Reply #16: Knowing how the chess pieces move

[OnyxCollie]

does not a chess master make. It requires strategy, what this writer (and many others lack).

I just finished writing a paper for my international relations grad class. My topic was The Invasion of Iraq: Realism vs. Imperialism. Using political theories of realism and capitalist imperialism, I had to evaluate whether the invasion was for national security or if it was to benefit the private sector.

Realism failed. The threats the administration claimed were either exaggerated or false. And not by accident. The intelligence was funneled through the Office of the Director of Intelligence, where anything that did not fit was discarded. (A popular tactic of the Bush Administration- put a crony in a gatekeeper position.)

Plus, prewar assessments of Iraq and its neighbors that said invading Iraq would jeopardize America's security. These turned out to be true.

Couple this with the cost in blood and treasure, and it becomes clear invading Iraq has weakened national security.

But, hey. It was just a bad decision. Right? No.

Moving to capitalist imperialism, corporations look for opportunities to exploit to gain resources, territory, etc. That's what capitalism does. That's ALL it does. Wolfowitz's Defense Planning Guidance document called for invading Iraq to secure oil for America, unilaterally if necessary. PNAC's Statement of Principles and Rebuilding America's Defenses lamented the end of the Cold War and called for increasing the defense budget to meet the needs of the new century. Cheney's National Energy Plan Development Group (NEPDG) was created in Bush's first week in office. From what could be gathered (Cheney and the NEPDG refused to provide info the the General Accounting Office, resulting in a lawsuit that Cheney won. The cause was taking up by others. See the SCOTUS' Cheney v U.S. District Court, but the decision was the same.), the NEPDG met with oil executives who provided guidance.

There are structural and political constraints preventing that, however. It takes a significant force to quickly overcome these constraints. Nationalism after an attack develops into imperialism, and misperceptions generated by Pentagon pundits and spread by an eager media, along with religious overtones partnered with brute force (appealing to the religiously dogmatic/ authoritarian personality), suppressed these constraints. A mythos of "cold-blooded killers" who must be "smoked out of their holes" appealed to Americans (and benefited the ruling class.)

Wolfowitz became the president of the World Bank. What does the deputy Secretary of Defense know about helping poor people? Nothing, but that's not why he was there. Wolfowitz was good at finding corruption in countries looking for structural adjustments, but not so much in Iraq, where corruption was widespread. The Iraq Development Fund, handled by the World Bank, was where Halliburton, KBR, et al. got their funding. So, if Halliburton dragged it's feet on repairing oil meters, it was able to raise its contract price while billions of dollars in oil was disappearing.

But it's easier to dismiss people as conspiracy theorists rather than learn the strategy. And the conspirators know this. It makes their job easier.