http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article2326.htm
Global Eye -- Dark Passage
By Chris Floyd
Not since "Mein Kampf" has a geopolitical punch been so blatantly
telegraphed, years ahead of the blow.
Adolf Hitler clearly spelled out his plans to destroy the Jews and
launch wars of conquest to secure German domination of world affairs
in his 1925 book, long before he ever assumed power. Despite the
zigzags of rhetoric he later employed, the various PR spins and
temporary justifications offered for this or that particular policy,
any attentive reader of his vile regurgitation could have divined his
intentions as he drove his country -- and the world -- to murderous
upheaval.
Similarly -- in method, if not entirely in substance -- the Bush
Regime's foreign policy is also being carried out according to a
strict blueprint written years ago, then renewed a few months before
the Regime was installed in power by the judicial coup of December
2000.
The first version, mentioned in passing here last week, was drafted by
a team operating under then-Defense Secretary ***** Cheney in 1992. It
set out a new doctrine for U.S. power in the 21st century, an
aggressive, unilateral approach that would secure American domination
of world affairs -- "by force if necessary," as one of the acolytes
put it.
When the Dominators were temporarily ousted from government after
1992, they continued their strategic planning with funding from the
military-energy-security apparatus and right-wing foundations. This
culminated in a new group, the aptly-named Project for a New American
Century (PNAC). Members included hard-right players like Cheney,
Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Zalmay Khalilzad (now "special envoy"
to the satrapy of Afghanistan) and other empire aspirants currently
perched in the upper reaches of government power.
In September 2000, PNAC updated the original Cheney plan in a
published report, "Strengthening America's Defenses." In this and
related documents, the earlier precepts were reiterated and refined.
The plans called for unprecedented hikes in military spending, the
plantation of American bases in Central Asia and the Middle East, the
toppling of recalcitrant regimes, the militarization of outer space,
the abrogation of international treaties, the willingness to use
nuclear weapons and control of the world's energy resources.
And the present course of action was clearly set forth: "The United
States has for decades sought to play a more permanent role in Gulf
regional security. While the unresolved conflict with Iraq provides
the immediate justification, the need for a substantial American force
presence in the Gulf transcends the issue of the regime of Saddam
Hussein."
But Iraq is just a stepping stone. Iran is next -- indeed, Cheney,
Rumsfeld and the PNAC team say that Iran is "perhaps a far greater
threat" to U.S. oil hegemony. Other nations will follow, including
Russia and China. In one way or another -- by military means or
economic dominance, by conquest, alliance or silent acquiescence --
they must all be brought to heel, forcibly prevented from "challenging
our leadership or even aspiring to a larger regional or global role."
These texts spring from the Dominators' quasi-religious cult of
"American exceptionalism," the belief in the unique and utter goodness
of the American soul -- embodied chiefly by the nation's moneyed
elite, of course -- and the irredeemable, metaphysical evil of all
those who would oppose or criticize the elite's righteous (and
conveniently self-serving) policies.
Anyone still "puzzled" over the Bush Regime's behavior need only look
to these documents for enlightenment. They have long been available to
the media -- which accepted Bush's transparent campaign lies about a
"more humble foreign policy" at face value -- but have only now
started attracting wider notice, in the New Yorker magazine this
spring, and this week in the Glasgow Sunday Herald.
The documents explain America's relentless march across Afghanistan,
Central Asia and soon into the Middle East. They explain the Bush
Regime's otherwise unfathomable rejection of international law, its
fanatical devotion to so-called missile defense, its gargantuan
increases in military spending -- even its antediluvian energy policy,
which mandates the continued primacy of oil and gas in the world
economy. (They can't conquer the sun or monopolize the wind, so
there's no profit, no leverage for personal gain and geopolitical
power in pursuing viable alternatives to oil.) The Sept. 11 attacks
gave the Regime a pretext for greatly accelerating this published
program of global dominance, but they would have pursued it in any
case.
So there will be war: either soon, after the November mid-term
elections, or -- in the unlikely event that Iraq's offer of
inspections is accepted -- then later, after some "provocation" or
"obstruction," no doubt in good time before the 2004 presidential
vote. The purse-lipped rhetoric about "liberation" and "moral clarity"
is just so much desert sand being thrown in our eyes. Backstage, the
Bush Regime is playing Mafia-style hardball, warning reluctant allies
to get on board now or else miss out on their cut of the loot when
America -- not a "democratic Iraq" -- divvies up Saddam's oil fields:
a shakedown detailed this week by the Economist, among many others.
The Dominators dream of empire. Not only will it extend their temporal
power, they believe it will also give them immortality. One of their
chief gurus, Reaganite firebreather Michael Ledeen, says that if the
Dominators reject "clever diplomacy" and "just wage total war" to
subjugate the Middle East, "our children will sing great songs about
us years from now." This madness, this bin Laden-like megalomania, is
now driving the hijacked American republic -- and the world -- to
murderous upheaval.
It's all there in the text, set down in black and white.
Read it and weep.