Washington,
DC
The
linchpin of an empire is the link between two elites, one in the imperial
center and the other in the peripheries.
Symmetric alliances exist, but not with a superpower in the center.
The
periphery elites do jobs for the center: killing, say, in Libya, Syria, when so
wanted; securing the center economic interests in return for a substantial cut,
serving as a bridgehead culturally–called americanization–delivering obedience
against protection.
For
this to work the elites have to believe in the empire. They put words up front–like democracy, human
rights, rule of law–serving as human shields.
However, the costs may be heavy, the benefits decreasing; they may have
difficulties with restless students, working classes, other countries. Or worse: they may sense that the empire is
not working, heading for decline and fall, and want to get out.
And
even if this is not the case, the US elites-the policy officials-may suspect it
to be and spy on empire-alliance leaders:
[Director
of the NSA] General Keith Alexander: “NSA–was asked by /US/ policy officials to
discover the “leadership intentions” of foreign countries. If you want to know
leadership intentions, these were the issues” (english@other-news.info
01-11-13).
Clear
from the beginning, beyond “threats to privacy”, “they all do it”, “it was
technically feasible”, and similar smoke screens. Spying on intentions of enemy leaders–the
“humint” (HUMan INTelligence) to complement capabilities–is an obvious part of
the state system. But on allies?
Even
more so. There are allies and allies;
empires may decline. Foreign leaders may not offer full obedience in return for
protection. Or may not accept US views
as accurate, but have their own. They
may even explore options. Their real
intentions are crucial, and nobody can spy and supervise better than their own
secret agencies–coordinated by CIA-NSA–and in their own language. Alexander said the obvious: “policy
officials” (ambassadors, etc.) and alliance agencies spying together on
policy-makers. The real power elite
inside the elite.
Look at
this through Angela Merkel’s eyes. She
hated the DDR-Deutsche Demokratische Republik Stasi surveillance. But they were amateurs; these people are
professionals. A decade went unnoticed, till Snowden. Imagine her rage, comparing.
And
imagine the non-rage over the same in Spain: beyond Franco, yes, but Rajoy’s
party (Partido Popular) is the–highly corrupt–successor to Franco.
Yet, as
there is an inner circle of self-appointed elites there is also an inner circle
of allies that presumably can be trusted, the “Five Eyes”: UK, USA, Canada,
Australia, New Zealand; Anglo-America writ large. Who are they?
A club of countries selected on a racist-culturalist basis. White and
Anglo, killers of indigenous peoples all over: USA of Native Indians, Canada a
little less of First Nations, Australia of Aborigines, New Zealand a little
less of Māoris, UK all over–getting the others launched on that slippery slope
of genocide and sociocide. They know
this. They know that the world’s majority is the kind of people they killed and
feel strongly they have to keep together, distrusting non-members. But the US spies on UK Labour and Parliament,
USA-UK together on the other three.
Germany
wants to join the club for another 5+l, like with the UNSC-UN Security Council
veto powers. Race is no problem but
culture is: they are not Anglo.
The
more the empire declines the more expectation of more spying to identify the
enemy within. How is the state of the empire?
Not good:
Afghanistan:
USA won bases and a pipeline and nothing else, and may lose both after 2014
withdrawal.
Iran
gains more influence in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon, being more legitimate than
Saudi-Qatar and G7 in general with their Islamism.
Iraq:
USA won bases and access to oil and seems to lose both; and managed to do what
Iran did not, turning Iraq into a Shia country.
Syria:
dividing Syria into three, four, smaller parts seems not to work; at any rate
the leading anti-Assad faction is Islamist Sunni.
Egypt: The USA misread the situation altogether,
stranded in a choice between two evils they do not master.
Libya:
One more misreading, not understanding how Western secular imperialism
(Italy-UK-France-USA-Israel) ignited an Islamist (rather than Arab) and a
Berber-Tuareg (rather than Arab) awakening.
Israel:
spying on US elites, tail-wags-dog politics, more US anti-semitism than ever
(watch YouTube), media increasingly critical of Israel; and Israel in the agony
between a Jewish state and democracy, sooner or later forced to declare its
Eastern border, faces a South African scenario, being declared a liability for
Washington.
Now,
how about the other force in the world, BRICS?
Not bad:
Brazil’s
president Roussef was the first to speak at the UN General Assembly with a
devastating critique of the NSA spy program, calling for alternative Internet
servers.
Russia:
Putin may have put an end to the Syrian crisis as part of a general Middle East
crisis–like Gorbachev put an end to the Cold War, not the US with perennial war
and threat of war–calling for an end to weapons of mass destruction, including
nuclear, in the region.
China:
Hsinhua media agency called for general deamericanization and for an end to the
dollar as “world reserve currency” in particular favoring a basket of
currencies not of any single country’s currency.
“Foreign
leaders” know this and would betray their own peoples were they not to explore
options. The question is how, when. They may use NSA spying as pretext for
withdrawal from the empire and cancel-postpone the “Trans-Atlantic
Partnership”, TAP. NSA widens the gap.
Leibach’s
book This Town makes it unlikely that the Washington politics-media
conglomerate will come up with solutions to calamities that dramatic. Few regimes are. Koht, Norwegian foreign minister, spent the
night Germany invaded Norway with his mistress, and then rose to the occasion;
Quisling, who took over, spent the last cabinet meeting discussing police
uniforms, then surrendered to the police.
One wonders what Washington DC will do with the double, triple, debacle.
Johan
Galtung . Profesor de estudios sobre la paz, el Dr. hc mult, es rector de la
Universidad de la Paz TRANSCEND-TPU. Es autor de más de 150 libros sobre la paz
y los asuntos relacionados.
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