenseless people, whose leaders already have agreed to peace. Ending this tragedy is a moral imperative. It is also important to America's national interests. Take a look at this map. Kosovo is a small place, but it sits on a major fault line between Europe, Asia, and the Middle East, at the meeting place of Islam and both the Western and Orthodox branches of Christianity. To the south are our allies, Greece and Turkey. To the north, our new democratic allies in Central Europe. And all around Kosovo, there are other small countries, struggling with their own economic and political challenges, countries that could be overthrown by a large new wave of refugees from Kosovo. All the ingredients for a major war are there. Ancient grievances, struggling democracies and in the center of it all, a dictator in Serbia who has done nothing since the Cold War ended, but start new wars and pour gasoline on the flames of ethnic and religious division. Sarajevo, the capital of neighboring Bosnia, is where World War I began. World War II and the Holocaust engulfed this region. In both wars Europe was slow to recognize the dangers, and the United States waited even longer to enter the conflicts. Just imagine if leaders back then had acted wisely and early enough, how many lives could have been saved? How many Americans would not have had to die? We learned some of the same lessons in Bosnia just a few years ago. The world did not act early enough to stop that war either. And let's not forget what happened. Innocent people herded into concentration camps, children gunned down by snipers on their way to school, soccer fields and parks turned into cemeteries. A quarter of a million people killed, not because of anything they had done, but because of who they were. Two million Bosnians became refugees. This was genocide in the heart of Europe, not in 1945, but in 1995. Not in some grainy newsreel from our parents' and grandparents' time, but in our own time, testing our humanity and our resolve. At the time, many people believed nothing could be done to end the bloodshed in Bosnia. They said, ``Well, that's just the way those people in the Balkans are.'' But when we and our allies joined with courageous Bosnians to stand up to the aggressors, we helped to end the war. We learned that in the Balkans, inaction in the face of brutality, simply invites brutality. But firmness can stop armies and save lives. We must apply that lesson in Kosovo, before what happened in Bosnia, happens there, too. Over the last few months, we have done everything we possibly could to solve this problem peacefully. Secretary Albright has worked tirelessly for a negotiated agreement. Mr. Milosevic has refused. On Sunday, I sent Ambassador Dick Holbrooke to Serbia to make clear to him again on behalf of the United States and our NATO allies that he must honor his own commitments and stop his repression or face military action. Again, he refused. Today, we and our 18 NATO allies agreed to do what we said we would do, what we must do to restore the peace. Our mission is clear - to demonstrate the seriousness of NATO's purpose so that the Serbian leaders understand the imperative of reversing course, to deter an even bloodier offensive against innocent civilians in Kosovo and, if necessary, to seriously damage the Serbian military's capacity to harm the people of Kosovo. In short, if President Milosevic will not make peace, we will limit his ability to make war. Now I want to be clear with you, there are risks in this military action - risk to our pilots and the people on the ground. Serbia's air defenses are strong. It could decide to intensify its assault on Kosovo, or to seek to harm us or our allies elsewhere. If it does, we will deliver a forceful response. Hopefully, Mr. Milosevic will realize his present course is self-destructive and unsustainable. If he decides to accept the peace agreement and demilitarize Kosovo, NATO has agreed to help to implement it with a peacekeeping force. If NATO's invited to do so, our troops should take part in that mission to keep the peace, but I do not intend to put our troops in Kosovo to fight a war. Do our interests in Kosovo justify the dangers to our armed forces? I thought long and hard about that question. I am convinced that the dangers of acting are far outweighed by the dangers of not acting - dangerous to defenseless people and to our national interests. If we and our allies were to allow this war to continue with no response, President Milosevic would read our hesitation as a license to kill. There would be many massacres, tens of thousands refugees, victims crying our for revenge. Right now, our firmness is the only hope the people of Kosovo have to be able to live in their own country, without having to fear for their own lives. Remember, we asked them to accept peace and they did. We asked them to promise to lay down their arms and they agreed. We pledged that we, the United States and the other 18 nations of NATO would stick by them if they did the right thing. We cannot let them down now. Imagine what would happen if we and our allies instead decided just to look the other way as these people were massacred on NATO's doorstep. That would discredit NATO, the cornerstone on which our security has rested for 50 years now.
We must also remember that this is a conflict with no natural national boundaries. Let me ask you to look again at a map. The red dots are towns the Serbs have attacked. The arrows show the movement of refugees north, east and south. Already, this movement is threatening the young democracy in Macedonia, which has its own Albanian minority and a Turkish minority. Already, Serbian forces have made forays into Albania from which Kosovars have drawn support. Albania has a Greek minority. Let a fire burn here in this area, and the flames will spread. Eventually, key U.S. allies could be drawn into a wider conflict - a war we would be forced to confront later, only at far greater risk and greater cost. I have a responsibility as president to deal with problems such as this before they do permanent harm to our national interests. America has a responsibility to stand with our allies when they are trying to save innocent lives and preserve peace, freedom and stability in Europe. That is what we are doing in Kosovo. If we've learned anything from the century drawing to a close, it is that if America is going to be prosperous and secure, we need a Europe that is prosperous, secure, undivided and free. We need a Europe that is coming together, not falling apart. A Europe that shares our values, and shares the burdens of leadership. That is the foundation on which the security of our children will depend. That is why I have supported the political and economic unification of Europe. That is why we brought Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic into NATO, and redefined its mission. And reached out to Russia and Ukraine for new partnerships. Now what are the challenges to that vision of a peaceful, secure, united, stable Europe? The challenge of strengthening a partnership with a democratic Russia, that despite our disagreements, is a constructive partner in the work of building peace. The challenge of resolving the tensions between Greece and Turkey, and building bridges with the Islamic world. And finally, the challenge of ending instability in the Balkans, so that these bitter, ethnic problems in Europe are resolved by the force of argument, not the force of bombs. So that future generations of Americans do not have to cross the Atlantic to fight another terrible war. It is this challenge that we and our allies are facing in Kosovo. That is why we have acted now - because we care about saving innocent lives, because we have an interest in avoiding an even crueler and costlier war and because our children need and deserve a peaceful, stable, free Europe. Our thoughts and prayers tonight must be with the men and women of our armed forces, who are undertaking this mission for the sake of our values and our children's future. May God bless them, and may God bless America. ============ try to tell me the parallels aren't striking. and that the left's political flipflop, now that the stakes are infinitely higher, isn't sickening. any takers?
in my opinion its not about the US having control of Iraqi oil - its about russia, china and france not having control. getting rid of wmd is part of it
Well I think Mandela was right to remind us that the first and only country to have used weapons of mass destructions is the US. I don't think they needed to drop atomic bombs on Japan to end the war. It's been suggested they could have given an ultimatum with evidence of the bomb's existence to Japanese officials. It was an experiment on live humans that ushered in the Cold War and caused babyboomers to live in fear of a nuclear holocaust. As for Bush it is clear he doesn't "think properly".The US human rights record has also been very questionablesince 9/11 with morethan 1200 people arrested and detained indefinitely and in secret just because they were Muslims and out of status.
who cares who "controls" the oil... the real question is: who gets to pocket iraq's oil sales revenues... right now it's saddam... if the US kicks saddam then it's going to be iraq's people, if all goes well. Is any big US oil corporation going to increase its sales revenues after Iraq's occupation? not likely. And before you change the discussion to the US corporations that WILL make money off the war, may I remind you all the US corporations that are and WILL BE losing money because of Iraq's conflict? Are they war cheerleaders too because of the OIL? you have been reading too much chomsky recently obviously, because for him it's all about who controls who, who get pissed, who doesn't, and the US is to blame for all the sh%t that happens in the world. logic and clear thinking are absent in his "view of the world". His biggest mistake is asserting that people around the world hate us because of what we do (economic/foreign policy). But the truth is they hate us more because of what we are. Everything else is just rationalization: we are arrogant, we are ignorant, blah blah Just read fairplay's posts and maybe you will get convinced of what I'm saying.
Why Kicking would be trying to defend Mandela's indefensible comments is beyond me. Some of Mandela's greatest admirers, including many on the anti-war side, have condemned his statements. Frankly, I don't believe Kicking is thinking properly. Untrue: The category Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) is a catch-all that includes chemical and biological as well as nuclear weapons. In theory, it could include some other, more exotic weapons, but that's beside the point. Biological weapons, broadly defined, have been used many times in the history of warfare. Poison gas was used in large quantities during World War I, and, more recently, by Saddam Hussein himself, both in his war with Iran and against the Kurds. It was believed, though never authoritatively verified, to my knowledge, that the Soviets made substantial use of chemical weapons in Afghanistan. Even without broadening the definition to include machine gun regiments, incendiary bombs, and political organizations, etc., it is by no means a stretch to say that the Nazis employed weapons of mass destruction (poison gas, in particular) against the Jews and other inmates of the Concentration Camps. Yeah, and I guess we could have given sanctions another try, too... Even the actual detonation of the first bomb at Hiroshima wasn't sufficient to cause Japanese surrender. There was significant resistance to surrender even after the second bomb. As hard as it is for us today to believe or understand, when the Japanese under the "Imperial Way" movement claimed to prefer death to dishonor, they largely meant it. The US was said to believe, with good reason, that the subjugation of Japan by "conventional" means would entail on the order of 1 million American casualties - along with much larger numbers of Japanese sacrificing themselves pointlessly for the sake of the Emperor. There were numerous other factors and concerns that went into President Truman's decision too complicated to go into here, and this all goes to the fallacy of imposing present-day standards and simplistic judgments on events of 60 years ago. By 1945, tens of millions of people had been killed as a direct result of the war, including an estimated 20 million citizens of the Soviet Union. Like the Germans, who, in addition to annihilating targeted social groups en masse invented so-called strategic bombing (i.e., bombing of civilian targets in order to weaken the enemy's ability to resist), the Japanese made the mass murder of civilian populations part of their national policy from early on, perhaps most famously during the "Rape of Nanking," during which hundreds of thousands of defenseless Chinese were put to death amidst a multi-month orgy of rape, torture, and genocide. http://www.tribo.org/nanking/ The US and its allies also engaged in horrific excesses, large and small, throughout World War II, but "total war" has a way of desensitizing where not thoroughly brutalizing all participants, and there's little room for doubt on the historical record who began the escalation and who engaged in by far the larger amounts of it. The whole category of WMD is a recent invention, speaking to narrow if extremely serious present-day concerns. When the atomic bombs were first used, they were an awesome technological refinement, but mass destruction of various types was on display worldwide, as it often has been during wars for thousands of years. You would have preferred a Hot War? Or would you prefer that no one was afraid of nuclear weapons? Mandela's statement was a direct and rather ironic insult aimed at Bush, not at any specific policy. It's ironic because it tends to emphasize the overall impression from Mandela's comments and even from the manner in which he made them: That Mandela is the one who has been having mental difficulties. I don't know whom you would like to appoint as the international judge of proper thinking. If I held the position, I would consider many indviduals in and around the anti-war movement subject to indictment, along with not a few on the other side as well. That's what's so great about democracy - every idiot is encouraged to think that his or her opinion, no matter how ill-informed or narrowly considered, is significant. Please give your evidence that 1,200 people are under detention, or that very many of them were held for any significant period, "just because they were Muslims and out of status."