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The miscalculated policies of the US
administration in the Middle East are quickly depleting the country's
ability to sustain its once unchallenged global position. Winds
of change are blowing everywhere, and there is little that Washington's
ideologues can do to stop it.
The above claim is increasingly
finding its way into the realm of mainstream thinking, despite
all attempts to mute or relegate its import. A recent speech
by US Republican congressman and chairman of the House of international
relations committee, Henry Hyde was the focal point of analysis
by Martin Jacques in The Guardian. "Our power has the grave
liability of rendering our theories about the world immune from
failure. But by becoming deaf to easily discerned warning signs,
we may ignore long-term costs that result from our actions and
dismiss reverses that should lead to a re-examination of our
goals and means," Hyde said.
In his poignant analysis--decoding
Hyde's deliberately implicit thoughts--Jacques argued, "The
Bush administration stands guilty of an extraordinary act of
imperial overreach which has left the US more internationally
isolated than ever before, seriously stretched financially, and
guilty of neglect in east Asia and elsewhere."
Ironically, the invasion of
Iraq with its "thousands of tactical" mistakes--as
recently admitted by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice--was
meant to solidify and ensure the US' post Cold-War global dominance.
According to Jacques, as inferred from Hyde's notable speech,
"It may well prove to be a harbinger of its decline."
It can also be argued that the US adventurism in Iraq has provided
the coveted opportunity to other countries to further their national
and regional interests without the constant fear of US reprisals.
In a recent interview, MIT
professor Noam Chomsky, known for his sharp criticism of US foreign
policy particularity in Indochina, Central and Latin America,
delineated a new global political reality that is being forged
as the US stubbornly insists on fighting a lost battle in Iraq.
"What's happening is something completely new in the history
of the hemisphere. Since the Spanish conquest, the countries
of Latin America have been pretty much separated from one another
and oriented towards the imperial power. For the first time,
they are beginning to integrate and in quite a few different
ways."
That integration is evident,
according to Chomsky, not only by examining the rise of the Left
in these countries and the almost immediate alliances--economic
cooperation, for example--that these popular governments have
achieved. There is a simultaneous rise of the political relevance
of the indigenous Indian population in Bolivia, and the opportunities
it represents to the Indian population of Ecuador and Peru. Moreover,
there is a noteworthy South-South integration that is already
breaking regional boundaries and significantly undermining the
overpowering grip of the IMF, which has played the infamous role
of the unfair middleman between the rich and hapless poor.
China and India, on the other
hand, continue to achieve astounding economic growth with China's
economic might and relevance to soon surpass that of the US.
In fact, there is an intense diplomatic clash underway between
the US and China, since the latter has dared to violate the understanding
of the Monroe Doctrine of 1823, which gave the US alone the right
to manage its Latin American domains. For the first time, says
a BBC analysis, a foreign country has challenged American influence
in the region, and successfully so. Indeed, China is upgrading
its economic relations with Brazil--both increasingly formidable
economic powers--in ways that will eventually help Brazil break
away from a domineering US hold.
These are all part of the "warning
signs" to which Hyde was refereeing in his speech. While
there are indications that Washington is finally waking up to
this grim reality, which it has helped create, there are no signs
whatsoever that a fundamental change of course in US foreign
policy in the Middle East is taking place: the destructive war
in Iraq rages on; the self-inflicting damage of unconditionally
backing Israel in its endless colonial ambitions perpetuates;
and the same detrimental policy line used with Iraq is employed,
almost identically with Iran. US policy planners are as ever
insistent on following the same destructive course that has compromised
their nation's global standing.
Instead of paying attention
to these woes, the Bush administration is trying to recover some
of its Southeast Asia losses by signing a nuclear treaty with
India, an action that reeks of double standards and miscalculations.
The administration has also lifted the ban on sales of lethal
arms to Indonesia in recognition of its "unique strategic
role in Southeast Asia," despite protests from human rights
groups.
Despite Bush's recent 'historic'
trip to India and other top officials' hasty attempts to reassert
America's global dominance, there should be no illusions that
the US' chief foreign policy debacle starts and ends with the
Middle East--especially its 'special' relationship with Israel.
While the latter has served the role of the client state since
its establishment on ethnically cleansed Palestinian territories,
this relationship was significantly altered in recent years,
with the pro-Israeli lobby taking centre stage, not simply by
influencing US foreign policy toward Israel, but eventually by
directing it altogether in the region.
The rise of the neoconservatives
helped create the false impression that the US and Israeli policies
are one and the same, including their mutual interests in maintaining
Israel's military "edge" over its neighbors, which
eventually led to the invasion of Iraq. While the neocons are
washing their hands of any responsibility in the Middle East
impasse, the Bush administration's arrogance is stopping it from
immediately withdrawing its troops from Iraq and reassessing
its relationship with Israel.
The world is changing, yet
the US government refuses to abandon its old ways: militaristic,
self-defeating and overbearing. Indeed, the US must remold, not
only its policies in the Middle East, but also its hegemonic
policies throughout the world. For once, the US administration
needs to tap into its sense of reason, and discern the "warning
signs", that should lead to "the re-examination of
[its] goals and means." A first step is to bring the troops
home, and with them the entire doctrine that unrestrained violence
and perpetual wars can further the cause of an already distrusted
superpower.
CounterPunch
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