Opinion Editorials, June 2010

The Bogus War on Terrorism:

How America and Britain Were Dragged to Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan? 

By Mahboob A. Khawaja                      

Al-Jazeerah: CCUN, June 14, 2010

 
“It is the policy of the United States government to provoke violent extremist groups into action. Once they are in play, their responses can then be used in whatever way the government that provoked them sees fit. And we also know that these provocations are being used, as a matter of deliberate policy, to rouse violent groups on the "Af-Pak" front to launch terrorist attacks.”  (Chris Floyd, “Darkness Renewed: Terror as a Tool of Empire,” 04/2009)
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The Global governance is in shackle - a complete failure, from the working of the UN to the global adventurous organizations such as NATO, the UN Security Council, the EU and other security establishments. They exist to protect the self interest of the minority ruling elite as has been the case throughout the human history. E.H Carr foresaw the teaching-learning role of the history but the modern so called superpowers appear devoid of making good out of the living history. NATO’s priorities were chartered in the collective defense of the member states against the hypothesis of communist led war in Europe, not the adventurous notion of collective security defying its own charter to fight in Afghanistan and possibly Iraq and Pakistan. This clearly is a self-expanded  dictum of the NATO war mongers. After the WW2, the UN was the embodiment of collective security for the war torn apart world by the European adventures of national pride and ethnic identity. Like the failure of the League of the Nations, history tells how the UN has come to be a failed enterprise in global affairs. It affirms the principle of self-interest, that is the wars of European nationalism and superiority over others nations in areas irrelevant to the European-American foremost national interests. The European war mongers and the US Empire lost sense of intellect and strategic direction by invading Iraq and Afghanistan under the guise of “war on terrorism.”

They is no rational purpose for the US and Britain to be fighting against the innocent people of Iraq and Afghanistan. Wars are the outcome of naïve, egoistic and corrupt mindset representing minority ruling elite, irresponsible to consequences on human society and are planned, financed and fought by governments, not by groups or ordinary people. Wars are based on political agendas and they long for complete control over resources, people and territory. Most wars would have multiple reasons, domestic, foreign and global outreach.

The American led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are fought to maintain the US domination worldwide, to occupy the untapped natural resources of the Middle East in particular the oil and gas, and to protect the value of American dollar as a stable international reserve currency. In September 2000, the proactive policy paper written by the neoconservative intellectuals to envision “the Project for the New American Century (PNAC): sets out the milestone seeking American domination over the rest of the world powers and to meet its energies needs plans to occupy by force all the oil resources in the Arab Middle East. The blueprint supports military occupation of the oil exporting Arab countries and regime change where it is necessary to fulfill the policy aims of the New American Century of global domination.

Centuries ago, German historian Carl Von Clausewitz wrote On War: “War is not merely a political act but also a real political instrument, a continuation of political commerce, a carrying out of the same by other means.” The small ruling elite who plans and wages war are often afraid of citizenry reaction and refusal to accept the so called antidote for the rationality of a war. Throughout the history European nationalism institutionalized the doctrine of war as a necessity to promote national interest and racial superiority over other by using war as a means to that end. Most proponents of wars have used “fear” as one of the major instruments of propaganda and manipulation to perpetuate allegiance from the ordinary folks to the elite warmongers in a crisis situation. Sheldon Richman (“War is Government Program” ICS, 05/2007), notes that “war is more dangerous than other government programs and  not just for the obvious reason – mass murder….war is useful  in  keeping the population in a state of fear and therefore trustful of their rulers.”
 
Ordinary citizens do not have passion for war as it disturbs the safe and secure, and destroys the living habitats. The ruling elite, the actual warmongers force people to think in their extreme terms of hatred and rejection of others so that people would be forced to align with the rulers to support and finance the war efforts. Sheldon Richman describes how Herman Goering, Hitler’s chief of the staff, understood the discourse of war making:

“Of course the people don’t want war….but after all, it’s the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it’s always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether, it’s a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a parliament or a Communist dictatorship.”
 
Paul Craig Roberts (“The Collapse of America Power”: ICS, 03/2008), attempts to explain how the British Empire had collapsed once its financial assets were depleted because of the 2nd World War debts. Correlli Barnett (The Collapse of British Power, 1972) states that at the beginning of the WW2, Britain had limited gold and foreign exchange to meet the pressing demands of the war. The British Government asked America to help finance their sustainability to continue the war. Thus, ‘this dependency signaled the end of British power.’

For its draconian wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, America is heavily dependent on China, Japan and Saudi Arabia. It is well known that American treasury owes trillion of dollars to its foreign debtors and therefore, its financial dependency is increasingly becoming an obvious indicator of the end of American global hegemony and wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now the US financial system  have broken down and some of the leading banking institutions have gone into declaring the bankruptcy the roller coaster repercussion could be seen across the American economic,  social and political spectrum of life.

Under the Bush administration, America has shrunk its capability and vitality of role and in fact appears dismantled as a superpower status in global affairs. It is no wonder that other nations of world do not seem to take America and its traditional influential stratum in any serious context. Paul Craig Roberts (The Collapse of American Power”) refers to Noam Chomsky stating that under the neoconservative Bush Presidency, “America thinks that it owns the world.” But the fact of the matter is, explains Roberts, “that the US owes the world. The US ”superpower” cannot even finance its own domestic operations, much less its gratuitous wars except via the kindness of foreigners to lend it money that cannot be repaid.” It is undeniable that the US is “bankrupt” because of the on-going wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. David M. Walker Comptroller General of the US and Head of the Government Accountability Office (December 2007). reports that “In everyday language, the US Government cannot pass an audit.”
 
 If one is a financial investor, the obvious question asks Paul C. Roberts, “would you want to hold debt in a currency that has such a poor record against the currency of a small island country that was nuked and defeated in WW II, or against a small landlocked European country that clings to its independence and is not a member of the EU?” Consequently, the American dollar is being replaced by Euro and other currencies and soon is going to be abandoned as a reserve currency in global financial system.
 
Chris Floyd (Darkness Renewed: Terror as Tool of Empire”), elaborates the warmongering mentality of the US policy makers: You goad and provoke violent extremist groups into retaliating against your attacks, your civilian-slaughtering invasions and incursions into their territory. Being unable to confront directly your war machine – the largest, most advanced military force in the history of the world, sustained by a tsunami of public money that each year surpasses the military spending of the rest of the world – they naturally respond with "asymmetrical" operations. At first, these are directed at nearby targets: your supply lines, the forces of your local proxies and allies, and other chaos-inducing depredations in the groups' own regions, designed to foul the lines of your control and drive you out. Just as naturally, you use these attacks to justify an even greater military presence in their regions. The cycle inevitably, inexorably ratchets upwards and outwards, until at last the extremists strike at your homeland – either with your connivance, or your covert acquiescence, or, in any event, with your foreknowledge that such an attack was sure to come. This is the moment you have waited for; this is exactly what you wanted. Now you can whip the herd back into a martial frenzy, keep the Long War going, and push aside the rabble's petty, small-minded desires for a peaceful, prosperous life at home, minding their own business.”
 
This War on Terror is Bogus

Michel Meacher, British Environment Minister under PM Blair (“This War on Terrorism is Bogus”) provides reliable insight on the real reasons for the “War on Terrorism.” He claims that the war on terror is superficial as “the 9/11 attacks gave the US an ideal pretext to use force to secure its global domination.” He further records that “the so called “war on terrorism” is being used largely as bogus cover for achieving wider US strategic geopolitical objectives…..in fact, 9/11 offered an extremely convenient pretext to put the PNAC plan into action. The evidence again is quite clear that plans for military action against Afghanistan and Iraq were in hand well before 9/11.”

In its report prepared by the Baker Institute of Public Policy (April 2001), it stated clearly that “the US remains a prisoner of its energy dilemma. Iraq remains a destabilizing influence to….the flow of oil to international markets from the Middle East” and it its recommendations elaborated the dire need that because it was a challenging risk therefore, the “US military intervention” was the most favored action (Sunday Herald: Oct 6, 2002).  Both the US and United Kingdom have increasing dependence on imported oil from the Middle East.

The overriding motivation for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are shielded by political smokescreen that the US and UK will run out of sufficient hydrocarbon energy supplies whereas, the Arab and Muslim world would control almost 60% of the world oil  producing capacity and perhaps more significantly 95% of the remaining global oil production capacity. The news media reports indicate that the US is predicted to produce only 39% of the domestic oil production in 2010, whereas in 1990 it produced 57% of its total oil consumption. The UK Government projects ”severe” gas shortages by 2005 and it confirmed that 70% of the electricity will drawn from gas and 90% of gas will be imported. It is interesting to note that Iraq is said to have 110 trillion cubic feet of gas reserves in addition to its approximately 15-20 % of the world oil reserves. In another research report by the Commission on America’s National Interests (July 2000), it observed that the most promising new energy resources are found in the Caspian Sea, Central Asian region and it would spare the US exclusive dependence on the Saudi Arabian oil imports.

The report outlined the feasible routes for the Caspian Seas oil deliveries, one hydrocarbon pipeline via Azerbaijan and Georgia and another pipeline through Afghanistan and Pakistan would ensure the future strategic demands of the US government. To review the documentary evidence of the 9/11 events, it is not unlikely that many strategists have seen the American Government failure to avert the 9/11 terrorist attacks as facilitating a much needed stage drama for its policy aims and an invaluable opportunity to attack Iraq and Afghanistan – a military intervention already been well planned in early 2000. The PNAC policy blueprint of September 2000 projects the transformation of the American power as an unchallengeable global superpower and the need for some tangible tragedy to make it happen. The paper outlines that it “is likely to be a long one in the absence of of some catastrophic and catalyzing event- like a new Pearl Harbor.”  In his analytical view, Minister Michael Meacher (“This War on terrorism is Bogus”) states that “global war on terrorism” has the hallmarks of a political myth propagated to pave way for a wholly different agenda-the US goal of world hegemony, built around securing by force command and over the oil supplies required to drive the whole project.”
 
Did the US hegemonic war achieved any of its set goals for world domination? Have the US and UK Governments secured any viable hydrocarbon energy routes to ensure their depleting gas and oil stocks and the much planned control over the Arab oil reserves? Is the US dollar still a welcomed international currency used by the world nations?
 
Recently, a retried American General Ricardo Sanchez challenged the prevailing notion of the Bush Administration “Mission accomplished “in Iraq, when he asserted that the occupation of Iraq is a “nightmare with no end in sight.” He claimed that the US administration is “incompetent” and “corrupt” and that the most American people could hope for under the present circumstances is to “stave off defeat” in Iraq war. Mike Whitney (“Come and see our overflowing morgues…..come and see the rubble of your surgical strikes”: An Arab Women Blues by Layla Anwar), believes that General Sanchez is neither against the war nor for withdrawal. He simply doesn’t like losing…. and the United Sates is losing.” 

The General is reported to have admitted that “ after more than four years of fighting , America continues its desperate struggle in Iraq without any concerted effort to devise a strategy that will achieve victory in that war-torn country or in the greater conflict  against extremism.”  Under President Barrack Obama, the global community looks anxiously how and when the promised change will come to America’s failed strategy in Iraq and Afghanistan. How soon, President Obama will be able to put the body of US politics together again after its moral, political and financial collapse. America and Britain appear lost, not knowing how to come out of the self-engineered defeat in wars against Islam and the humanity. 

Masses have sympathies with the true believers and the Muslim freedom fighters appear to have lost nothing. They had no banks to declare bankruptcy and they had no Bush and Cheney to go down in disgrace. They remain in tact and active all the fronts even buying weapons from the US and Russia to fight against them. American strategists know well to do business in global arms market. The so called superpowers are extremely nervous not knowing how soon they could be replaced by smaller nations of the developing world.
 
Layla Anwar (“An Arab Women Blues”-blog), a prominent high spirited Iraq female blogger attempts to share the global conscience with an inborn natural perspective of the Iraqi people who are the real victims of this ferocious war against their country. To reflect on how the adversely affected Iraqi people think on the on-going America-British led occupation of Iraq and unending causalities of daily deaths and destruction of the civilian population and habitats, Layla Anwar offers the real world description on her web site:

“Everyday, under the pretext of either al-Qaida, insurgents, militants or whatever imaginary name you coined, you have not ceased, not even for one day, slaughtering our innocents……for 4 years, you have not ceased for one single day, Not during holiday periods, not during religious celebrations, not even during the day your so called God was born….if you have a God that is.”
 
Did the US Empire achieve any of its strategic goals in transporting super war machines and the military and civilian death squads to Iraq and Afghanistan? Chris Floyd (Darkness Renewed”), explains the prevalent reality in global affairs:

“the United States government is planning to use "cover and deception" and secret military operations to provoke murderous terrorist attacks on innocent people. Let's say it again: Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, George W. Bush and the other members of the unelected regime in Washington plan to deliberately foment the murder of innocent people – your family, your friends, your lovers, you – in order to further their geopolitical ambitions.”
 
Overwhelmingly deficient with its thinking, moral and intellectual resources, America and Britain need “Idea Men” and THINKING people to dispel the obvious military defeat and surrender in Iraq and Afghanistan. These are some of the critical measures that any strategic thinkers should prefer to have for change and adaptability to the future in -waiting for the lost in action US and British forces.  
 
Paul J. Balles (“The World Sickest Warrior State” 03/2010, ICH), offers candid observations:
“We have now reached a stage where our extreme horrors of brutality and cruelty have exceeded our past records. We no longer have the rationale of moral righteousness of the earlier wars…. There were no excuses for Abu-Ghraib, but our interest in that inhuman travesty dried up and blew away. We have little concern about our violations of human rights in Guantanamo. ….the real horrors - of this war come with the primitive killer mentality developed in our youth. I've now seen a half dozen documentary films and read eyewitness accounts that reveal troops or pilots gloating over the massacres of civilians who just happened to be available targets.” 
 
The wars spread hatred, chaos and human degeneration as are the global institutions responsible for security, peace and conflict resolution. The UN, NATO and other security agencies are driven to failure by their own deviations of the original role-play and inaction in situation of real world challenges. They have been manipulated and misled by the contemporary superpowers as was the devastating fate of the League of Nations. When something loses its purpose an direction, it ends-up in self-defeat and piles of garbage. American and British policy makers appear more victims of their own failing mindset than the self-desired challenges posed by the Talibans and other Mujihdeens in Afghanistan and Iraq. America and its allies need a Navigational Change. President Obama got elected with the motivational promise: “Yes We Can” Would President Obama know how to make a navigational change when there is nothing left to navigate for Change? 
 
Dr. Mahboob A. Khawaja, an academic with special interests in global peace and security and conflict resolution, and comparative cultures and civilizations, and author of numerous publications in global affairs. His latest book includes: To America and Canada with Reason, 2009.  Comments are welcome: [email protected]

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