Reply #36: It's not about stopping genocide -- it's garrisoning of the planet

[IrateCitizen]

PPI advocates a "softer, gentler" brand of imperialism -- something more in line with the practices of the Clinton years.

In the words of Chalmers Johnson, author of Blowback and The Sorrows of Empire, Bill Clinton was actually a much better imperialist than George W. Bush. He was better because he wasn't so overt about it, and because he couched that imperialism in humanitarian rhetoric. However, when you insist on maintaining military presence in over 120 nations around the globe -- even in areas where that presence is not particularly liked by the populace, as in Okinawa and South Korea -- there is no other way to refer to it except as imperialism.

While it is a typical Ameri-centric attitude to excuse such a military presence as "enhancing stability", in the eyes of people in the rest of the world, it is largely seen for what it is -- protection of American economic and geopolitical objectives for the purposes of maintaining hegemony. They also, unlike many of us here in the states, see the cost in global relations at maintaining this hegemony. Just look at how we've managed to fuck things up between South and North Korea for the purposes of maintaining our military presence in Korea. After all, if peace ever broke out between the North and South (as it was on the verge of doing from Kim Dae-Jung's sunshine policy), then the overwhelming majority of Koreans would suddenly turn to our troops and ask, "So what in the hell ARE you doing here now?"

PPI is imperialism with a happy face. That happy face matters very little if you're on the receiving end of that imperialism.