Galloway: This is the death knell of the American Empire

ruggedtoast

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/dec/15/iraq-death-knell-of-us-empire

So the Yanks are going home. Apart from the thousands of their servicemen and women whose lifeblood they are leaving in the sands of Iraq, and the tens of thousands too maimed or otherwise damaged to make it back to home and hearth. And minus the trillion-plus of dollars in treasure they have expended on destroying an Arab country (which may have lost a million souls and seen three millions off into exile), fanning the flames of fanaticism, making Iran more powerful, and unleashing a wave of sectarianism throughout the Muslim world. Nice work, but hardly "Mission Accomplished", as the melancholy valediction delivered by President Obama at Fort Bragg this week made clear to the discerning.

The more he talked about what he once called the "dumb war", the more obvious it was that his was the task of holding the dipped banner of defeat. And the crew of thick-necked servicemen straight out of central casting roaring their approval at his description of their success could not quite drown out the sound of the Last Post. This is the death knell of American empire, the end of the brief unipolar world in the ashes of whose hubris the lone bugler now stands playing the retreat. Like Ozymandias, history – which hasn't ended after all – will invite us to gaze upon its ruined works and tremble. But instead we will rejoice, rejoice. For the Project for the New American Century it will be never glad confident morning again.

The war that was waged – yes, for oil, and yes, also for Israel – was waged above all to terrify the world (especially China) with American power. It turned into the largest boomerang in history. For what has been demonstrated instead are the limits of near-bankrupt America's power. Far from being cowed, America's adversaries – and its enemies – have been emboldened. With shock and awe the empire soon dominated the skies over Iraq to be sure. But they never controlled a single street in the country from the day they invaded until this day of retreat. One street alone – Haifa Street in Baghdad – became the graveyard of scores, maybe hundreds of Americans.

Fortresses like Fallujah entered history alongside Stalingrad as symbols of the unvanquishable power of popular resistance to foreign invasion. Crimes like Abu Ghraib prison – where Iraqis were stripped naked and humiliated, forced to perform indecent acts upon each other and videotaped doing so for the entertainment of their torturers in the barracks afterwards – entered the lexicon of the barbarism of those who invade others, flying the colours of their "civilising" mission. As Chairman Mao once put it: "Sometimes the enemy struggles mightily to lift a huge stone; only to drop it on its own foot." In an America where a third of the population are living in poverty or terrifyingly near it, and where imperial hubris met its nemesis on Haifa Street, China now knows it has nothing to fear from this paper tiger.

I wrote at the time that the invasion of Iraq would be worse than a crime: it would be the Mother of All Blunders. I told Tony Blair – outside the men's lavatory in the library corridor of the House of Commons, to be precise – that the fall of Baghdad would be not the beginning of the end, but merely the end of the beginning. And that the Iraqis would fight them, with their teeth if necessary, until they had driven them from their land. I told Blair that there was no al-Qaida in Iraq, but that if he and Bush were to invade there would be thousands of them.

But two things, as George Bush would put it, I "mis-underestimated". First, that when the tower of lies on which the case for the Iraq war had been constructed was exposed, the credibility of the political systems of the two main liars would collapse under the weight. And second, that the example of the Iraqi resistance would trigger seismic changes in the Arabian landscape from Marrakesh to Bahrain.

Almost nobody in Britain or America any longer believes a word their politicians say. This profound change is not wholly the result of the Iraq war, but it moved into top gear following the war and the militarised mendacity that paved the way to it. In America this malaise has fuelled both the Tea Party phenomenon and the Occupy movement alike, even if the word Iraq seldom crosses their lips. And from the Atlantic Ocean to the Persian Gulf the plates are moving still ...

I would probably be more inclined to listen to George if I didn't get an image of him crawling around in a lycra cat suit and mewing on Celebrity Big Brother every time I heard his name.

Nevertheless he comes up with some salient points. If the US can't somehow reconcile regulating gangster capitalism, and staunching the flow of trillions of dollars that vanish in corporate welfare and military imperialism each year, with their innate aversion towards top down regulation; then its hard to see what will turn it around for them.

It's beginning to look like Obama will be a one term president who will be replaced by yet another right wing, tax slashing, Middle East invading neo-liberal nutbar, then its back to Dubya with a bigger deficit.

Aberdeenangarse

ruggedtoast wrote: »

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/dec/15/iraq-death-knell-of-us-empire



I would probably be more inclined to listen to George if I didn't get an image of him crawling around in a lycra cat suit and mewing on Celebrity Big Brother every time I heard his name.

How could we forget! :rotfl:

Generali

ruggedtoast wrote: »

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/dec/15/iraq-death-knell-of-us-empire



I would probably be more inclined to listen to George if I didn't get an image of him crawling around in a lycra cat suit and mewing on Celebrity Big Brother every time I heard his name.

Nevertheless he comes up with some salient points. If the US can't somehow reconcile regulating gangster capitalism, and staunching the flow of trillions of dollars that vanish in corporate welfare and military imperialism each year, with their innate aversion towards top down regulation; then its hard to see what will turn it around for them.

It's beginning to look like Obama will be a one term president who will be replaced by yet another right wing, tax slashing, Middle East invading neo-liberal nutbar, then its back to Dubya with a bigger deficit.

Ron Paul is doing quite credibly. He's possibly the only candidate that can return the USA to solvency. He has some interesting economic ideas including directly linking Politicians' wages to inflation: as prices rise, political wages fall at the rate of inflation.

nearlynew

For me, George Galloway's finest hour came when he appeared before some senate committe to answer questions about his involvment in an iraqi charity.

Asked if it was true that he had met saddam hussein twice, he replied- "yes, just like your donald rumsfeld did. Only when I met him, I didn't sell him any weapons"


Classic.

tartanterra

ruggedtoast wrote: »

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/dec/15/iraq-death-knell-of-us-empire



I would probably be more inclined to listen to George if I didn't get an image of him crawling around in a lycra cat suit and mewing on Celebrity Big Brother every time I heard his name.

Nevertheless he comes up with some salient points. If the US can't somehow reconcile regulating gangster capitalism, and staunching the flow of trillions of dollars that vanish in corporate welfare and military imperialism each year, with their innate aversion towards top down regulation; then its hard to see what will turn it around for them.

It's beginning to look like Obama will be a one term president who will be replaced by yet another right wing, tax slashing, Middle East invading neo-liberal nutbar, then its back to Dubya with a bigger deficit.

Well, if a publicity mad, x list celebrity, former marxist sympathiser and failed politician, who's never had a proper jobs says so, then clearly it must be true.:)

StevieJ

Aberdeenangarse wrote: »

How could we forget! :rotfl:

True, I prefer the video of him giving evidence in the US senate, they didn't know what hit them
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HrdFFCnYtbk

bugslet

Generali wrote: »

Ron Paul is doing quite credibly. He's possibly the only candidate that can return the USA to solvency. He has some interesting economic ideas including directly linking Politicians' wages to inflation: as prices rise, political wages fall at the rate of inflation.

And his foreign policy has always been very hands off.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/12/16/us-usa-campaign-paul-idUSTRE7BD1TN20111216

He's been very consistent in his many years as a politician and his stance has always been to avoid being the world's policeman.

ruggedtoast

bugslet wrote: »

And his foreign policy has always been very hands off.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/12/16/us-usa-campaign-paul-idUSTRE7BD1TN20111216

He's been very consistent in his many years as a politician and his stance has always been to avoid being the world's policeman.

Looks like his reluctance to invade Iran would put him against AIPAC from that list. Has any US president been elected without their blessing?

No, it'll be a right wing neo-liberal nut bar.

bugslet

Probably! The Americans can be remarkably consistent.

FTBFun

nearlynew wrote: »

For me, George Galloway's finest hour came when he appeared before some senate committe to answer questions about his involvment in an iraqi charity.

Asked if it was true that he had met saddam hussein twice, he replied- "yes, just like your donald rumsfeld did. Only when I met him, I didn't sell him any weapons"


Classic.

I loved when - as a sitting MP - he said to the Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein:

"I salute your courage, your strength and your indefatigability"

An odious little specimen of a man.

StevieJ

FTBFun wrote: »

I loved when - as a sitting MP - he said to the Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein:

"I salute your courage, your strength and your indefatigability"

An odious little specimen of a man.

Then again who supplied those arms to enable Saddam to murder his own people? they are your real odious specimens.