America wants to re-invent NATO.
Whoever thought Barack Obama’s election would make the world more peaceful and imperialism less imperialistic should have learned a lesson by now. Washington hasn’t in the least lessened its claim to being leader of both the world and the Atlantic Alliance. In fact, the crisis in capitalism has made it feel it needs to assume even greater command. Obama is attempting to modernize imperialism and improve its interconnectedness. A prerequisite for this is a certain flattening of the domestic imperialistic hierarchy.
Obama’s change of strategy also makes itself evident in his understanding of NATO. If Bush’s people had already declared the Atlantic Alliance obsolete because it wouldn’t approve the U.S. invasion of Iraq, Obama seeks to use NATO as an extension of America’s military power and redefine its mission as a general policy enforcer. Obama’s security advisor James Jones made that abundantly clear at the G20 summit in London on the eve of the NATO anniversary meeting. “We need a newly created NATO,” Jones said, “one that is faster and more mobile.” He added that “a new strategic vision” was also necessary. Above all, he said, NATO needed to be empowered to take preventive action to stop conflicts from developing. Decoded, that means NATO should be allowed to attack whenever and wherever it wants without provocation.
Not even George W. Bush went that far. That was the advantage of declared unilateralism. The United States justified its destruction of civil liberties by cloaking its actions in the mantle of self-reliance, but made no attempt to make that the norm for its allies. NATO already showed its own disregard for civil liberties and revealed its character as a criminal organization in 1999 with the invasion of Serbia. Obama’s people apparently derive their new NATO-specific strategy from the resolution of a national conflict in the Balkans, something already widely known. It consists of the destruction of countries that wish to escape the hegemony of the West. And they call this “nation building.”
Washington wants to see NATO’s new mission put immediately into action in Afghanistan because that’s the war Obama absolutely wants to win. To do that, the member nations are expected to ramp up their participation on the front lines because a reinvented NATO doesn’t mean the allies can cop out of the fight. Washington’s requested increase in European Union military participation in the Hindu Kush doesn’t find much resonance in European capitals. Still, Obama’s personal popularity remains high here. But for how much longer?
Few Americans have a clue what you are talking about.
Americans believe they have every right to attack any country they are told is a threat to them.
There have been decades of telling Americans the threats in the world. Most actually believe that these wars for profits are protecting their freedoms. Tell someone something long enough and they believe it. Besides much of this industrial military complex has control of the media and the journalists. I.e. corp sponsorship.
The wars for profits group in America make tons (billions) of profits from these wars for profits.
We have southern states that raise their children to fight in these wars for profits and then call them heroes for doing so. Anyone suggesting they are not heroes is called traitors. Surely Germans can understand that frame of mind from their past.
Afghan and Iraq will be Obama’s Vietnam. The afgahan’s will not be as easy to control as the Iraqis. Religious fundamentalism and the mountains and safe haven in Pakistan will bleed America’s resolve and treasure month by month. Also afghan is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. This is a cultural issue that cannot change overnight. Americans don’t have the stomach or treasure for nation building.
Anyone that thinks the Iraq war is now a success is drinking the American kool aid of misinformation. We keep the Iraq gov locked up in the green zone to protect them from their own people and then call that war a success. Fools.
We Americans did not learn our lesson from Vietnam so we get another chance. Only time will tell if we learn this time. Germany did not learn her lesson in world war one so she got another chance. The lessons are harsh but effective.
Americans live in a bubble and their world is America. Most Americans did not know who the Viet Cong were in the Vietnam War and most Americans don’t have a clue who the afghans are or the three tribes in Iraq.
The only thing America has left as a national status symbol is its mega size military and it won’t give that up easily. As long as china keeps loaning us money we will continue to spend much of our money on our industrial military complex. If you got it you have to use it to protect it. Human nature 101.
American imperialism will not go away any time soon but it will go away. History tells us that with other imperialist countries (England, Rome, Russia, etc.) . Universe and karma 101.
Few very few will see me as a patriot but most Americans will see me as a traitor. Anytime you live in an imperialist country and challenge your country’s imperialism you are called a traitor by the masses. Who were the real patriots in Germany during world war two?