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Cold War II
by Noam Chomsky; August 27, 2007
These are exciting days in Washington, as the government directs
its energies to the demanding task of "containing Iran" in what
Washington Post correspondent Robin Wright, joining others, calls
"Cold War II."[1]
During Cold War I, the task was to contain two awesome forces.
The lesser and more moderate force was "an implacable enemy whose
avowed objective is world domination by whatever means and at whatever
cost." Hence "if the United States is to survive," it will have to
adopt a "repugnant philosophy" and reject "acceptable norms of human
conduct" and the "long-standing American concepts of `fair play'" that
had been exhibited with such searing clarity in the conquest of the
national territory, the Philippines, Haiti and other beneficiaries of
"the idealistic new world bent on ending inhumanity," as the newspaper
of record describes our noble mission.[2] The judgments about the
nature of the super-Hitler and the necessary response are those of
General Jimmy Doolittle, in a critical assessment of the CIA
commissioned by President Eisenhower in 1954. They are quite
consistent with those of the Truman administration liberals, the "wise
men" who were "present at the creation," notoriously in NSC 68 but in
fact quite consistently.
In the face of the Kremlin's unbridled aggression in every corner
of the world, it is perhaps understandable that the US resisted in
defense of human values with a savage display of torture, terror,
subversion and violence while doing "everything in its power to alter
or abolish any regime not openly allied with America," as Tim Weiner
summarizes the doctrine of the Eisenhower administration in his recent
history of the CIA.[3] And just as the Truman liberals easily matched
their successors in fevered rhetoric about the implacable enemy and
its campaign to rule the world, so did John F. Kennedy, who bitterly
condemned the "monolithic and ruthless conspiracy," and dismissed the
proposal of its leader (Khrushchev) for sharp mutual cuts in offensive
weaponry, then reacted to his unilateral implementation of these
proposals with a huge military build-up. The Kennedy brothers also
quickly surpassed Eisenhower in violence and terror, as they
"unleashed covert action with an unprecedented intensity" (Wiener),
doubling Eisenhower's annual record of major CIA covert operations,
with horrendous consequences worldwide, even a close brush with
terminal nuclear war.[4]
But at least it was possible to deal with Russia, unlike the
fiercer enemy, China. The more thoughtful scholars recognized that
Russia was poised uneasily between civilization and barbarism. As
Henry Kissinger later explained in his academic essays, only the West
has undergone the Newtonian revolution and is therefore "deeply
committed to the notion that the real world is external to the
observer," while the rest still believe "that the real world is almost
completely internal to the observer," the "basic division" that is
"the deepest problem of the contemporary international order." But
Russia, unlike third word peasants who think that rain and sun are
inside their heads, was perhaps coming to the realization that the
world is not just a dream, Kissinger felt.
Not so the still more savage and bloodthirsty enemy, China, which
for liberal Democrat intellectuals at various times rampaged as a "a
Slavic Manchukuo," a blind puppet of its Kremlin master, or a monster
utterly unconstrained as it pursued its crazed campaign to crush the
world in its tentacles, or whatever else circumstances demanded. The
remarkable tale of doctrinal fanaticism from the 1940s to the '70s,
which makes contemporary rhetoric seem rather moderate, is reviewed by
James Peck in his highly revealing study of the national security
culture, Washington's China.
In later years, there were attempts to mimic the valiant deeds of
the defenders of virtue from the two villainous global conquerors and
their loyal slaves - for example, when the Gipper strapped on his
cowboy boots and declared a National Emergency because Nicaraguan
hordes were only two days from Harlingen Texas, though as he
courageously informed the press, despite the tremendous odds "I refuse
to give up. I remember a man named Winston Churchill who said, `Never
give in. Never, never, never.' So we won't." With consequences that
need not be reviewed.
Even with the best of efforts, however, the attempts never were
able to recapture the glorious days of Cold War I. But now, at last,
those heights might be within reach, as another implacable enemy bent
on world conquest has arisen, which we must contain before it destroys
us all: Iran.
Perhaps it's a lift to the spirits to be able to recover those
heady Cold War days when at least there was a legitimate force to
contain, however dubious the pretexts and disgraceful the means. But
it is instructive to take a closer look at the contours of Cold War II
as they are being designed by "the former Kremlinologists now running
U.S. foreign policy, such as Rice and Gates" (Wright).
The task of containment is to establish "a bulwark against Iran's
growing influence in the Middle East," Mark Mazzetti and Helene Cooper
explain in the New York Times (July 31). To contain Iran's influence
we must surround Iran with US and NATO ground forces, along with
massive naval deployments in the Persian Gulf and of course
incomparable air power and weapons of mass destruction. And we must
provide a huge flow of arms to what Condoleezza Rice calls "the forces
of moderation and reform" in the region, the brutal tyrannies of Egypt
and Saudi Arabia and, with particular munificence, Israel, by now
virtually an adjunct of the militarized high-tech US economy. All to
contain Iran's influence. A daunting challenge indeed.
And daunting it is. In Iraq, Iranian support is welcomed by much
of the majority Shi'ite population. In an August visit to Teheran,
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki met with the supreme leader Ali
Khamenei, President Ahmadinejad and other senior officials, and
thanked Tehran for its "positive and constructive" role in improving
security in Iraq, eliciting a sharp reprimand from President Bush, who
"declares Teheran a regional peril and asserts the Iraqi leader must
understand," to quote the headline of the Los Angeles Times report on
al-Maliki's intellectual deficiencies. A few days before, also
greatly to Bush's discomfiture, Afghan President Hamid Karzai,
Washington's favorite, described Iran as "a helper and a solution" in
his country.[5] Similar problems abound beyond Iran's immediate
neighbors. In Lebanon, according to polls, most Lebanese see Iranian-
backed Hezbollah "as a legitimate force defending their country from
Israel," Wright reports. And in Palestine, Iranian-backed Hamas won a
free election, eliciting savage punishment of the Palestinian
population by the US and Israel for the crime of voting "the wrong
way," another episode in "democracy promotion."
But no matter. The aim of US militancy and the arms flow to the
moderates is to counter "what everyone in the region believes is a
flexing of muscles by a more aggressive Iran," according to an unnamed
senior U.S. government official - "everyone" being the technical term
used to refer to Washington and its more loyal clients.[6] Iran's
aggression consists in its being welcomed by many within the region,
and allegedly supporting resistance to the US occupation of
neighboring Iraq.
It's likely, though little discussed, that a prime concern about
Iran's influence is to the East, where in mid-August "Russia and China
today host Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at a summit of a
Central Asian security club designed to counter U.S. influence in the
region," the business press reports.[7] The "security club" is the
Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), which has been slowly taking
shape in recent years. Its membership includes not only the two
giants Russia and China, but also the energy-rich Central Asian states
Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Tajikistan. Hamid Karzai of
Afghanistan was a guest of honor at the August meeting. "In another
unwelcome development for the Americans, Turkmenistan's President
Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov also accepted an invitation to attend the
summit," another step its improvement of relations with Russia,
particularly in energy, reversing a long-standing policy of isolation
from Russia. "Russia in May secured a deal to build a new pipeline to
import more gas from Turkmenistan, bolstering its dominant hold on
supplies to Europe and heading off a competing U.S.-backed plan that
would bypass Russian territory."[8]
Along with Iran, there are three other official observer states:
India, Pakistan and Mongolia. Washington's request for similar status
was denied. In 2005 the SCO called for a timetable for termination of
any US military presence in Central Asia. The participants at the
August meeting flew to the Urals to attend the first joint Russia-
China military exercises on Russian soil.
Association of Iran with the SCO extends its inroads into the
Middle East, where China has been increasing trade and other relations
with the jewel in the crown, Saudi Arabia. There is an oppressed
Shi'ite population in Saudi Arabia that is also susceptible to Iran's
influence - and happens to sit on most of Saudi oil. About 40% of
Middle East oil is reported to be heading East, not West.[9] As the
flow Eastward increases, US control declines over this lever of world
domination, a "stupendous source of strategic power," as the State
Department described Saudi oil 60 years ago.
In Cold War I, the Kremlin had imposed an iron curtain and built
the Berlin Wall to contain Western influence. In Cold War II, Wright
reports, the former Kremlinologists framing policy are imposing a
"green curtain" to bar Iranian influence. In short, government-media
doctrine is that the Iranian threat is rather similar to the Western
threat that the Kremlin sought to contain, and the US is eagerly
taking on the Kremlin's role in the thrilling "new Cold War."
All of this is presented without noticeable concern.
Nevertheless, the recognition that the US government is modeling
itself on Stalin and his successors in the new Cold War must be
arousing at least some flickers of embarrassment. Perhaps that is how
we can explain the ferocious Washington Post editorial announcing that
Iran has escalated its aggressiveness to a Hot War: "the Revolutionary
Guard, a radical state within Iran's Islamic state, is waging war
against the United States and trying to kill as many American soldiers
as possible." The US must therefore "fight back," the editors thunder,
finding quite "puzzling...the murmurs of disapproval from European
diplomats and others who say they favor using diplomacy and economic
pressure, rather than military action, to rein in Iran," even in the
face of its outright aggression. The evidence that Iran is waging war
against the US is now conclusive. After all, it comes from an
administration that has never deceived the American people, even
improving on the famous stellar honesty of its predecessors.
Suppose that for once Washington's charges happen to be true, and
Iran really is providing Shi'ite militias with roadside bombs that
kill American forces, perhaps even making use of the some of the
advanced weaponry lavishly provided to the Revolutionary Guard by
Ronald Reagan in order to fund the illegal war against Nicaragua,
under the pretext of arms for hostages (the number of hostages tripled
during these endeavors).[10] If the charges are true, then Iran could
properly be charged with a minuscule fraction of the iniquity of the
Reagan administration, which provided Stinger missiles and other high-
tech military aid to the "insurgents" seeking to disrupt Soviet
efforts to bring stability and justice to Afghanistan, as they saw
it. Perhaps Iran is even guilty of some of the crimes of the
Roosevelt administration, which assisted terrorist partisans attacking
peaceful and sovereign Vichy France in 1940-41, and had thus declared
war on Germany even before Pearl Harbor.
One can pursue these questions further. The CIA station chief in
Pakistan in 1981, Howard Hart, reports that "I was the first chief of
station ever sent abroad with this wonderful order: `Go kill Soviet
soldiers'. Imagine! I loved it." Of course "the mission was not to
liberate Afghanistan," Tim Wiener writes in his history of the CIA,
repeating the obvious. But "it was a noble goal," he writes. Killing
Russians with no concern for the fate of Afghans is a "noble goal."
But support for resistance to a US invasion and occupation would be a
vile act and declaration of war.
Without irony, the Bush administration and the media charge that
Iran is "meddling" in Iraq, otherwise presumably free from foreign
interference. The evidence is partly technical. Do the serial numbers
on the Improvised Explosive Devices really trace back to Iran? If so,
does the leadership of Iran know about the IEDs, or only the Iranian
Revolutionary Guard. Settling the debate, the White House plans to
brand the Revolutionary Guard as a "specially designated global
terrorist" force, an unprecedented action against a national military
branch, authorizing Washington to undertake a wide range of punitive
actions. Watching in disbelief, much of the world asks whether the US
military, invading and occupying Iran's neighbors, might better merit
this charge -- or its Israeli client, now about to receive a huge
increase in military aid to commemorate 40 years of harsh occupation
and illegal settlement, and its fifth invasion of Lebanon a year ago.
It is instructive that Washington's propaganda framework is
reflexively accepted, apparently without notice, in US and other
Western commentary and reporting, apart from the marginal fringe of
what is called 'the loony left." What is considered "criticism" is
skepticism as to whether all of Washington's charges about Iranian
aggression in Iraq are true. It might be an interesting research
project to see how closely the propaganda of Russia, Nazi Germany, and
other aggressors and occupiers matched the standards of today's
liberal press and commentators..
The comparisons are of course unfair. Unlike German and Russian
occupiers, American forces are in Iraq by right, on the principle, too
obvious even to enunciate, that the US owns the world. Therefore, as
a matter of elementary logic, the US cannot invade and occupy another
country. The US can only defend and liberate others. No other
category exists. Predecessors, including the most monstrous, have
commonly sworn by the same principle, but again there is an obvious
difference: they were Wrong, and we are Right. QED.
Another comparison comes to mind, which is studiously ignored when
we are sternly admonished of the ominous consequences that might
follow withdrawal of US troops from Iraq. The preferred analogy is
Indochina, highlighted in a shameful speech by the President on August
22. That analogy can perhaps pass muster among those who have
succeeded in effacing from their minds the record of US actions in
Indochina, including the destruction of much of Vietnam and the
murderous bombing of Laos and Cambodia as the US began its withdrawal
from the wreckage of South Vietnam. In Cambodia, the bombing was in
accord with Kissinger's genocidal orders: "anything that flies on
anything that moves" - actions that drove "an enraged populace into
the arms of an insurgency [the Khmer Rouge] that had enjoyed
relatively little support before the Kissinger-Nixon bombing was
inaugurated," as Cambodia specialists Owen Taylor and Ben Kiernan
observe in a highly important study that passed virtually without
notice, in which they reveal that the bombing was five times the
incredible level reported earlier, greater than all allied bombing in
World War II. Completely suppressing all relevant facts, it is then
possible for the President and many commentators to present Khmer
Rouge crimes as a justification for continuing to devastate Iraq.
But although the grotesque Indochina analogy receives much
attention, the obvious analogy is ignored: the Russian withdrawal from
Afghanistan, which, as Soviet analysts predicted, led to shocking
violence and destruction as the country was taken over by Reagan's
favorites, who amused themselves by such acts as throwing acid in the
faces of women in Kabul they regarded as too liberated, and then
virtually destroyed the city and much else, creating such havoc and
terror that the population actually welcomed the Taliban. That
analogy could indeed be invoked without utter absurdity by advocates
of "staying the course," but evidently it is best forgotten.
Under the heading "Secretary Rice's Mideast mission: contain
Iran," the press reports Rice's warning that Iran is "the single most
important single-country challenge to...US interests in the Middle
East." That is a reasonable judgment. Given the long-standing
principle that Washington must do "everything in its power to alter or
abolish any regime not openly allied with America," Iran does pose a
unique challenge, and it is natural that the task of containing
Iranian influence should be a high priority.
As elsewhere, Bush administration rhetoric is relatively mild in
this case. For the Kennedy administration, "Latin America was the
most dangerous area in the world" when there was a threat that the
progressive Cheddi Jagan might win a free election in British Guiana,
overturned by CIA shenanigans that handed the country over to the
thuggish racist Forbes Burnham.[11] A few years earlier, Iraq was "the
most dangerous place in the world" (CIA director Allen Dulles) after
General Abdel Karim Qassim broke the Anglo-American condominium over
Middle East oil, overthrowing the pro-US monarchy, which had been
heavily infiltrated by the CIA.[12] A primary concern was that Qassim
might join Nasser, then the supreme Middle East devil, in using the
incomparable energy resources of the Middle East for the domestic.
The issue for Washington was not so much access as control. At the
time and for many years after, Washington was purposely exhausting
domestic oil resources in the interests of "national security,"
meaning security for the profits of Texas oil men, like the failed
entrepreneur who now sits in the Oval Office. But as high-level
planner George Kennan had explained well before, we cannot relax our
guard when there is any interference with "protection of our
resources" (which accidentally happen to be somewhere else).
Unquestionably, Iran's government merits harsh condemnation,
though it has not engaged in worldwide terror, subversion, and
aggression, following the US model - which extends to today's Iran as
well, if ABC news is correct in reporting that the US is supporting
Pakistan-based Jundullah, which is carrying out terrorist acts inside
Iran.[13] The sole act of aggression attributed to Iran is the
conquest of two small islands in the Gulf - under Washington's close
ally the Shah. In addition to internal repression - heightened, as
Iranian dissidents regularly protest, by US militancy -- the prospect
that Iran might develop nuclear weapons also is deeply troubling.
Though Iran has every right to develop nuclear energy, no one -
including the majority of Iranians - wants it to have nuclear
weapons. That would add to the threat to survival posed much more
seriously by its near neighbors Pakistan, India, and Israel, all
nuclear armed with the blessing of the US, which most of the world
regards as the leading threat to world peace, for evident reasons.
Iran rejects US control of the Middle East, challenging
fundamental policy doctrine, but it hardly poses a military threat. On
the contrary, it has been the victim of outside powers for years: in
recent memory, when the US and Britain overthrew its parliamentary
government and installed a brutal tyrant in 1953, and when the US
supported Saddam Hussein's murderous invasion, slaughtering hundreds
of thousands of Iranians, many with chemical weapons, without the
"international community" lifting a finger - something that Iranians
do not forget as easily as the perpetrators. And then under severe
sanctions as a punishment for disobedience.
Israel regards Iran as a threat. Israel seeks to dominate the
region with no interference, and Iran might be some slight
counterbalance, while also supporting domestic forces that do not bend
to Israel's will. It may, however, be useful to bear in mind that
Hamas has accepted the international consensus on a two-state
settlement on the international border, and Hezbollah, along with
Iran, has made clear that it would accept any outcome approved by
Palestinians, leaving the US and Israel isolated in their traditional
rejectionism.[14]
But Iran is hardly a military threat to Israel. And whatever
threat there might be could be overcome if the US would accept the
view of the great majority of its own citizens and of Iranians and
permit the Middle East to become a nuclear-weapons free zone,
including Iran and Israel, and US forces deployed there. One may also
recall that UN Security Council Resolution 687 of 3 April 1991, to
which Washington appeals when convenient, calls for "establishing in
the Middle East a zone free from weapons of mass destruction and all
missiles for their delivery."
It is widely recognized that use of military force in Iran would
risk blowing up the entire region, with untold consequences beyond. We
know from polls that in the surrounding countries, where the Iranian
government is hardly popular -- Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan --
nevertheless large majorities prefer even a nuclear-armed Iran to any
form of military action against it.
The rhetoric about Iran has escalated to the point where both
political parties and practically the whole US press accept it as
legitimate and, in fact, honorable, that "all options are on the
table," to quote Hillary Clinton and everybody else, possibly even
nuclear weapons. "All options on the table" means that Washington
threatens war.
The UN Charter outlaws "the threat or use of force." The United
States, which has chosen to become an outlaw state, disregards
international laws and norms. We're allowed to threaten anybody we
want -- and to attack anyone we choose.
Washington's feverish new Cold War "containment" policy has spread
to Europe. Washington intends to install a "missile defense system" in
the Czech Republic and Poland, marketed to Europe as a shield against
Iranian missiles. Even if Iran had nuclear weapons and long-range
missiles, the chances of its using them to attack Europe are perhaps
on a par with the chances of Europe's being hit by an asteroid, so
perhaps Europe would do as well to invest in an asteroid defense
system. Furthermore, if Iran were to indicate the slightest intention
of aiming a missile at Europe or Israel, the country would be
vaporized.
Of course, Russian planners are gravely upset by the shield
proposal. We can imagine how the US would respond if a Russian anti-
missile system were erected in Canada. The Russians have good reason
to regard an anti-missile system as part of a first-strike weapon
against them. It is generally understood that such a system could
never block a first strike, but it could conceivably impede a
retaliatory strike. On all sides, "missile defense" is therefore
understood to be a first-strike weapon, eliminating a deterrent to
attack. And a small initial installation in Eastern Europe could
easily be a base for later expansion. Even more obviously, the only
military function of such a system with regard to Iran, the declared
aim, would be to bar an Iranian deterrent to US or Israel aggression.
Not surprisingly, in reaction to the "missile defense" plans,
Russia has resorted to its own dangerous gestures, including the
recent decision to renew long-range patrols by nuclear-capable bombers
after a 15-year hiatus, in one recent case near the US military base
on Guam. These actions reflect Russia's anger "over what it has
called American and NATO aggressiveness, including plans for a missile-
defense system in the Czech Republic and Poland, analysts
said" (Andrew Kramer, NYT).[15]
The shield ratchets the threat of war a few notches higher, in the
Middle East and elsewhere, with incalculable consequences, and the
potential for a terminal nuclear war. The immediate fear is that by
accident or design, Washington's war planners or their Israeli
surrogate might decide to escalate their Cold War II into a hot one -
in this case a real hot war.
[1] Wright, WP, July 29 07
[2] Correspondent Michael Wines, NYT, June 13, 1999. Doolittle
report, Tim Weiner, Legacy of Ashes: the History of the CIA, Doubleday
2007
[3] Ibid., 77.
[4] Ibid., 180.
[5] Paul Richter, LAT, Aug. 10, 2007. Karzai, CNN, Aug. 5, 2007.
[6] Robin Wright, "U.S. Plans New Arms Sales to Gulf Allies," WP,
July 28, 2007.
[7] Henry Meyer, Bloomberg, Aug. 16, 2007.
[8] Ibid.
[9] Hiro
[10] Weiner
[11] Schmitz, Weiner.
[12] Weiner. Failed States.
[13] Brian Ross and Christopher Isham, "ABC News Exclusive: The
Secret War Against Iran," April 3, 2007; Ross and Richard Esposito,
ABC, "Bush Authorizes New Covert Action Against Iran," May 22, 2007.
[14] On Iran, see Gilbert Achcar, Noam Chomsky, and Stephen
Shalom, Perilous Power (Paradigm, 2007), and Ervand Abrahamian, in
David Barsamian, ed., Targeting Iran (City Lights, 2007). On Hamas,
among many similar statements see the article by Hamas's most militant
leader, Khalid Mish'al, "Our unity can now pave the way for peace and
justice," Guardian, February 13, 2007. Hezbollah leader Hassan
Nasrallah has repeatedly taken the same position. See among others
Irene Gendzier, Assaf Kfoury, and Fawwaz Traboulsi, eds., Inside
Lebanon (Monthly Review, 2007).
[15] Kramer, "Recalling Cold War, Russia Resumes Long-Range
Sorties," Aug. 18, 2007.
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by Noam Chomsky; August 27, 2007
These are exciting days in Washington, as the government directs
its energies to the demanding task of "containing Iran" in what
Washington Post correspondent Robin Wright, joining others, calls
"Cold War II."[1]
During Cold War I, the task was to contain two awesome forces.
The lesser and more moderate force was "an implacable enemy whose
avowed objective is world domination by whatever means and at whatever
cost." Hence "if the United States is to survive," it will have to
adopt a "repugnant philosophy" and reject "acceptable norms of human
conduct" and the "long-standing American concepts of `fair play'" that
had been exhibited with such searing clarity in the conquest of the
national territory, the Philippines, Haiti and other beneficiaries of
"the idealistic new world bent on ending inhumanity," as the newspaper
of record describes our noble mission.[2] The judgments about the
nature of the super-Hitler and the necessary response are those of
General Jimmy Doolittle, in a critical assessment of the CIA
commissioned by President Eisenhower in 1954. They are quite
consistent with those of the Truman administration liberals, the "wise
men" who were "present at the creation," notoriously in NSC 68 but in
fact quite consistently.
In the face of the Kremlin's unbridled aggression in every corner
of the world, it is perhaps understandable that the US resisted in
defense of human values with a savage display of torture, terror,
subversion and violence while doing "everything in its power to alter
or abolish any regime not openly allied with America," as Tim Weiner
summarizes the doctrine of the Eisenhower administration in his recent
history of the CIA.[3] And just as the Truman liberals easily matched
their successors in fevered rhetoric about the implacable enemy and
its campaign to rule the world, so did John F. Kennedy, who bitterly
condemned the "monolithic and ruthless conspiracy," and dismissed the
proposal of its leader (Khrushchev) for sharp mutual cuts in offensive
weaponry, then reacted to his unilateral implementation of these
proposals with a huge military build-up. The Kennedy brothers also
quickly surpassed Eisenhower in violence and terror, as they
"unleashed covert action with an unprecedented intensity" (Wiener),
doubling Eisenhower's annual record of major CIA covert operations,
with horrendous consequences worldwide, even a close brush with
terminal nuclear war.[4]
But at least it was possible to deal with Russia, unlike the
fiercer enemy, China. The more thoughtful scholars recognized that
Russia was poised uneasily between civilization and barbarism. As
Henry Kissinger later explained in his academic essays, only the West
has undergone the Newtonian revolution and is therefore "deeply
committed to the notion that the real world is external to the
observer," while the rest still believe "that the real world is almost
completely internal to the observer," the "basic division" that is
"the deepest problem of the contemporary international order." But
Russia, unlike third word peasants who think that rain and sun are
inside their heads, was perhaps coming to the realization that the
world is not just a dream, Kissinger felt.
Not so the still more savage and bloodthirsty enemy, China, which
for liberal Democrat intellectuals at various times rampaged as a "a
Slavic Manchukuo," a blind puppet of its Kremlin master, or a monster
utterly unconstrained as it pursued its crazed campaign to crush the
world in its tentacles, or whatever else circumstances demanded. The
remarkable tale of doctrinal fanaticism from the 1940s to the '70s,
which makes contemporary rhetoric seem rather moderate, is reviewed by
James Peck in his highly revealing study of the national security
culture, Washington's China.
In later years, there were attempts to mimic the valiant deeds of
the defenders of virtue from the two villainous global conquerors and
their loyal slaves - for example, when the Gipper strapped on his
cowboy boots and declared a National Emergency because Nicaraguan
hordes were only two days from Harlingen Texas, though as he
courageously informed the press, despite the tremendous odds "I refuse
to give up. I remember a man named Winston Churchill who said, `Never
give in. Never, never, never.' So we won't." With consequences that
need not be reviewed.
Even with the best of efforts, however, the attempts never were
able to recapture the glorious days of Cold War I. But now, at last,
those heights might be within reach, as another implacable enemy bent
on world conquest has arisen, which we must contain before it destroys
us all: Iran.
Perhaps it's a lift to the spirits to be able to recover those
heady Cold War days when at least there was a legitimate force to
contain, however dubious the pretexts and disgraceful the means. But
it is instructive to take a closer look at the contours of Cold War II
as they are being designed by "the former Kremlinologists now running
U.S. foreign policy, such as Rice and Gates" (Wright).
The task of containment is to establish "a bulwark against Iran's
growing influence in the Middle East," Mark Mazzetti and Helene Cooper
explain in the New York Times (July 31). To contain Iran's influence
we must surround Iran with US and NATO ground forces, along with
massive naval deployments in the Persian Gulf and of course
incomparable air power and weapons of mass destruction. And we must
provide a huge flow of arms to what Condoleezza Rice calls "the forces
of moderation and reform" in the region, the brutal tyrannies of Egypt
and Saudi Arabia and, with particular munificence, Israel, by now
virtually an adjunct of the militarized high-tech US economy. All to
contain Iran's influence. A daunting challenge indeed.
And daunting it is. In Iraq, Iranian support is welcomed by much
of the majority Shi'ite population. In an August visit to Teheran,
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki met with the supreme leader Ali
Khamenei, President Ahmadinejad and other senior officials, and
thanked Tehran for its "positive and constructive" role in improving
security in Iraq, eliciting a sharp reprimand from President Bush, who
"declares Teheran a regional peril and asserts the Iraqi leader must
understand," to quote the headline of the Los Angeles Times report on
al-Maliki's intellectual deficiencies. A few days before, also
greatly to Bush's discomfiture, Afghan President Hamid Karzai,
Washington's favorite, described Iran as "a helper and a solution" in
his country.[5] Similar problems abound beyond Iran's immediate
neighbors. In Lebanon, according to polls, most Lebanese see Iranian-
backed Hezbollah "as a legitimate force defending their country from
Israel," Wright reports. And in Palestine, Iranian-backed Hamas won a
free election, eliciting savage punishment of the Palestinian
population by the US and Israel for the crime of voting "the wrong
way," another episode in "democracy promotion."
But no matter. The aim of US militancy and the arms flow to the
moderates is to counter "what everyone in the region believes is a
flexing of muscles by a more aggressive Iran," according to an unnamed
senior U.S. government official - "everyone" being the technical term
used to refer to Washington and its more loyal clients.[6] Iran's
aggression consists in its being welcomed by many within the region,
and allegedly supporting resistance to the US occupation of
neighboring Iraq.
It's likely, though little discussed, that a prime concern about
Iran's influence is to the East, where in mid-August "Russia and China
today host Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at a summit of a
Central Asian security club designed to counter U.S. influence in the
region," the business press reports.[7] The "security club" is the
Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), which has been slowly taking
shape in recent years. Its membership includes not only the two
giants Russia and China, but also the energy-rich Central Asian states
Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Tajikistan. Hamid Karzai of
Afghanistan was a guest of honor at the August meeting. "In another
unwelcome development for the Americans, Turkmenistan's President
Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov also accepted an invitation to attend the
summit," another step its improvement of relations with Russia,
particularly in energy, reversing a long-standing policy of isolation
from Russia. "Russia in May secured a deal to build a new pipeline to
import more gas from Turkmenistan, bolstering its dominant hold on
supplies to Europe and heading off a competing U.S.-backed plan that
would bypass Russian territory."[8]
Along with Iran, there are three other official observer states:
India, Pakistan and Mongolia. Washington's request for similar status
was denied. In 2005 the SCO called for a timetable for termination of
any US military presence in Central Asia. The participants at the
August meeting flew to the Urals to attend the first joint Russia-
China military exercises on Russian soil.
Association of Iran with the SCO extends its inroads into the
Middle East, where China has been increasing trade and other relations
with the jewel in the crown, Saudi Arabia. There is an oppressed
Shi'ite population in Saudi Arabia that is also susceptible to Iran's
influence - and happens to sit on most of Saudi oil. About 40% of
Middle East oil is reported to be heading East, not West.[9] As the
flow Eastward increases, US control declines over this lever of world
domination, a "stupendous source of strategic power," as the State
Department described Saudi oil 60 years ago.
In Cold War I, the Kremlin had imposed an iron curtain and built
the Berlin Wall to contain Western influence. In Cold War II, Wright
reports, the former Kremlinologists framing policy are imposing a
"green curtain" to bar Iranian influence. In short, government-media
doctrine is that the Iranian threat is rather similar to the Western
threat that the Kremlin sought to contain, and the US is eagerly
taking on the Kremlin's role in the thrilling "new Cold War."
All of this is presented without noticeable concern.
Nevertheless, the recognition that the US government is modeling
itself on Stalin and his successors in the new Cold War must be
arousing at least some flickers of embarrassment. Perhaps that is how
we can explain the ferocious Washington Post editorial announcing that
Iran has escalated its aggressiveness to a Hot War: "the Revolutionary
Guard, a radical state within Iran's Islamic state, is waging war
against the United States and trying to kill as many American soldiers
as possible." The US must therefore "fight back," the editors thunder,
finding quite "puzzling...the murmurs of disapproval from European
diplomats and others who say they favor using diplomacy and economic
pressure, rather than military action, to rein in Iran," even in the
face of its outright aggression. The evidence that Iran is waging war
against the US is now conclusive. After all, it comes from an
administration that has never deceived the American people, even
improving on the famous stellar honesty of its predecessors.
Suppose that for once Washington's charges happen to be true, and
Iran really is providing Shi'ite militias with roadside bombs that
kill American forces, perhaps even making use of the some of the
advanced weaponry lavishly provided to the Revolutionary Guard by
Ronald Reagan in order to fund the illegal war against Nicaragua,
under the pretext of arms for hostages (the number of hostages tripled
during these endeavors).[10] If the charges are true, then Iran could
properly be charged with a minuscule fraction of the iniquity of the
Reagan administration, which provided Stinger missiles and other high-
tech military aid to the "insurgents" seeking to disrupt Soviet
efforts to bring stability and justice to Afghanistan, as they saw
it. Perhaps Iran is even guilty of some of the crimes of the
Roosevelt administration, which assisted terrorist partisans attacking
peaceful and sovereign Vichy France in 1940-41, and had thus declared
war on Germany even before Pearl Harbor.
One can pursue these questions further. The CIA station chief in
Pakistan in 1981, Howard Hart, reports that "I was the first chief of
station ever sent abroad with this wonderful order: `Go kill Soviet
soldiers'. Imagine! I loved it." Of course "the mission was not to
liberate Afghanistan," Tim Wiener writes in his history of the CIA,
repeating the obvious. But "it was a noble goal," he writes. Killing
Russians with no concern for the fate of Afghans is a "noble goal."
But support for resistance to a US invasion and occupation would be a
vile act and declaration of war.
Without irony, the Bush administration and the media charge that
Iran is "meddling" in Iraq, otherwise presumably free from foreign
interference. The evidence is partly technical. Do the serial numbers
on the Improvised Explosive Devices really trace back to Iran? If so,
does the leadership of Iran know about the IEDs, or only the Iranian
Revolutionary Guard. Settling the debate, the White House plans to
brand the Revolutionary Guard as a "specially designated global
terrorist" force, an unprecedented action against a national military
branch, authorizing Washington to undertake a wide range of punitive
actions. Watching in disbelief, much of the world asks whether the US
military, invading and occupying Iran's neighbors, might better merit
this charge -- or its Israeli client, now about to receive a huge
increase in military aid to commemorate 40 years of harsh occupation
and illegal settlement, and its fifth invasion of Lebanon a year ago.
It is instructive that Washington's propaganda framework is
reflexively accepted, apparently without notice, in US and other
Western commentary and reporting, apart from the marginal fringe of
what is called 'the loony left." What is considered "criticism" is
skepticism as to whether all of Washington's charges about Iranian
aggression in Iraq are true. It might be an interesting research
project to see how closely the propaganda of Russia, Nazi Germany, and
other aggressors and occupiers matched the standards of today's
liberal press and commentators..
The comparisons are of course unfair. Unlike German and Russian
occupiers, American forces are in Iraq by right, on the principle, too
obvious even to enunciate, that the US owns the world. Therefore, as
a matter of elementary logic, the US cannot invade and occupy another
country. The US can only defend and liberate others. No other
category exists. Predecessors, including the most monstrous, have
commonly sworn by the same principle, but again there is an obvious
difference: they were Wrong, and we are Right. QED.
Another comparison comes to mind, which is studiously ignored when
we are sternly admonished of the ominous consequences that might
follow withdrawal of US troops from Iraq. The preferred analogy is
Indochina, highlighted in a shameful speech by the President on August
22. That analogy can perhaps pass muster among those who have
succeeded in effacing from their minds the record of US actions in
Indochina, including the destruction of much of Vietnam and the
murderous bombing of Laos and Cambodia as the US began its withdrawal
from the wreckage of South Vietnam. In Cambodia, the bombing was in
accord with Kissinger's genocidal orders: "anything that flies on
anything that moves" - actions that drove "an enraged populace into
the arms of an insurgency [the Khmer Rouge] that had enjoyed
relatively little support before the Kissinger-Nixon bombing was
inaugurated," as Cambodia specialists Owen Taylor and Ben Kiernan
observe in a highly important study that passed virtually without
notice, in which they reveal that the bombing was five times the
incredible level reported earlier, greater than all allied bombing in
World War II. Completely suppressing all relevant facts, it is then
possible for the President and many commentators to present Khmer
Rouge crimes as a justification for continuing to devastate Iraq.
But although the grotesque Indochina analogy receives much
attention, the obvious analogy is ignored: the Russian withdrawal from
Afghanistan, which, as Soviet analysts predicted, led to shocking
violence and destruction as the country was taken over by Reagan's
favorites, who amused themselves by such acts as throwing acid in the
faces of women in Kabul they regarded as too liberated, and then
virtually destroyed the city and much else, creating such havoc and
terror that the population actually welcomed the Taliban. That
analogy could indeed be invoked without utter absurdity by advocates
of "staying the course," but evidently it is best forgotten.
Under the heading "Secretary Rice's Mideast mission: contain
Iran," the press reports Rice's warning that Iran is "the single most
important single-country challenge to...US interests in the Middle
East." That is a reasonable judgment. Given the long-standing
principle that Washington must do "everything in its power to alter or
abolish any regime not openly allied with America," Iran does pose a
unique challenge, and it is natural that the task of containing
Iranian influence should be a high priority.
As elsewhere, Bush administration rhetoric is relatively mild in
this case. For the Kennedy administration, "Latin America was the
most dangerous area in the world" when there was a threat that the
progressive Cheddi Jagan might win a free election in British Guiana,
overturned by CIA shenanigans that handed the country over to the
thuggish racist Forbes Burnham.[11] A few years earlier, Iraq was "the
most dangerous place in the world" (CIA director Allen Dulles) after
General Abdel Karim Qassim broke the Anglo-American condominium over
Middle East oil, overthrowing the pro-US monarchy, which had been
heavily infiltrated by the CIA.[12] A primary concern was that Qassim
might join Nasser, then the supreme Middle East devil, in using the
incomparable energy resources of the Middle East for the domestic.
The issue for Washington was not so much access as control. At the
time and for many years after, Washington was purposely exhausting
domestic oil resources in the interests of "national security,"
meaning security for the profits of Texas oil men, like the failed
entrepreneur who now sits in the Oval Office. But as high-level
planner George Kennan had explained well before, we cannot relax our
guard when there is any interference with "protection of our
resources" (which accidentally happen to be somewhere else).
Unquestionably, Iran's government merits harsh condemnation,
though it has not engaged in worldwide terror, subversion, and
aggression, following the US model - which extends to today's Iran as
well, if ABC news is correct in reporting that the US is supporting
Pakistan-based Jundullah, which is carrying out terrorist acts inside
Iran.[13] The sole act of aggression attributed to Iran is the
conquest of two small islands in the Gulf - under Washington's close
ally the Shah. In addition to internal repression - heightened, as
Iranian dissidents regularly protest, by US militancy -- the prospect
that Iran might develop nuclear weapons also is deeply troubling.
Though Iran has every right to develop nuclear energy, no one -
including the majority of Iranians - wants it to have nuclear
weapons. That would add to the threat to survival posed much more
seriously by its near neighbors Pakistan, India, and Israel, all
nuclear armed with the blessing of the US, which most of the world
regards as the leading threat to world peace, for evident reasons.
Iran rejects US control of the Middle East, challenging
fundamental policy doctrine, but it hardly poses a military threat. On
the contrary, it has been the victim of outside powers for years: in
recent memory, when the US and Britain overthrew its parliamentary
government and installed a brutal tyrant in 1953, and when the US
supported Saddam Hussein's murderous invasion, slaughtering hundreds
of thousands of Iranians, many with chemical weapons, without the
"international community" lifting a finger - something that Iranians
do not forget as easily as the perpetrators. And then under severe
sanctions as a punishment for disobedience.
Israel regards Iran as a threat. Israel seeks to dominate the
region with no interference, and Iran might be some slight
counterbalance, while also supporting domestic forces that do not bend
to Israel's will. It may, however, be useful to bear in mind that
Hamas has accepted the international consensus on a two-state
settlement on the international border, and Hezbollah, along with
Iran, has made clear that it would accept any outcome approved by
Palestinians, leaving the US and Israel isolated in their traditional
rejectionism.[14]
But Iran is hardly a military threat to Israel. And whatever
threat there might be could be overcome if the US would accept the
view of the great majority of its own citizens and of Iranians and
permit the Middle East to become a nuclear-weapons free zone,
including Iran and Israel, and US forces deployed there. One may also
recall that UN Security Council Resolution 687 of 3 April 1991, to
which Washington appeals when convenient, calls for "establishing in
the Middle East a zone free from weapons of mass destruction and all
missiles for their delivery."
It is widely recognized that use of military force in Iran would
risk blowing up the entire region, with untold consequences beyond. We
know from polls that in the surrounding countries, where the Iranian
government is hardly popular -- Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan --
nevertheless large majorities prefer even a nuclear-armed Iran to any
form of military action against it.
The rhetoric about Iran has escalated to the point where both
political parties and practically the whole US press accept it as
legitimate and, in fact, honorable, that "all options are on the
table," to quote Hillary Clinton and everybody else, possibly even
nuclear weapons. "All options on the table" means that Washington
threatens war.
The UN Charter outlaws "the threat or use of force." The United
States, which has chosen to become an outlaw state, disregards
international laws and norms. We're allowed to threaten anybody we
want -- and to attack anyone we choose.
Washington's feverish new Cold War "containment" policy has spread
to Europe. Washington intends to install a "missile defense system" in
the Czech Republic and Poland, marketed to Europe as a shield against
Iranian missiles. Even if Iran had nuclear weapons and long-range
missiles, the chances of its using them to attack Europe are perhaps
on a par with the chances of Europe's being hit by an asteroid, so
perhaps Europe would do as well to invest in an asteroid defense
system. Furthermore, if Iran were to indicate the slightest intention
of aiming a missile at Europe or Israel, the country would be
vaporized.
Of course, Russian planners are gravely upset by the shield
proposal. We can imagine how the US would respond if a Russian anti-
missile system were erected in Canada. The Russians have good reason
to regard an anti-missile system as part of a first-strike weapon
against them. It is generally understood that such a system could
never block a first strike, but it could conceivably impede a
retaliatory strike. On all sides, "missile defense" is therefore
understood to be a first-strike weapon, eliminating a deterrent to
attack. And a small initial installation in Eastern Europe could
easily be a base for later expansion. Even more obviously, the only
military function of such a system with regard to Iran, the declared
aim, would be to bar an Iranian deterrent to US or Israel aggression.
Not surprisingly, in reaction to the "missile defense" plans,
Russia has resorted to its own dangerous gestures, including the
recent decision to renew long-range patrols by nuclear-capable bombers
after a 15-year hiatus, in one recent case near the US military base
on Guam. These actions reflect Russia's anger "over what it has
called American and NATO aggressiveness, including plans for a missile-
defense system in the Czech Republic and Poland, analysts
said" (Andrew Kramer, NYT).[15]
The shield ratchets the threat of war a few notches higher, in the
Middle East and elsewhere, with incalculable consequences, and the
potential for a terminal nuclear war. The immediate fear is that by
accident or design, Washington's war planners or their Israeli
surrogate might decide to escalate their Cold War II into a hot one -
in this case a real hot war.
[1] Wright, WP, July 29 07
[2] Correspondent Michael Wines, NYT, June 13, 1999. Doolittle
report, Tim Weiner, Legacy of Ashes: the History of the CIA, Doubleday
2007
[3] Ibid., 77.
[4] Ibid., 180.
[5] Paul Richter, LAT, Aug. 10, 2007. Karzai, CNN, Aug. 5, 2007.
[6] Robin Wright, "U.S. Plans New Arms Sales to Gulf Allies," WP,
July 28, 2007.
[7] Henry Meyer, Bloomberg, Aug. 16, 2007.
[8] Ibid.
[9] Hiro
[10] Weiner
[11] Schmitz, Weiner.
[12] Weiner. Failed States.
[13] Brian Ross and Christopher Isham, "ABC News Exclusive: The
Secret War Against Iran," April 3, 2007; Ross and Richard Esposito,
ABC, "Bush Authorizes New Covert Action Against Iran," May 22, 2007.
[14] On Iran, see Gilbert Achcar, Noam Chomsky, and Stephen
Shalom, Perilous Power (Paradigm, 2007), and Ervand Abrahamian, in
David Barsamian, ed., Targeting Iran (City Lights, 2007). On Hamas,
among many similar statements see the article by Hamas's most militant
leader, Khalid Mish'al, "Our unity can now pave the way for peace and
justice," Guardian, February 13, 2007. Hezbollah leader Hassan
Nasrallah has repeatedly taken the same position. See among others
Irene Gendzier, Assaf Kfoury, and Fawwaz Traboulsi, eds., Inside
Lebanon (Monthly Review, 2007).
[15] Kramer, "Recalling Cold War, Russia Resumes Long-Range
Sorties," Aug. 18, 2007.
http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=11&ItemID=13629
= = = =
STILL FEELING LIKE THE MAINSTREAM U.S. CORPORATE MEDIA
IS GIVING A FULL HONEST PICTURE OF WHAT'S GOING ON?
= = = =
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