Wars 4 Status Quo

... que votaram contra a Torture-”Terrorist” Tribunal bill (HR 6166):

Ron Paul, Roscoe Bartlett, Wayne Gilchrest, Walter Jones, Steven LaTourette, James Leach, Jerry Moran.

"JERUSALEM - Israeli forces have killed 3,733 Palestinians, including 767 minors, in the West Bank' and Gaza while Palestinians have killed 1,011 Israelis during six years of conflict, a leading Israeli human rights group said Thursday.

B'Tselem, the Israeli Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories, said at least 1,812 of the Palestinians were not taking part in hostilities when they were killed and 208 were the object of a targeted killing, usually an air strike aimed at suspected militants.

On the other side, Palestinians have killed 697 Israeli civilians, including 119 minors, in the West Bank, Gaza and inside Israel.In addition, Palestinians killed 314 members of the Israeli security forces.

The group published the figures as it marked the sixth anniversary of the second Palestinian uprising, which began on September 28, 2000.

In addition to the casualties in the West Bank and Gaza, B'Tselem said Israeli security forces killed 60 Palestinians inside Israel. Israeli civilians killed 41 Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, according to the group.

The B'Tselem figures are slightly lower than an Associated Press tally for the same period. The AP count in 70 months of fighting shows 4,015 people killed on the Palestinian side and 1,098 on the Israeli side."

Anwarblog: "When plans to produce My Name Is Rachel Corrie, a play based on the journal entries of an American girl murdered by the IDF for her pro-Palestinian activism, were canceled in New York City this year, in the U.S. we only read about it in The Nation. When plans to put on Idomeneo, a Mozart opera, in Germany were recently canceled to placate Muslim sensibilities — the original has nothing to do with Muslims, or Mohammed, but the “post-modern” version that was being planned featured a scene involving the Prophet’s severed head being brought out onto the stage — we read about it … everywhere.

Go figure… "

Na The Nation:

"The book is the play My Name Is Rachel Corrie. Composed from the journal entries and e-mails of the 23-year-old from Washington State who was crushed to death in Gaza three years ago under a bulldozer operated by the Israeli army, the play had two successful runs in London last year and then became a cause celebre after a progressive New York theater company decided to postpone its American premiere indefinitely out of concern for the sensitivities of (unnamed) Jewish groups unsettled by Hamas's victory in the Palestinian elections. When the English producers denounced the decision by the New York Theatre Workshop as "censorship" and withdrew the show, even the mainstream media could not ignore the implications. Why is it that the eloquent words of an American radical could not be heard in this country--not, that is, without what the Workshop had called "contextualizing," framing the play with political discussions, maybe even mounting a companion piece that would somehow "mollify" the Jewish community?..."

Muita custa dizer o óbvio.

Falta ainda admitir que tal como Estaline recebeu do pós-WWII algo que nem sequer tinha reivindicado (o domínio a Leste, legado do objectivo de "Vitória Total"), também os Iranianos apenas se limitam a gerir o que lhes foi oferecido.

Depois, na Sábado, naquilo que chamo o Complexo de Churchill (a "velha raposa" que quase impedia Chamberlain - o parvo - de conseguir o tempo suficiente para um adequado rearmamento), Pacheco Pereira fala que estamos na Europa de 1939 (bem, Hitler estava já com derrota marcada a prazo em pouco mais de 2,5 anos enquanto que a Guerra ao Terrorismo "apenas" contiua a alastrar-se por toda a civilização). Outros falam no islamo-fascismo-leninismo.

Thomas L. Friedman, que atira o "sucesso" no Iraque crónicamente para os "próximos 6 meses", resolveu agora virar-se para Lenine. Brilhante.

" Prior to widespread prohibition the biggest political development with drugs was the British government’s encouragement of opium use in China under the auspices of the British East India Company.

In the eighteenth century the company controlled the opium-producing areas in India and had a dominant position in the trade of Indian opium into China.

The profits helped subsidize British control of India and to keep exports to China balanced with imports.

In the late 1830s the British government started the First Opium War by sending a naval expedition that easily defeated Chinese forces, opened up Chinese ports to British trade, and won monetary compensation and Hong Kong as a British colony from China.

The Second Opium War began in 1856 when Britain, France, Russia, and the United States attacked China in order to gain increased access to Chinese markets and to legalize opium in China.

The Emperor was forced to pay the British government £20,000 which was
according to Abadinsky (2001) “more than enough to offset the balance of trade which was the real cause of the war” (page 29)." Recreational Drug Prohibitions by Mark Thornton (Mises Institute; Auburn University) 8/31/2006

"If America is indeed the "new Rome", then it has been rising to this role over the last few years, with Britain by its side.

Virgil once wrote that Rome's "imperial art" was (in Dryden's translation) "to tame the proud; the fettered slave to free."

Since the Kosovo war we've seen many proud men tamed: Saddam, Slobbo, the warlords of Sierra Leone. Good. Sadly, we've also found that the "fettered slave" once freed is not necessarily particularly grateful, or even likeable.(...)

And in the midst of what is effectively just yet another complex African civil war, what could UN forces - especially Western ones - hope to achieve? There are basically three outcomes:

1) They get dragged into a shooting conflict themselves.
2) A botched Rwanda/Srebenica-style situation.
3) Managing somehow to hold Khartoum forces out of an area that will in all likelihood become a de facto rebel state.

Unfortunately this is just another chapter in the endless book of inter-tribal conflict. This was of course exacerbated by European powers carving the continent up into unwieldy mongrel states, but such conflicts had been going on long before their arrival.(...)

Like most people in most places on earth, the different tribes and peoples of Africa have rarely needed to be given additional reasons to fight." Bloging The inhumane folly of our interventionist machismo Anyone can call for action to end fighting. Few consider what this usually involves: people dying to no good purpose

Via LRCBlog: Posted by Lew Rockwell at September 19, 2006 08:21 PM

"A Manhattan friend recently attended an exclusive neocon gathering. The lowlight came when Norman Podhoretz reassured a worried group that Bush would assault Iran."

PS: Se vier a concretizar-se antecipo já as habituais lamentações sobre "Como a guerra é uma necessidade. É que eles, rodeados no Afeganistão , Iraque e 200 ogivas nucleares Israelitas, são um perigo para o Ocidente.", e depois as lágrimas de crocodilos sobre vítimas civis.

E depois teremos todo o Médio Oriente em plena "liberation".

PS2: Claro que Vasco Rato conseguiu pronunciar o insight que "Afeganistão" é onde está o perigo para o "Ocidente". É mesmo isso, um enorme perigo, temos de os combater lá se não eles já estavam a entrar pelas nossas praias.

Wikipedia.

* Closer to his work as a historian, Taylor championed less government secrecy and perhaps ironically for a staunch leftist, fought for more privately-owned television stations.

* The frequent television appearances helped to make Taylor the most famous British historian of the 20th century.

* A recurring theme in his writings was the role of accidents in deciding history. In his view, leaders did not make history; instead they reacted to events - what happened in the past was due to sequences of blunders and errors that were largely outside anyone's control. To the extent that anyone made anything happen in history, it was only through their mistakes. Thus, in his best-selling biography of Bismarck, Taylor argued that the Iron Chancellor had unified Germany more by accident than by design.

* His argument was that Hitler wished to make Germany the strongest power in Europe but he did not want or plan war. The outbreak of war in 1939 was an unfortunate accident caused by mistakes on everyone's part.

Notably, Taylor portrayed Hitler as a grasping opportunist with no beliefs other than the pursuit of power and anti-Semitism. He argued that Hitler did not possess any sort of programme and his foreign policy was one of drift and seizing chances as they offered themselves. He did not even consider Hitler’s anti-Semitism unique: foreshadowing the arguments that Daniel Goldhagen was to make decades later

* Taylor argued that the basic problem with an interwar Europe was a flawed Treaty of Versailles that was sufficiently onerous to ensure that the overwhelming majority of Germans would always hate it but insufficiently onerous that it failed to destroy the Reich’s potential to be a Great Power once more.

* Taylor always made clear that he wanted nothing with either Barnes or Hoggan. Much to Taylor’s intense discomfort, various neo-Nazi groups claimed that The Origins of the Second World War “acquitted” Hitler of responsibility for World War Two and tried to claim Taylor. Taylor always disowned the support of the neo-Nazis, making clear that he held their politics in extreme distaste.

* In the aftermath of the controversy occasioned by The Origins of the Second World War, many felt that Taylor was discredited forever as a historian, a point reinforced by the University of Oxford’s refusal to renew his teaching term in 1964. However in 1965 he rebounded with the spectacular success of his book English History 1914-1945, his only venture into social and cultural history, where he offered a loving, affectionate portrayal of the years between 1914 and 1945. English History 1914-1945 was enormous bestseller and in its first year in print sold more than all of the previous volumes of the Oxford History of England combined.

Though he felt there was much to be ashamed of in British history, especially in regard to Ireland, he was very proud to be British and more specifically English. He was fond of stressing his Non-Conformist Northern English background and saw himself as part of a grand tradition of radical dissent that he regarded as the real glorious history of England.

* One of Taylor’s finer moments occurred in the 1960s when he became the first English language historian and indeed the first historian after Hans Mommsen to accept the conclusions of the book The Reichstag Fire by journalist Fritz Tobias, that the Nazis had not set the Reichstag on fire in 1933 and that Marinus van der Lubbe had acted alone. What Tobias and Taylor argued had happened, was that the new Nazi government had been looking for something to increase its share of the vote in the elections of March 5, 1933, so as to activate the Enabling Act and that van der Lubbe had serendipitously (for the Nazis) provided it by burning down the Reichstag. Even without the Reichstag fire, the Nazis were quite determined to destroy German democracy. (...) Today, it is universally accepted by historians that Tobias and Taylor were correct about van der Lubbe as the sole arsonist.

*Taylor possessed a magnificent literary style, which allowed him to get away with many of his more frivolous ideas, such as that the major cause of the First World War was the wrong turn taken by the chauffeur of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo in 1914. His views were those of a quirky, idiosyncratic and flamboyant individualist who challenged orthodoxies.

Wikipedia:

* "Taylor himself was a member of the British Communist Party from 1924 to 1926, though he broke with the Party over what he considered to be its ineffective stand during the 1926 General Strike. After leaving the Communists, he was an ardent Labour Party supporter for the rest of his life"

* During this period, Muggeridge and Taylor began a life-long disagreement over the Soviet Union, though this dispute did not seriously affect their friendship.

* The opposing influences of Pribram and Namier can be seen in Taylor's writings on Austria-Hungary until the publication of his 1941 book The Habsburg Monarchy 1809–1918, which was published in a revised edition in 1948. Taylor's earlier writings reflected Pribram's favourable opinion of the Habsburgs; his later writings show the influence of Namier's unfavourable views. In The Habsburg Monarchy, Taylor stated that the Habsburgs saw their realms entirely as a tool for foreign policy and thus could never build a genuine nation-state. In order to hold their realm together, they resorted to playing one ethnic group off against another and promoted German and Magyar hegemony over the other ethnic groups in Austria-Hungary.

[portanto era possível em 1941 Taylor ter uma opinião favorável dos Habsburgs - ao contrário do cruzada de Wilson que a destruiu...]

* "After 1936 he fervently criticized appeasement, a stance he would disavow in 1961. Also after 1936 he resigned from the Manchester Peace Council, urged British rearmament in the face of what Taylor considered to be the Nazi menace, and advocated an Anglo-Soviet alliance to contain Germany. In 1938 he denounced the Munich Agreement at several rallies and may have written several leaders in the Manchester Guardian criticizing the Munich Agreement; later he would compare the relatively smaller number of Czechoslovak dead with the number of Polish dead."

[Parece igualzinho a Churchill, não? Mais tarde, e não parece tolo, com a devida distância histórica escreve que o appeasement permitiu o rearmamento para além de explorar as hipóteses de paz. Parece perfeitamente legítima a posiçao, não?]

* "Throughout his life, Taylor was basically sympathetic to the foreign policy of the Soviet Union, though he was strongly critical of Communism."

* Taylor was nonetheless critical of repression within the Soviet Union. In 1948 he attended and did his best to sabotage a Stalinist cultural congress in Wrocław, Poland. His speech, which was broadcast live on Polish radio and via speakers on the streets of Wrocław, about the right of everyone to hold different views from those who hold power, was enthusiastically received by the delegates and was met with thunderous applause. The speech was clearly intended as a rebuttal of a speech given by the Soviet writer Alexander Fadeyev the previous day, who had demanded obedience on the part of everyone to Joseph Stalin.

* For Taylor, Nazi racial imperialism was a continuation of policies pursued by every German ruler. The Course of German History was a bestseller in both the United Kingdom and the United States; it was the success of this book that made Taylor's reputation in the United States.

* Earlier, in the 1950s-1960s, Taylor became a good friend of and wrote the biography of Lord Beaverbrook, a Conservative who believed strongly in the British Empire and whose entry into politics was in support of Andrew Bonar Law, a Conservative leader strongly connected with the establishment of Northern Ireland.

Poucos notaram...

"The emperor goes on to explain in detail the reasons why spreading the faith through violence is something unreasonable. Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul. 'God is not pleased by blood, and not acting reasonably ("syn logo") is contrary to God's nature. Faith is born of the soul, not the body. Whoever would lead someone to faith needs the ability to speak well and to reason properly, without violence and threats…. To convince a reasonable soul, one does not need a strong arm, or weapons of any kind, or any other means of threatening a person with death….'"

...que referências sobre espalhar uma fé pela violência serve também a outras fés e outras violências.

Cara Patrícia Lança, porque não tenta argumentar um pouco sobre o que está em causa e deixa de lado as técnicas de "smearing" tão tipicamente neo-con.

Confunde-se o realismo de Taylor com preferências ideológicas (deixou cedo de ser comunista passando para o Labour).

Basta ler apenas as introduções de AJP Taylor para ficar esclarecido sobre as suas posições (e a sua qualidade).Por exemplo, a que fez ao livro de John Reed sobre a revolução russa, "Dez dias que mudaram o mundo", e consegue ver que não contém absolutamente nenhuma glorificação da "revolução". Aliás, esta introdução tinha sido pedida na edição original e depois recusada, percebe-se pela falta de adesão e "revisionismo" crítico dos actores e do processo. Foi publicada mais tarde com o livro apenas porque os direitos de autor caducaram.

AJP Taylor era de facto um realista de esquerda (e cedo anti-estalinista) [ao contrário dos ex-trostskistas que continuam a praticar o trotskismo nos dias de hoje vestidos de direita, intoxicados pela sua ideologia internacionalista, revolucionária e iluminista, o anti-semitismo substituído pela islamofobia, e indutores da escalada "de excepção" securitária e militarista].

[adenda: esta parece-me ser uma caracterização dos mais acérrimos "opinion-makers" dados como neo-conservadores, porventura os de 2ª geração. Não estou a afirmar que muitos liberais são neo-conservadores nem que Patrícia Lança o é (e já agora, que não seja possível encontrar opiniões válidas no neo-conservadorismo), algumas ideias e resultados confundem-se (no sentido de resultarem no mesmo) por vezes, mas percebe-se que partem de pontos diferentes - o que acaba por fazer uma importante diferença]

Historiadores de "direita" pró-Império como Neil Fergusson defendem hoje as mesmas (ou do tipo) teses (por exemplo, o erro da Inglaterra ter entrado na "WWI"), mas mais tarde.

É bom reparar que o seu provável herói Churchill, (capaz de comentários do mais puro anti-semitismo e racismo), fomentou a aliança com Estaline depois do mundo saber das suas atrocidades nos anos 30 e de ter igualmente invadido a Polónia com práticas de genocídio. No fim, sabemos que Estaline ganhou e o Império Britânico caiu. Falemos de cegueira germanofóbica.

O "realismo" e alguma moralidade podia ter conseguido que Hitler e Estaline se destruíssem mutuamente. Chamberlain o que conseguiu foi tempo para o rearmamento e a França e Inglaterra tinham os meios para a defesa, mas não para se meterem num conflito a Leste, tomando a iniciativa de declarar guerra por causa da Polónia (em vez de esperarem), que acabou no fim nas mãos de Estaline. Especulação? Sim, mas vale a pena colocá-la.

Taylor que, lendo os seus livros sobre Bismarck, a monarquia dos Habsburgs, a história alemã, não se lhe nota especial germanofobia, e apenas defende (como Thatcher) que os alemães têm uma capacidade especial para a tragédia. De resto, escreve História como não sabia ser possível escrever.

Aquilo que lhe noto de socialismo é acreditar no Keynesianismo, do tipo, a despesa pública ajuda a economia privada em tempo de crise. Mas nisso, todos os primeiros ministros do "Ocidente" acreditam também.

Ukraine 'shelves bid to join NATO'

"We have explained that because of the political situation in Ukraine, we will have to take a pause, But the time will come when a decision will be made," new Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich told a joint news conference Thursday after talks with NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer and NATO ambassadors.

Yanukovich, regarded as closer to Moscow than reformist President Viktor Yushchenko, who came to power in an Orange Revolution after defeating Yanukovich in a flawed 2004 election, said he did not want to complicate Ukraine-Russia relations.

"We (Ukraine) should be a reliable bridge between the European Union and Russia," he said.

Mass Grave of Massacred Poles Found in Ukraine

"Ukrainian government commission has concluded that thousands of people buried in a mass grave outside Kiev were killed during Stalin's purges, not by Nazi soldiers.

The commission's conclusion supports the testimony of elderly witnesses in the nearby village of Bykovnia, who said they saw trucks dripping blood en route to the site in the 1930's, before the Nazis occupied the area. Unofficial estimates put the number of bodies in the grave at 200,000 to 300,000.

Villagers in Bykovnia broke five decades of silence to accuse Stalin's secret police after the Ukrainian government erected a monument in May 1988 blaming Nazi occupiers for the crime. The villagers in December forced Ukrainian authorities to establish the commission, saying three previous investigations had covered up the truth by blaming Nazi troops."

Agora permitam-me o raciocíonio:

Invadiu a Polónia 15 dias depois de Hitler, já depois das purgas e outros massacres nos anos 30, o tratamento dos polacos foi de genocídio (o que não aconteceu própriamente com a ocupação nazi), depois passa a aliado e no fim da guerra fica com metade da Europa? Foi isto a guerra pela "libertação" da Europa (e já agora, qual foi o resultado da "libertação" da Ásia...)? É isto que devemos celebrar em Roosevelt e Churchill?

Este texto foi escrito antes desta descoberta:

"Here, however, criticism is halted before it starts. A moral postulate of our time is that in pursuit of the destruction of Hitler, all things were permissible. Yet why is it self-evident that morality required a crusade against Hitler in 1939 and 1940, and not against Stalin? At that point, Hitler had slain his thousands, but Stalin had already slain his millions. In fact, up to June, 1941, the Soviets behaved far more murderously toward the Poles in their zone of occupation than the Nazis did in theirs. Around 1,500,000 Poles were deported to the Gulag, with about half of them dying within the first two years. As Norman Davies writes: "Stalin was outpacing Hitler in his desire to reduce the Poles to the condition of a slave nation." Of course, there were balance-of-power considerations that created distinctions between the two dictators. But it has yet to be explained why there should exist a double standard ordaining that compromise with one dictator would have been "morally sickening," while collaboration with the other was morally irreproachable." Rethinking Churchill, Part 3 by Ralph Raico

Moldovan region holds vote on independence

CHINISAU (Reuters) - Ex-Soviet Moldova's separatist Dnestr region, unrecognized internationally, votes this weekend to underpin 16 years of independence and promote moves toward eventually joining Russia.

But Western countries say they will not recognize Sunday's vote in Dnestr, run by Russian-speaking hardliners in one of the "frozen conflicts" defying resolution in ex-Soviet states.

Only Russia, which maintains 1,200 troops in Dnestr, has urged Europe to take heed of the plebiscite, certain to return a large majority backing independence.
Some 400,000 voters in Dnestr, a sliver of land bordering Ukraine, will be asked two questions: whether they uphold independence and subsequent attachment to Russia or whether they reject independence and back integration with Moldova.

"For all the claptrap about Churchill's "far-sightedness" during the 30s in opposing the "appeasers," in the end the policy of the Chamberlain government to rearm as quickly as possible, while testing the chances for peace with Germany was more realistic than Churchill's.

The common mythology is so far from historical truth that even an ardent Churchill sympathizer, Gordon Craig, feels obliged to write:

The time is long past when it was possible to see the protracted debate over British foreign policy in the 1930s as a struggle between Churchill, an angel of light, fighting against the velleities of uncomprehending and feeble men in high places. It is reasonably well-known today that Churchill was often ill-informed, that his claims about German strength were exaggerated and his prescriptions impractical, that his emphasis on air power was misplaced.

Moreover, as a British historian has recently noted: "For the record, it is worth recalling that in the 1930s Churchill did not oppose the appeasement of either Italy or Japan."

It is also worth recalling that it was the pre-Churchill British governments that furnished the material with which Churchill was able to win the Battle of Britain. Clive Ponting has observed:

the Baldwin and Chamberlain Governments . . . had ensured that Britain was the first country in the world to deploy a fully integrated system of air defence based on radar detection of incoming aircraft and ground control of fighters . . . Churchill's contribution had been to pour scorn on radar when he was in opposition in the 1930s." Rethinking Churchill

Terrorist Network Disconnect, Via Tom Paine: "(...) Gen. Greg Newbold, the senior staff officer for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, later recalled to Michael R. Gordon and Gen. Bernard E. Trainor, the authors of COBRA II, “You could still smell the smoke in the corridors” when Undersecretary for Policy Douglas Feith upbraided him when he said he was working hard on tracking down al-Qaida in Afghanistan. “Why are you working on Afghanistan?” Feith demanded. “You ought to be working on Iraq.” When the United States sent its forces into Afghanistan, it was allying with the existing Iranian-supported anti-Taliban coalition forces rather than creating something new. In fact, the United States could not have gotten rid of the Taliban regime without the help of Iran. Not only did Tehran allow the United States to transport food and humanitarian goods across Iran’s territory, but gave the Bush administration advice on the sociopolitical cleavages in Afghanistan and, according to James Risen’s State of War, even what targets to bomb.

After the Taliban was overthrown, Iran not only used its considerable political influence with the Northern Alliance to help put together the new Afghan regime but ensured that its charter would commit it to cooperation with war on terrorism. Then Iran offered to feed, cloth, equip and train 20,000 Afghan troops, as then-U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan James Dobbins has described in detail, only to be refused by the Bush administration. The Bush administration also refused to cooperate actively with Iran against al-Qaida, rejecting the recommendations of its intelligence and counterterrorism specialists.

Contrary to the propaganda pumped out by Rumsfeld from 2002 to 2004, accusing Iran of harboring al-Qaida cadres, within the first few months after the collapse of the Taliban, Iran had arrested 80 percent of the group of cadres who had been associated with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, which had crossed the border to hide in Iran. That account was given by high-ranking al-Qaida member Saif al-Adel, posted on an al-Qaida website in mid-2005. The al-Qaida leader declared, "The steps taken by Iran against us shook us and caused the failure of 75 percent of our plan.”

But if Iran has been the main state enemy of al-Qaida and its state sponsor, where was the external support for the Taliban regime coming from? None other than Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, the closest allies of the United States in the Islamic world. Ahmad Rashid’s authoritative account in Taliban shows that, as early as mid-1994, Pakistan’s intelligence services began secretly providing financial and material support to the Taliban, aimed at setting up a Saudi-style radical anti-Shiite Sunni theocracy in Afghanistan.(...) "

N´O Amigo do Povo

Comentários avulsos. Não que não concorde com a tese.

"Aliás, o que foram senão idiotas homens como George Washington ou Thomas Jefferson? Lutaram pela independência das Trexe Colónias? Que disparate! Não era óbvio que iam perder?"

As Guerras pela Independência sempre tiveram uma grande probabilidade de sucesso (por causa da sua característica não convencional). Um dos poucos casos de insucesso foi mesmo o dos Confederados.

"O que foi Winston Churchiil senão um idiota? Onde já se viu fazer com que a Grã-Bretanha e um império semi-esfarrapado e impreparado para a guerra continuassem praticamente sozinhos uma guerra com a quase generalidade do continente Europeu entre Junho de 1940 e Junho de 1941? Os realistas, os “velhos do Restelo” da altura, é que tinham razão quando começaram a pressionar seriamente Churchill e os seus incondicionais para que se iniciassem negociações com Hitler."

O Império não estava esfarrapado, a Grande Guerra tinha conseguido aumentar ainda mais o Império (que já era o maior). Os meios militares de Inglaterra e França não eram inferior à Alemanha. E coragem tiveram os Franceses, que depois de terem experimentado a realidade da luta no seu território da Primeira, declararam guerra sem hesitação na Segunda (sem canal a protegê-los). Já tinha sido a França a combater Carlos V.

Churchill conduziu o Império ao seu fim. O "realismo" podia ter conseguido que o regime de Hitler e Estaline se tivessem destruído mutuamente e sem invasão a Oeste. O resultado final foi a vitória de Estaline (invasor da Polónia 15 dias depois de Hitler) e do comunismo.

O Império sobreviveu enquanto...(AJP Taylor):" Though the object of being a Great Power is to be able to fight a great war, the only way of remaining a Great Power is not to fight one, or to fight it on a limited scale. This was the secret of Great Britain greatness...".

E não, Chruchill não trocou o Império por uma causa, a sua causa era a da preservação do Império (como digo, sejam quais forem as suas virtualidades).

"Afinal, não apenas a guerra estava perdida como era um sonho quimérico pensar que a Europa, ao menos em parte, podia e devia ser subtraída à Alemanha, restaurando Estados, Governos e liberdades literalmente engolidas pelo avanço do fascismo e do nazismo – tanto na frente interna como externa."

O fascismo e nazismo inicialmente, surgem como herdeiros do medo ao comunismo, do fim da civilizada ordem monárquica, e como tentativa de restabelecer o que os Impérios derrotados tinham perdido na anterior. Afinal o Império Britânico era quem dominava.

"E Pitt, o jovem Pitt, que foi senão um idiota? Não teria sido melhor para ele, para a Grã-Bretanha e para a Europa, meter a viola no saco e deixar tudo a Napoleão e à França."

Tal como no caso da Revolução Russa, a tentativa inicial de intervir em França contribuiu para consolidar o que viria a ser Napoleão. A bandeira do perigo e ingerência externa é sempre o melhor veículo para a população apoiar o "seu" candidato a ditador.

"E Reagan na década de 1980? Outro idiota chapado, sempre com aquela conversa de que a União Soviética era não apenas o “império do mal” mas que, sobretudo, seria um dia derrotada numa guerra “fria” que durava há já mais do que três décadas. A afrontar os soviéticos, a propor essa idiotice que foi a “guerra da estrelas”, sempre a sublinhar a superioridade moral da democracia sobre o comunismo. Idiota chapado!"

Reagan e Tatcher estenderam a mão ao Império do Mal que por sua vez caiu precisamente quando contrariou a sua prudente antiga política externa (de apenas preservar aquilo que lhes foi oferecido com o fim da WWII) ao invadir o Afeganistão.

Blair jabs 'mad anti-Americanism'

Ok, tudo bem. É verdade. Existe o irritante anti-americanismo. Como diz CAA: "Em relação a Ribeiro e Castro sinto uma reacção semelhante à que, por vezes, tenho por George W. Bush, mutatis mutandis - não simpatizo especialmente com a figura, mas os ataques injustos e perniciosos com que os seus detractores permanentemente o obsequeiam quase que me levam a defendê-lo."

O Ethos (por mais que se afaste da realidade de hoje ou constitua em si um mito demasiado romantizado) americano é de não intervencionismo na economia e sociedade civil. Atingiu o auge no período da fronteira (e funcionou razoávelmente até ao fim do século 19, mesmo apesar de Lincoln). Ausência de Estado. Burke tem um texto que afirma mais ou menos que o mais puro anarquismo funcionou. Um livro recente, "The not so Wild, Wild West", confirma que existia Ordem, "Rule of Law" e ausência de Estado. O nível de crime, hoje na América (já bem mais reduzido que nos anos 70), é ainda 10 vezes superior ao do tal "Wild Wild West", o tal, onde todos andavam armados até aos dentes quando iam para os copos no Saloon.

Mas em assuntos internacionais, desde a WWII, que o intervencionismo internacional é a palavra de ordem, algo talvez inevitável a qualquer nação que chega à posição de grande nação, com um poder político centralizado e consolidado e o seu "complexo militar-industrial" ... o inevitável caminho para o Império, onde os acontecimentos passam a comandar a República para um destino inevitável porque é assim a ordem natural das coisas.

Por isso, o anti-americanismo, critíca o capitalismo internamente e o intervencionismo externo (se bem que aqui, é mais pelas escolhas feitas e não pelo princípio - porque também a tradição isolacionista parece ser vítima de tal perseguição, os isolacionisas coitados, os únicos com razão, estão sujeitos à censura de todas as partes, descartados com uma espécie de anomalia teórica).

Mas no final, o anti-anti-americanismo pode prestar um mau serviço à América.

Diz AJP Taylor:" Though the object of being a Great Power is to be able to fight a great war, the only way of remaining a Great Power is not to fight one, or to fight it on a limited scale. This was the secret of Great Britain greatness..".

Claro, o Império Britânico, que a tudo resistiu, morreu por morte súbita pelo mão do seu maior defensor: Churchill, aquele que nunca recusou a mais pequena hipótese de entrar em mais um conflito.

A América percorre o mesmo caminho. Os seus "maiores" defensores preparam-lhe a pior das armadilhas, aplaudidos entusiásticamente em todo o mundo pelos anti-anti-americanos. É o destino. Tem de ser?

"Lessons from the First Five Years of War. Where Do We Go from Here?", By Newt Gingrich

Suponho que este discurso marca qualquer coisa. Mais um atentado mais sério e provávelmente temos algo semelhante ao incêndio do Parlamento Alemão. As medidas excepcionais por causa do perigo interno e externo.

Lendo AJP Taylor, o conceituado historiador, este dá como definitivo que o Parlamento foi mesmo incendiado por um acto individual e não, note-se, por um acto conspirativo de Hitler. Em nada desculpa o que se seguiu. Mas existia a percepção real do perigo comunista. Por outro lado, o evento em si dava mesmo jeito para servir de alavanca à tomada do poder por meios consitucionais. AJP Taylor também acrescenta que nas prisões que se seguiram, a sua lista não era da responsabilidade de Goering, irónicamente, tinha sido o anterior responsável social-democrata a prepará-la, como medida de precaução.

O uso do medo para escalar o histerismo securitário é o caminho mais seguro para o desastre. E o pior é que arrisca-se sempre a implementar medidas que contribuem para a sua própria previsão apocalíptica. É nessa vertigem que vivemos. Cabe a cada um escolher o caminho. Mas não digam que os "really tough guys" são logo aqueles que se prestam sempre a ceder ao mais puro sentimento de medo.

"NATO permanece no Afeganistão por mais um ano"

Even the Pentagon knows the painful answer to the question of "why?"

"Muslims do not hate ‘our freedom,’ but rather, they hate our policies. The overwhelming majority voice their objection to what they see as our one-sided support in favor of Israel and against Palestinian rights, and the longstanding, even increasing support for what Muslims collectively see as tyrannies, most notably in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Pakistan, and the Gulf states….the dramatic narrative since 9/11has essentially borne out the entire radical Islamist bill of particulars." The Question They Never Ask John M. Peters

PS: Se fosse Mário Soares a afirmá-lo...

Fácil. O mesmo de sempre. A divisão dos islâmicos e dos regimes. Os regimes que são ameaçados pelo tipo de ideologia subversiva para qualquer Estado e qualquer tipo de regime representado pela AlQaeda. Todos os actuais regimes àrabes se sentem ameaçados pelo retro-ideologia implícita em Bin Laden.

E a melhor forma de ajudar Bin Laden é mesmo induzir a mudança de regimes e criar o caos (ou seja, o Iraque eo Afeganistão numa versão alargada a todo o Médio Oriente).

O que dizem os proto-neo-cons? "faster, please". Hoje como antes, a turculência para salvar o mundo e a pretensão à detenção da moral onde a moral dificilmente pode sequer ser articulada (é curioso porque costumam ser os mesmos para quem a aliança com Estaline, realísticamente não lhes causa qualquer incómodo, pleo contrário, Churchill e Roosevelt devem ser celebrados pela sua visão!), é mesmo o maior perigo que enfrentamos.

"(...)Although Secretary Rice says it's "too early" to know who was behind the attack, the Syrians – who keep a very close watch on their neck of the woods – are pretty certain: the Syrian ambassador to the U.S. said on CNN that Jund al-Sham, a Syrian Sunni fundamentalist terrorist group, is undoubtedly responsible, and therein lies a story…

Jund al-Sham, loosely affiliated with al-Qaeda, has claimed responsibility for a number of attacks in the Levant, including the assassination of a Hezbollah official. Now this last certainly seems like an odd task for a purportedly Islamist group to undertake. The ostensible motivation for this attack is the Shi'ite-Sunni rivalry: the Shi'ite Hezbollah is considered heretical, and therefore a target of Takfiri retribution, yet the confluence of interests between these "Soldiers of Syria" with the soldiers of Israel in the IDF is striking. Another oddity: the links between Jund al-Sham and a recently uncovered Israeli spy network in Lebanon.

Hussein Khattab, a Palestinian member of the spy ring – which has been linked to several assassinations of Palestinian leaders and Hezbollah militants in Lebanon – is the brother of Sheik Jamal Khattab, an Islamic cleric and recruiter for al-Qaeda in Iraq, who is, in turn, connected to Jund al-Sham. Furthermore, a suspiciously large part of Jund al-Sham's activities in the Levant have been directed against Hezbollah. In July 2005, Jund al-Sham faxed a threat to the Shi'ite Fatwa Center in Tyre, vowing to murder several prominent Hezbollah figures, including former spiritual leader Sayyed Hussein Fadlallah. The group also issued a number of statements labeling Hezbollah "unbelievers" – and thus justifiably targeted by "true" Muslims. Another coincidence: the assassination of Hezbollah leaders Ali Saleh and Ghaleb Awali, as well as Palestinian militants in Lebanon, previously claimed by Jund al-Sham, has been uncovered by the Lebanese security forces as the work of the Mossad ring.

The attack on the U.S. embassy underscores the reality of what is going on in the Levant, with Syria at the epicenter of a brewing Islamist storm – and the U.S. and Israel objectively allied with radical Islamists seeking "regime change" in Damascus. Syria, with its secular government and moderate religious leaders, is an affront to the real terrorists, just as it is anathema in Washington and Tel Aviv. A rational American policy in the region would be to seek a reconciliation with Damascus and an alliance against al-Qaeda and the forces of religious extremism that represent a real threat to our interests. But U.S. interests have nothing to do with our Middle East policy, and that has been true for a long time.

Syria, too, is living in the shadow of a terrorist threat – but it will be a cold day in hell before Washington ever recognizes that. All our policymakers care about is appeasing Israel and maintaining the support of that country's vocal and very powerful Washington lobby – and American interests be damned. Until that policy changes, the Syrians will be fighting a lonely battle against al-Qaeda in their country. I would merely point out that the interests of the Israelis and the Islamists are entirely congruent in the Levant: "regime change" in Damascus, and the elimination of the Hezbollah "unbelievers." That, of course, is just a coincidence – and no doubt a very useful one for all concerned." Terror in the Levant Who attacked the U.S. embassy in Damascus – and why?

Gore Vidal: " It is still not known to the American public that every single important commander of World War Two from General Eisenhower in Europe to Admiral Nimitz in the Pacific pleaded with our first really small president not to atomise two cities of a defeated nation desperately trying to surrender. But Truman, and his Metternich, Dean Acheson, wanted to replace Hitler and Fascism with Stalin and Communism. It was under Truman that the ever greater lie came into its glittering own. Despite the unanimous objections of the American military, Truman insisted on dropping two nuclear bombs. I was serving in the Pacific theatre of operations at the time and we were assured, along with the rest of the world, that one million of us would die in the coming invasion of Japan. Did we love the Bomb? Yes, we did. But little did we know that, had we invaded as originally planned, there was no way that we would have encountered the survivors of the Japanese army on the mainland of Asia as they did not have sufficient transport to return to their home islands."

CNN. "Syrian security forces kill four gunmen after they attempt to storm the U.S. Embassy in Damascus, authorities say. No American diplomats were harmed. The gunmen apparently blew up an auto before launching their attack, according to diplomatic sources. "

PS: A estupidez Neo-Con nunca refere que os actuais regimes são uma protecção contra o extremismo ideologico da AlQaeda. A estupidez Neo-Con tenta sempre misturar as motivações de uns e outros, fazendo parecer que o não reconhecimento do Estado de Israel e os conflitos que seriam perfeitamente previsiveis apriori (de fronteiras com estados vizinhos, com a polulação local directamente afectada), são os mesmos do neo-medievalismo da AlQaeda.

Misturar AlQaeda, Irão, Saddam, Hamas, Hezbollah, Síria, islamismo, a discussão sobre regimes (teocracia, etc), tudo apresentado como ameaça aos "valores do Ocidente"...falar de islamo-fascismo...

E depois, vemos comentários do tipo, a possibilidade de células adormecidas dos Hezbollah em Londres (para quê? que sentido faria?).

É só o apelo ao medo. Cobarde é quem cede ao medo.

A propósito da leitura de "The Origins of the WWII" - AJP Taylor.

Parece ser logo no primeiro capitulo "Second Thoughts" (se nada mais for lido, este primeiro capítulo quase que basta por si mesmo) que AJP Taylor demonstra porque foi o historiador conceituado e controverso (primeiro comunista depois e sempre pelo Labour Party e cedo (ou mais cedo que outros) crítico do estalinismo - assim como George Orwell, creio, e insuspeito por desde cedo, nos anos 30 (e antes do inicio do conflito), defender uma aliança soviética-britânico contra os alemães (concretizada para nosso mal, o aliado Estaline acabou por ser o grande vencedor e o Império Britânico o grande derrotado).

Neste livro, põe as culpas em todas as partes (incluindo o famoso exagero-mas-ainda-hoje-dado-como-sábio de Curchill sobre a capacidade militar, aliás evidente na incapacidade demonstrada pelos alemães na guerra aérea com os ingleses), sendo que de Hitler, a única coisa consistente com a sua fama é o seu racismo a leste e anti-semitismo, mas que não tinha planos de guerra precisos na exacta medida em que os eventos ocorreram.

"German rearmament was largely a myth until the spring of 1936. Then Hitler put some reality into it. His motive was principally fear of the Red Army; and of course Great Britain and France had begun to rearm also."

"When war borke out in 1939, German had 1450 modern fighter planes and 800 bombers; Great Britain and France had 950 fighters and 1300 bombers. The Germans had 3500 tanks; Great Britain and France had 3850. In each case Allied intelligence estimated German strenght at more than twice the true figure. As usual, Hitler was thought to have planned and prepared for a great war. In fact, he had not."

Agora, as verdades que nunca se dizem, e que quase que parecem uma blasfémia por serem verdade:

* "...the almost universal belief that Hitler started the indiscriminate bombing of civilians, whereas it was started by the directors of British strategy, as some of the more honest among them have boasted"

* "Only the British bombing attacks on German cities stimulated Hitler and Germans to take war seriously"

E tanto quanto sei também, foram também os Britânicos através de Churchill que já no decorrer/fim da WWI (a última com os resquícios de uma moral ainda civilizada própria da velha ordem que desapareceu nas suas cinzas), que se preparavam para iniciar bombardeamentos "totais". E Churchill, já depois do mundo ter observado horrorizado dos efeitos da guerra química, conseguiu ainda recomendar o seu uso em bombardeamentos na guerra às tribos do Iraque (depois dizem que são "eles" que querem invadir o Ocidente), em mais um caso que os "libertados"-coitados-não-se percebe-porquê combatem um império libertador-civilizador.

Conclusão: que objectivo se persegue em dizer mal "dos bons" e parecer desculpar os "maus"? Bem, para mim, o estatismo é que é o mal em si mesmo. O poder centralizado, seja eleito ou autocrático, padece dos mesmos males. Sendo um deles, a inexorável tendência para praticar o mal mesmo quando pretende fazer o bem. O poder democrático (no pior do seu sentido - o do centralismo democrático - sendo que esta característica no que respeita à política externa atinge o seu máximo, decidida por uns poucos) repetidamente padece de um mal adicional, uma certa tendência para "idealizar" os conflitos. Os poderes não-democratas (especialmente as monarquias), por paradoxo que possa parecer, têm consciência da precaridade da sua posição em termos de legitimidade (ou melhor, da presunção de consentimento) aos olhos da sua população. Mesmo no fascismo com políticas externas agressivas, as guerras têm de ser limitadas a objectivos compreensíveis. E mesmo os tiranos compreendem que uma guerra em larga escala é um perigo para a manutenção do poder. Por isso se pode dizer que Estaline venceu sem nada ter feito por isso.

"(...) But if the ideology of our enemy is "Islamofascism," what is the ideology of George W. Bush? According to James Montanye, writing in The Independent Review, it is "democratic fundamentalism."(...)

Ideology is substitute religion, and Bush's beliefs were on display in his address to the Legion, where he painted the "decisive ideological struggle of the 21st century" in terms of good and evil.

"On the one side are those who believe in the values of freedom … the right of all people to speak, and worship, and live in liberty. And on the other side are those driven by the values of tyranny and extremism, the right of a self-appointed few to impose their fanatical views on all the rest."

Casting one's cause in such terms can be effective in wartime. In his Gettysburg Address and Second Inaugural, Lincoln converted a war to crush Southern secession into a crusade to end slavery and save democracy on earth.

Wilson recast a European war of imperial powers as a " war to end war" and "make the world safe for democracy." FDR and Churchill in the Atlantic Charter talked of securing "the Four Freedoms," but were soon colluding to hand over Eastern Europe to the worst tyrant and mass murderer of the 20th century.

The peril of ideology is that it rarely comports with reality and is contradicted by history, thus leading inevitably to disillusionment and tragedy. Consider but a few of the assertions in Bush's address.

Said Bush, we know by "history and logic" that "promoting democracy is the surest way to build security." But history and logic teach, rather, what George Washington taught: The best way to preserve peace is to be prepared for war and to stay out of wars that are none of the nation's business.

"Democracies don't attack each other or threaten the peace," said Bush.

How does he then explain the War of 1812 [os EUA declaram Guerra aos Britânicos em pleno conflito com Napoleão], when we went to war against Britain, when she was standing up to Napoleon? What about the War Between the States? Were not the seceding states democratic? What about the Boer War, begun by the Brits? What about World War I, fought between the world's democracies, which also happened to be empires ruling subject peoples?

In May 1901, a 26-year-old Tory member of Parliament rose to issue a prophetic warning: "Democracy is more vindictive than Cabinets. The wars of peoples will be more terrible than the wars of kings." Considering the war that came in 1914 and the vindictive peace it produced, giving us Lenin, Stalin, Mussolini, and Hitler, was not Churchill more right than Bush? (...)" America's Ideologue in Chief by Patrick J. Buchanan

Sempre o mais difícil de pronunciar.

* "One of the few conservative magazines worth reading, The New American, reports that Henry Kissinger told an Italian reporter in 1972 that the war in Vietnam had “been a useless war.”

"Nation, State and Economy" (1919):

"If we wanted to throw ourselves into the arms of Bolshevism merely for the purpose of annoying our enemies, the robbers of our freedom and our property, or to set their house on fire too, that would not help us in the least. It should not be the goal of our policy to drag our enemies into our destruction with us. We should try not to be destroyed ourselves and try to rise again out of servitude and misery."

Mais tarde em "Liberalism" (1927), diria:

"Let the Russians be Russians. Let them do what they want in their own country. But do not let them pass beyond the boundaries of their own land to destroy European civilization. (...) Whether or not the Russian people are to discard the Soviet system is for them to settle among themselves."

* KURDS IN NORTH IRAQ THREATEN SECESSIONFree Market News Network - Pompano Beach,FL,USAThe leader of the Kurdish region in northern Iraq threatened secession Sunday as a dispute over flying the Iraqi flag intensified

* News RoundupMonsters and Critics.com - Glasgow,UK... BELGRADE, Serbia, Sept. 4 (UPI) -- A Bosnian Serb leader Monday said the secession of Serb-run Bosnia from Bosnia-Herzegovina is inevitable in the long term. ...

* Namibia: Govt Cracks Down On UDP AllAfrica.com - Washington,USA... In addition, those individuals who are publicly advocating the secession of the Caprivi Region from the rest of Namibia in furtherance of UDP objectives will ...

PS: O caso Kurdo é interessante porque afecta igualmente o Iraque, Irão e Turquia. Como não têm apoio de nenhum vizinho, a sua causa é subversiva para todos. Aliás, a própria ideia de secessão é subversiva para todos Estados.

Webster's Online Dictionary

Bible: War , The Israelites had to take possession of the Promised Land by conquest. They had to engage in a long and bloody war before the Canaanitish tribes were finally subdued. Except in the case of Jericho and Ai, the war did not become aggressive till after the death of Joshua. Till then the attack was always first made by the Canaanites. Now the measure of the iniquity of the Canaanites was full, and Israel was employed by God to sweep them away from off the face of the earth. In entering on this new stage of the war, the tribe of Judah, according to divine direction, took the lead. In the days of Saul and David the people of Israel engaged in many wars with the nations around, and after the division of the kingdom into two they often warred with each other. They had to defend themselves also against the inroads of the Egyptians, the Assyrians, and the Babylonians. The whole history of Israel from first to last presents but few periods of peace. The Christian life is represented as a warfare, and the Christian graces are also represented under the figure of pieces of armour (Eph. 6:11-17; 1 Thess. 5:8; 2 Tim. 2:3, 4). The final blessedness of believers is attained as the fruit of victory (Rev. 3:21). Source: Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary.

PS: A perseguição e injustiça ao longo dos tempos sofrida pelos Judeus é bem conhecida (ainda que é pouco frequente falar do judaismo ortodoxo - principalmente a Leste - e da sujeição ao poder dos rabinos, de cuja emancipação foi proclamada pelos monarcas europeus - até aí estavam sujeito ao seu próprio direito civil e criminal, restrições e censura à aprendizagem de ciências, com direitosa definir e colectar os seus próprios impostos - e servindo também de colectores de impostos para os monarcas fora da sua comunidade. Terá sido após a emancipação que surge o sucesso reconhecido na ciência e negócios, embora suponho, existam excepções e também dependa se falamos mais a Leste ou a Ocidente). Menos comentado é o padrão dos acontecimentos no que respeita à formação de um Estado (ou similar).

Descontando que não tenho própriamente conhecimento profundo sobre a sua história, sempre diria que a história dos Judeus parece ser algo universal em todas as culturas, religiões e nacionalidades. O comentário que me parece ajustado é:

* a história da formação do Estado (na antiguidade e presentemente) é bem o exemplo da lógica de todos os Estados: imposto pela guerra e força, nacionalista porque sempre baseado no "nós" versus os "outros", tornado inevitável pela própria definição de Estado - um monopólio absoluto territorial pelo uso da violência e poder legislativo (por isso na Idade Média não existiam Estados e mesmo mais tarde esse monopólio não era tão absoluto como o é hoje).

* a existência fora de um Estado, por outro lado, representa bem como uma cultura pode constituir uma Nação sem Estado, que consegue sobreviver mesmo quando espalhada por vários Estados e mesmo quando com frequência é perseguida e discriminada (sendo que esta discriminação só é possível pelo próprio poder monopolista dos Estados centralistas).

+
PS: como dizia um conhecido maestro israelita em entrevista recente, com a fundação do Estado de Israel, os judeus perderam a inocência, acrescentando que os Estados o que reivindicam é o direito a matar. Uma característica universal.

O Estado reivindica e as pessoas concedem, que vive fora da lei porque a razão da sua existência será proteger a lei. Uma contradição óbvia. Um anarquista fácilmente reconhece, ainda sem sequer entrar em discussão sobre a sua inevitabilidade ou não, do que se trata é apenas de defender o seu monopólio absoluto territorial, protegendo todos os interesses que se instalam à sua volta e que inclui a própria ilusão das populações e intelectuais, tal como o foi em tempos o comunismo e fascismo.

NAIROBI (Reuters) - Anarchic Somalia has confounded U.S. foreign policy once again, leaving Washington struggling to find a coherent approach to a state whose internal turmoil threatens to destabilise the Horn of Africa.(...)

A covert counter-terrorism initiative in which the United States threw its support behind secular warlords fighting Islamists in Mogadishu backfired spectacularly in June. The U.S. involvement actually worked to strengthen the Islamists' hand and helped them conquer the capital, analysts say."

Para um enquadramento Somalia: A Case Study in Interventionism

"(...) Post-Barre, Somalia reverted back to what it has always been and will doubtless be as far as the eye can see: a patchwork collection of clan-based factions and sub-clan alliances, based on cultural and religious rather than political or state-based allegiances. In 1991, the north declared its independence, but "Somaliland," as it was deemed, was not recognized by any foreign government.

Instead, the UN – determined to impose the kind of centralism desired by Barre and his "scientific socialism" – went in to reestablish a central government, feed the people, and lead them to "democracy," Western-style. Initiated by Bush the Elder, and passed off to incoming President Bill Clinton, "Operation Restore Hope" was sold as a "humanitarian intervention."

As it turned out, however, the effects of this intervention – aside from the deaths of 18 American servicemen and the dragging of their bodies through the streets of Mogadishu – were not quite so humanitarian. As Brendan O'Neill points out in an excellent piece:

"Restore Hope was part of America's search for a sense of moral purpose after it had been robbed of its big, bad enemy, the Soviet Union. That is why American officials continually exaggerated the scale of the famine in Somalia, which they claimed to be launching a war against: because this was a staged intervention rather than a genuine attempt to lift Somalia out of poverty.

In truth, the worst of the famine was over before American forces arrived, and as some experts have pointed out, the interventions by the U.S., the UN, and numerous aid agencies increased poverty and hunger in Somalia rather than alleviating it. For example, the flooding of Somalia with aid effectively destroyed the country's agricultural industry."

And of course it was pure coincidence that, as Steve Kretzman pointed out in Multinational Monitor,

"Just before pro-U.S. President Mohamed Siad Barre was overthrown in 1991, nearly two-thirds of the country's territory had been granted as oil concessions to Conoco, Amoco, Chevron, and Phillips. Conoco even lent its Mogadishu corporate compound to the U.S. embassy a few days before the Marines landed, with the first Bush administration's special envoy using it as his temporary headquarters."

During the "golden age" of imperialism, the Somalis were traded back and forth between the European powers, their resources divvied up and exploited. In the Cold War era, they were used as pawns by the two superpowers in a game of geopolitical chess, subsidized and egged on in their internal conflicts by foreign sponsors eager to cash in on the bloody consequences. Today, Somalia is once again a plaything in the hands of much larger forces, becoming the latest battleground in the war between the United States and what the administration and its neoconservative amen corner would have us believe is al-Qaeda.

The most recent U.S. intervention into a clan dispute – occasioned by the misperception that their guys had been attacked by al-Qaeda-affiliated "terrorists" – is surely the definitive demonstration of U.S. policymakers' incompetence and arrogance. This has led to U.S. support for the "warlords" – who were previously hunted by U.S. troops (...)"

"The following comes from a post–World War II interview between Gustave Gilbert, a German-speaking intelligence officer and psychologist who was allowed by the Allies to speak with Nazi POWs, and Hermann Goering, the Nazi Reichsmarshall. Their conversation took place on April 18, 1946, during a break in the Nuremberg trials, and was recounted in Gilbert's book, Nuremberg Diary:

We got around to the subject of war again and I said that, contrary to his attitude, I did not think that the common people are very thankful for leaders who bring them war and destruction.

“Why, of course, the ‘people’ don't want war,” Goering shrugged. “Why would some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best that he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece. Naturally, the common people don't want war; neither in Russia nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a Parliament or a Communist dictatorship.”

“There is one difference,” I pointed out. “In a democracy the people have some say in the matter through their elected representatives, and in the United States only Congress can declare wars.”

“Oh, that is all well and good, but, voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country.” The Bush Administration and Godwin's Law, Ken Silverstein

* The Republican advisor to a political action committee founded by veterans is blasting the Bush Administration for using "fascist" language in some recent speeches and interviews(..)

"I also believe we need to be vigilant in defending America," Schultz continued. "That is why I feel I must speak out about the Administration's recent contention that the war in Iraq is part of the fight against 'Islamic fascism.'"

"I am a proud Republican, who ran for my party's nomination for Congress in Indiana, because I believe in traditional values," said Sam Schultz, who served in Iraq and Afghanistan with the Indiana Army National Guard and acts as the Republican Senior Advisor

Schultz explained why he thinks "fascism" is an inappropriate word for the Bush Administration to use "First, we are not fighting an enemy that fits the definition of fascist, nor does Iraq resemble anything close to Hitler's Germany or Mussolini's Italy," Schultz said. "Second,I do not believe the war in Iraq has furthered our battle against radical Islamism."

Haaretz: Israelis at center of ecstasy drug trade, By Nathan Guttman

"Israel is at the center of international trade in the drug ecstasy, according to a document published last week by the U.S. State Department.In recent years, organized crime in Israel, some with links to criminal organizations in Russia, have come to control the distribution of the drug in Europe, according to a Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs document.The same document also points out that Israeli criminal groups have a hand in the distribution of ecstasy in North America."

reuters.myway.com:

" The Vatican's envoy in the Holy Land and bishops from three other churches have launched a rare joint attack on the Christian Zionist movement, accusing it of promoting "racial exclusivity and perpetual war."

Christian Zionists form a growing part of the pro-Israel lobby in the United States, the Jewish state's main ally. They believe the return of Jews to the Holy Land and establishment of Israel are proof of God's promises to biblical patriarchs.

Churches in the Middle East often appear closer to the Palestinians, whose Christian minority makes up a substantial portion of their clergy in the region.

The "Jerusalem Declaration on Christian Zionism" was signed by Latin Patriarch Michel Sabbah, a Palestinian, and by bishops of the Episcopal, Evangelical Lutheran and Syrian Orthodox Churches in Jerusalem. Many Christian Zionists are evangelical Protestants, and the declaration is a sign of a growing struggle between the groups.

"The Christian Zionist programme provides a world view where the Gospel is identified with the ideology of empire, colonialism and militarism," said the declaration, accusing Christian Zionists of hurting hopes for Middle East peace.

"We reject the teachings of Christian Zionism that facilitate and support these policies as they advance racial exclusivity and perpetual war," the declaration added."

* A Guerra contra a Coroa Espanhola (1898), cujo início se deu com um incêndio de um navio americano no porto de em Cuba (sendo consensual que foi acidental), pela libertação de Cuba (ajudando os ... movimentos independentistas ou separatistas terroristas?).

Wikipedia: "The Spanish-American War took place in 1898 and resulted in the United States gaining control over the former colonies of Spain in the Caribbean and Pacific. The US lost 379 troops in combat and over 5,000 to disease. As a result of the war, Cuba would be declared independent in 1902."

"The United States gained almost all of Spain's colonies, including the Philippines, Guam, and Puerto Rico. Cuba was granted independence, but the United States imposed various restrictions on the new government, including prohibiting alliances with other countries. On August 14, 1898, 11,000 ground troops were sent to occupy the Philippines. When U.S. troops began to take the place of the Spanish in control of the country, warfare broke out between U.S. forces and the Filipinos. The resulting Philippine-American War was long, bloody, incurring thousands of military and civilian casualties during its fourteen-year span."

No final, acabou a libertar anexando as Filipinas no outro lado do mundo, e uma guerra de 2 anos contra os seus próprios "libertados" (cristianização e civilizar, foram motivos evocados - como se uma grande maioria não fosse já católica...).

Mais uma vez, uma monarquia europeia que sai debilitada com os excessos "libertadeiros" de terceiros, e que acaba mais tarde, numa ditadura. Um padrão. Não há notícia que Cuba tenha acabado melhor.

Nesta história, como hoje em dia, esteve presente o papel de uma certa imprensa, tal como hoje temos os habituais tambores de guerra e o seu "fog of war" na National Review,Weekly Standard e outros.

Wikipedia: William Randolph Hearst's newspaper in New York documented the atrocities committed in Cuba. (...) Joseph Pulitzer was also a key in publicizing the war in New York City. His newspapers, along with Hearst's, exaggerated news of the atrocities in Cuba in an attempt to sway popular opinion in New York City in favor of intervention.Fueled by the reports of inhumanity of the Spanish, a majority of Americans became convinced that an "intervention" was becoming necessary. Hearst was famously (though probably erroneously)to return home from an uneventful and docile stay in Havana, as writing: "Please remain. You furnish the pictures and I'll furnish the war.(...)

Spanish minister Práxedes Mateo Sagasta did much to try to prevent this, including withdrawing the officials in Cuba against whom complaints had been made, and offering the Cubans autonomy. This was well short of full independence for Cuba, however, and would have done little to change the status quo. The decisive event was probably the speech of Republican Senator Redfield Proctor in mid-March, very thoroughly analyzing the situation and concluding war was the only answer."

Democracia republicana e Demagogos em interesse próprio, o pior de todos os mundos.

Killing in the Name of Democracy ,by James Bovard ."The U.S. government’s first experience with forcibly spreading democracy came in the wake of the Spanish-American War. When the U.S. government declared war on Spain in 1898, it pledged it would not annex foreign territory. But after a swift victory, the United States annexed all of the Philippines.

As Tony Smith, author of America’s Mission, noted, Ultimately, the democratization of the Philippines came to be the principal reason the Americans were there; now the United States had a moral purpose to its imperialism and could rest more easily. William McKinley proclaimed that in the Philippines the U.S. occupation would “assure the residents in every possible way [of the] full measure of individual rights and liberties which is the heritage of a free people, substituting the mild sway of justice and right for arbitrary rule.” He also promised to “Christianize” the Filipinos, as if he did not consider the large number of Filipino Catholics to be Christians.

McKinley was devoted to forcibly spreading American values abroad at the same time that he championed high tariffs to stop Americans from buying foreign products. The “mild sway of justice” worked out very well for Filipino undertakers. The United States Christianized and civilized the Filipinos by authorizing American troops to kill any Filipino male 10 years old and older and by burning down and massacring entire villages. (Filipino resistance fighters also committed atrocities against American soldiers.)

Hundreds of thousands of Filipinos died as the United States struggled to crush resistance to its rule in a conflict that dragged on for a decade and cost the lives of 4,000 American troops."