The
Neoconservative Threat
To American Freedom
By Paul Craig Roberts
12 June, 2007
Countercurrents.org
The
Bush/Cheney White House, which told the American people in 2003 that
the Iraqi invasion would be a three to six week affair, now tells us
that the US occupation is permanent. Forever.
Attentive Americans of which,
alas, there are so few, had already concluded that the occupation was
permanent. Permanence is the obvious message from the massive and fortified
US embassy under construction in Iraq and from the large permanent military
bases that the Bush regime is building in Iraq.
Bush regime propagandists
have created a false analogy with “the Korean model” in
their effort to sell the permanent occupation of Iraq as necessary for
Iraq’s security. More than one half century after the close of
the Korean war, US troops continue to be based in Korea, as they are
in Germany more than six decades after the end of World War II.
The rationale for the US
troops in S. Korea is to remind N. Korea that an attack on S. Korea
is an attack on the US itself. The rationale for US troops in Germany
disappeared when Reagan and Gorbachev brought the cold war to an end.
There is, of course, no similarity
between Iraq and Korea. There was no insurgency in Korea and no attacks
on US troops based in S. Korea once the fighting stopped. The presence
of US troops in S. Korea has produced many protest demonstrations by
South Koreans, but the US troops in S. Korea have had no exposure to
combat since the war ended in 1953.
In contrast, the insurgency
in Iraq continues to rage and could expand dramatically if Shi’ites
were to join the Sunnis in attacks on US forces. Most American military
leaders no longer believe the insurgency can be defeated. Permanent
occupation means permanent insurgency. Indeed, an attempt at permanent
occupation could possibly unify the Arabs in a joint effort to expel
the Americans.
The absurd analogy with Korea
is so far-fetched that it raises the question whether the Bush/Cheney
regime has entered a new, higher level of delusion. Bush cannot keep
troops in Iraq permanently unless he intends to remain permanently in
the White House. Even some Republicans in Congress are talking about
beginning withdrawals of US troops in September. Republicans believe
that if withdrawals do not begin, their party will be wiped out in the
2008 election.
The wild card is the neoconservatives
and their long-standing alliance with Israeli Zionists. The neoconservatives
still have a death grip on the discredited Bush regime. Jim Lobe (http://www.ips.org/blog/jimlobe/)
describes the extensive international organization that the neoconservatives
have put into place for the purpose of orchestrating an attack on Iran.
A sane reader might wonder
why neoconservatives would want to expand a conflict in which the US
has failed. Surely, even delusional “cakewalk” neoconservatives
must realize that attacking Iran would greatly increase the threat to
US troops in Iraq and perhaps bring missile attacks on oil facilities
and US bases throughout the Middle East. An attack on Iran would further
radicalize Muslims and further undermine US puppets in the Middle East.
It could bring war to the entire region.
The point is that the neoconservatives
do realize this. Their defeat in Iraq and Israel’s defeat in Lebanon
has taught the neoconservatives that the US cannot prevail in the Middle
East by conventional military means. As I have previously explained,
the neoconservatives’ plan is to escape the failure of their Iraq
plan by orchestrating a war with Iran in which the US can prevail only
by using nuclear weapons. As previously reported, the neoconservatives
believe that the use of nuclear weapons against Iran will convince Muslims
that they must accept US hegemony.
The neoconservatives have
put the elements of their plan in place. They have powerful naval forces
on station off Iran’s coast. They have convinced President Bush
that only by attacking Iran can he prevail in Iraq.
The neoconservatives have
rewritten US war doctrine to permit preemptive US nuclear attack on
non-nuclear countries (http://www.antiwar.com/orig/hirsch.php?articleid=8263).
They have demonized Iran as the greatest threat since Hitler. Neoconservatives
have invented “Islamofascism,” something that exists only
in the neoconservative propaganda used to instill in Americans hatred
of Muslims. The neoconservatives have dehumanized Muslims as monsters
who must be destroyed at all costs. Recent statements by neoconservative
leaders such as Norman Podhoretz read like the ravings of ignorant lunatics.
Podhoretz has written Muslims out of the human race. He demands that
their culture be deracinated.
Neoconservatives, convinced
that a nuclear attack will bring Muslims to heel, are ignoring the likely
blowback and unintended consequences of an attack on Iran, just as they
ignored the likely consequences of their attack on Iraq. If the neoconservatives
are mistaken in their assumption that nuclear weapons will cause Muslims
to submit to the US, the consequences will be unmanageable.
The neoconservative Bush
regime has got away with more than I thought possible, perhaps because
most of Congress and the American public cannot imagine the degree of
insanity that lies behind the Bush administration. Most Americans who
have turned against the regime think that the administration is incompetent,
that it jumped to wrong conclusions about Iraq, and that it mismanaged
the war and will not admit its mistakes. As every reason Bush gave for
the war has proven to be false, people see no point in continuing the
struggle.
If Americans understood the
enormity of the deception behind the invasion of Iraq (and Afghanistan)
and the pending attack on Iran, Bush and Cheney would be impeached and
turned over to the War Crimes Tribunal at the Hague, and AIPAC would
be forced to register as a foreign agent.
Just as Goebbels said, some
lies are too big to be disbelieved. It is this disbelief that is so
dangerous. The inability of Americans to see through the Big Lie to
the secret agenda allows the neoconservatives to escape accountability
and to continue with their plot.
The neoconservatives also
believe that nuclear attack on Iran will isolate America in the world
and, thereby, give the government control over the American people.
The denunciations that will be hurled at Americans from every quarter
will force the country to wrap itself in the flag and to treat domestic
critics as foreign enemies. Not only free speech but also truth itself
will disappear along with every civil liberty.
Paul Craig Roberts
wrote the Kemp-Roth bill and was assistant secretary of the Treasury
in the Reagan administration. He was associate editor of the Wall Street
Journal editorial page and contributing editor of National Review.
Leave
A Comment
&
Share Your Insights
Comment
Policy
Digg
it! And spread the word!
Here is a unique chance to help this article to be read by thousands
of people more. You just Digg it, and it will appear in the home page
of Digg.com and thousands more will read it. Digg is nothing but an
vote, the article with most votes will go to the top of the page. So,
as you read just give a digg and help thousands more to read this article.