Michael Parenti Speaks on Empire at Portland State University

[applause] thank you thank you um it's a little embarrassing when the applause you get before you speak are more enthusiastic than the applause you get after you speak um I wanna talk about empire because that's a hot subject ok if i talk about empire then there is really an enormous disparity between what empires actually do an and the way they were represented in history by their leaders and their apologists and the chroniclers um empires are presented to us believe it or not as creations of peace they're even given names of peace pax romano packs britannica and we even hear of packs americano

empires are represented as bringing stability justice and prosperity to they're subject peoples they're often represented as selfless things can you hear me alright i don't feel like i'm getting picked up so there we are as selfless organizations that bring order where there is disorder let me let me quote a great scholar of empire edward gibbon his decline and fall of the roman empire this is the way he describes rome of a certain period the obedience of the roman world was uniformed voluntary and permanent the vanquished nations blended into one great people resign the hope even may even the wish of resuming their independence the vast roman empire was governed by absolute power

under the guidance of virtue and wisdom yeah right not a word here not a word about an empire of shattered army's sacked towns raped women and slave prisoners of war oppressively overtaxed populations burned crops slaughtered herds and so forth that not a word about that let me give you the quote of um an english political leader and writer of the nineteenth century named john morely speaking about the british empire eighteen seventy seven we have had imposed upon us by the unlucky prowess of our ancestors the task of ruling millions of alien dependents we undertake it with a disinterestedness and executed with a skill of administration to which history supplies no parallel I mean don't hold back john and self praise

here um but do you see the words you see the words we have had imposed upon us by the unlucky prowess of our ancestors they were so strong and out there they just went out and gobbled up land and now we're stuck with this big ol' empire millions they've actually it's a vast number of millions of alien the pendants they're dependent on us all these all these little brown people and so it's always all these people in these on strange exotic places they're dependent upon us where things i mean they are like children they need our guidance and our administrative wisdom so the literature is really very self congratulatory um and i'm surprised at how little critical comment that surrounds the new hearing some of it tonight but uh in the literature it's amazing empires are sometimes represented as unintentional conglomerates I think more lee's quote the one I just read is a perfect example of that unintentional

the product of of an unconscious circumstance when i was a youth i heard i used to hear and you've some of you heard this phrase like the british empire was formed in a fit of absent mindedness right a state of absent mindedness was put together syril robinson a british historian significantly he's a classicist I take him to task him among a small army of other historians in my book the assassination of julius caesar and this is a quote from the book he is his expertise is ancient rome and he says the same thing he says it was perhaps almost as true of rome as of great britain that she acquired her world domination in a fit of absence of mind no syril you've got the fit of absence of mind and we hear it today about the united states also we hear that the united states was

reluctantly thrust into the role of world leader we found ourselves oh this this responsibility and obligation has been put upon us they never say who did all the putting upon and all the thrusting it just sorta something that happened in fact it's a product of deliberate manipulation and contrivance and a very systematic force and interest involved as I shall try to argue tonight americans have always been taught that empire and imperialism and imperialism is the process of empire that's what empires do imperialism we've always been taught that this is something that other countries do when i was in the sixth grade my sixth grade teacher grace a myers i remember she said to me the united states is the only advanced country that doesn't have any colonies and in those days we had alaska hawaii guam puerto rico

the philippines has just given uh hadn't been given their independence yet and we had a bunch of colonies but um and she said no those are called territories or possessions they're not called colonies so a lot depends on labeling labeling is a very powerful thing in politics as you know in recent years however it's become rather acceptable to refer to the US as an empire when I wrote my book against empire some years ago a few people come and said oh empire aren't you overstating it aren't you overdoing it it wasn't too long later a few years later maybe and there were all these books coming out the sorrow of empire the folly of empire the challenge of empire american empire and so forth it's become really a hot term everybody's talking even conservative pundits uh on tv will now say and push it they'll even say they say

we're the strongest nation in the world and we have every right to act of such where an empire with all the obligations and responsibilities and opportunities of an empire and we'd better get used to it these are practically near quotes from this or that conservative pundit that i've heard or oval populate our media uh our media their media there's always this thing about um and again it's always this it's an impersonal force no explanation how this happened to happen you know it's an impersonal force that stuff just happens and this is where we are now and the mantle that's been thrown upon our shoulders by history and to maintain our credibility as a great power we have to act like a great power which means acting imperialistically so the communists were right we're imperialists they used to say that for years we'd say commie propaganda but we should have paid more attention

now one of the other things i noticed in the whole literature on empire is people really i mean and there's some exceptions now finally some people beginning to read what we've been writing for some years and they're saying it but for the longest time you could look at the literature and histories on empire and they never explain why why is there an empire they'll describe them the mongol empire the roman empire the british empire the japanese empire the way that most vicious and evil and relentless power craze of all empires most aggressive most ruthless most brutal the soviet empire which just went away in a few years of people demonstrating and all that uh supposedly was the most power hungry and it's never and so why why do empires come along why do people build empires it takes a lot of purposive and conscious effort to build an empire why all this conquest

is a conquest just for conquest power for power's sake actually there are very real material interests involved in empire there's plunder there's tribute there are resources there are markets there's expropriating the land the crops the cheap labor and in the case of rome the slave labor empires are enormously profitable and they're enormously costly they cost more than they bring in but it doesn't matter because the profits go to one group and the costs go to another group the empires are very profitable for their ruling elites and interests and empires are enormously costly for the common populous of the imperial nation

the empire feeds off the resources of the republic you can see that today two hundred billion dollars allocated one hundred and twenty billion spent but two hundred or so allocated for iraq that's two hundred billion dollars of our money that's two hundred billion dollars less of rebuilding infrastructure human services healthcare education and all those other marginal frills all that money going and yet of course enormous multi-billion dollar contracts for halliburton bechtel and and an enormous uh repository of oil for the US oil cartels so the people pay the taxes and do without the services so that the patricians can pursue their far off plunder the center is bled so that

the periphery can continue to expand and expand e badian speaking of rome's imperial class he wrote no administration history has ever devoted itself so wholeheartedly to fleecing its subjects for the private benefit of it's ruling class as rome of the late republic course he was writing uh several decades before the the present administration here in the US um the difference between what americans think their country is doing in the world and what the us rulers really are doing in the world it's one of the great propaganda achievements of modern history most people in this country would be absolutely astonished to hear what i'm saying

most of them when many of them wouldn't even come in I mean they would sit there and say what i've never heard that on fox what what are you saying many of them would be outraged to hear many of them would just simply say oh you say you hate america you're criticizing or that's the book super patriotism is about how you can criticize without be called hater of america as one of the things that i deal with critically when there is some awareness that things aren't going well then US policy is still passed off as in vietnam as in iraq is still passed off as well intentioned but just not successful overextended honestly confused ill informed we thought there were weapons of mass destruction we just got bad data the CIA for some reason just got it all wrong that time and what a coincidence the british intelligence just got it all wrong for tony blair at about the same time geez stuff like that happens what a coincidence duh

the intelligence information just wasn't that good they never explained why wouldn't the intelligence information be that good what are you talking about yeah all sorts of other groups you have the UN going in there you had all all sorts of reports written saying the opposite you kept sending it back to cook and asked them to cook it up cook it for iraq that's that's really close to the truth now I'm one of those who believe that US foreign policy is not foolish it's not stupid it's not led by stupid men the guy in the white house is a crafty resourceful conniving lying hypocritical with a scoundrel with all the intelligence of a rat he has a polemical instinct and he knows what the hell he's doing and if you want to get some gratification out of the joking about how stupid he is he's so stupid when he's sticking it up you one side and down the other

you better wake up so we should we should we should give less attention we should give less attention to how stupid this conniving failed businessman coke head reformed alcoholic ? snot is and we should and we should see how vicious and relentless he is in the pursuit of his interests I shouldn't hold back should I [laughter and applause] I don't know what it is I think US foreign policy is remarkably resourceful and successful it's one of the most effective and brilliantly ruthless policies in the history of empires I am now going to read to you all it's victories the history of US foreign policy not all the victories actually I don't have comprehensive extended list these are just things I that came to my memory on the plane

and this only goes from after world war two ok and there were things way before that US foreign policy after world war two has a history of bloody repressive and successful interventions US leaders profess a dedication to democracy yet over the last fifty years US national security state has been a key force in overthrowing reformists democratic governments in guatemala giona the dominican republic brazil chile uruguay syria indonesia ?andasircano? greece twice argentina twice haiti twice haiti three times if you count a couple months ago bolivia and other countries and replace them in each instance with pro capitalist military regimes that opened their resources their markets and the cheap labor

to US corporate investors on terms completely favorable to the investors who integrated themselves into the free market global system rigged us leaders having actively pursued covert actions or proxy mercenary wars against popular revolutionary governments in cuba angola mozambique ethiopia portugal south yemen nicaragua cambodia east timor western sahara iraq and elsewhere iraq now there's a story that's never told never mentioned never mention all the talk on iraq and never mentioned is the fact that the Iraqis who the present leadership presumes needs education in democracy the Iraquis had a wide based coalition democratic revolution back in nineteen sixty eight wasn't it or so and took over had a wonderful government nationalized the oil industry kicked out the english oil

companies kicked out the american oil companies and it was the US and the CIA that backed the ?bathis? party the conservative wing of the ?bathis? party and saddam hussein who went in there and they overthrew and they murdered and they tortured and they killed those democratic forces that's never mentioned that saddam hussein was washington's poster boy for years during the years when he was doing his worst and ruthless torture and murder and killings brutal horrible things he was doing and he was being paid advised and supported by the CIA and the US national security state that's never mentioned that's been dropped down the memory hole and it's only afterwards when he started committing economic nationalism that they thought of not liking him we started asking for better brake on the oil quotas that's when they decided they really didn't need them when he nationalized the whole economy and started health and education

programs uh in limited ways and all that that's when saddam hussein suddenly became a dictator US rule is has actively destabilized and moved against reformist governments in egypt lebanon peru iran and ? uh syria ziere under patrice lamamba jamaica and the michael manley venezuela under hugo chavez the fiji islands afghanistan before the soviets ever went into the country pakistani and US intelligence were already in there destabilizing the military that was in power because it was a left reformist military since world war two US direct a military invasion with US forces invading or you or area or launching aerial attacks bombings or both against vietnam cuba the dominican republic north korea laos

cambodia yugoslavia lebanon grenada panama libya iraq twice somalia now there's no there's no rouge state there's no uh e axis of evil there's no communist country that has a record of aggression like the one i just read off and this is an incomplete listing I'm giving you here the cost ten thousand killed in somalia hundreds of thousands have been killed in iraq since the first gulf war because of direct bombings and sanctions I was in iraq in um in um in November two thousand I was there just for the week and a half I was there uh uh this is before there was no war at that time a school was hit by US planes and and four students were badly maimed and two teachers were killed just in that

one week uh and this went on this was going on to say the war began Feb- in march twenty oh three is really never had really stopped the bombings had been going on all through that decade under clinton also three million people killed in vietnam two hundred thousand still missing a half a million in laos a million in indonesia in the us sponsored coup against ?sircano? three hundred thousand killed in east timor by that derranged murder machine known as the indonesian army paid equipped advised trained supplied by the United States eighty thousand killed in el salvador guatemala finally acknowledged in the new york times two hundred and five thousand killed by the death squads and extermination programs by rios mont general monte the who uh who wiped out six hundred Mayan villages clinton went down there twenty twenty five years later right and he apologized

apologize for two hundred and five thousand killings and what about the people who survived will never be the same who will live with the nightmares and horrors what you kill is not only a portion of the population you kill the country's future you destroy it and you whack it you dam- damp it down and he apologized I mean how do how do you do that you kill all of you and say alright I'm sorry I feel your pain and one could go on look also at the fact that US power has never been used to assist popular reformist governments or revolutionary movements or governments in any of these countries US power has never been used to assist broad mass based revolutionary democratic agitation the democratic revolutions and overthrows in chile and and in uh where the I mean when the democrat democracy

and the people came back into the streets and fought back the US never give them any kind of help there's not a case where you can say that the US helped not in guatemala not in nicaragua not in palestine or lebanon not in south africa not in south korea not anywhere not in china until china opened its economy to massive private investment with millions of chinese workers laboring without a contract and without protections twelve hours a day for miserable pay not until china started privatizing and dismantling much of it's public services and same with vietnam vietnam doing this very much the same as china now suddenly the US is friendlier to vietnam it's no longer a pariah nation and so with libya I mean do you really think the US policy is changing toward libya because libya said well we're not going up do any weapons of mass destruction gimme a break there's about forty or fifty countries who've got programs of one sort or another here

that isn't what they opposed in libya is that colonel gadhafi led a revolution in libya that took a country that had a social structure like saudi arabia with a few obscenely rich families at the top kicked them out nationalized the oil industry and you shouldn't worry if they nationalized the oil they still want to sell it to you you often hear a politician say we need that oil we need it you'll need it for your car will lead to try to create a false community of interest they'll sell you the oil what do you think they're going to do with it iran is eager to sell oil iraq was always eager to sell oil to us it's not that it's not that the oil cartels want to buy their oil and then sell it to you with a good marked up profit it's that they want to own that oil themselves and then sell it to you and reap all of the earnings from it and libya took over that oil industry and gadhafi went in there and he planted forty million trees for reforestation programs and he started education and health programs and housing programs and all sorts of

other things women could finally to go to school for the first time in libian history I mean go to advanced professional school even military school and the like that's when libya became a pariah nation and libya today is now being welcomed back by tony blair and george bush because gadhafi is finally giving in the sanctions have been just too hard on his country and he saying ok we'll open it up to western investment that's what that's what's been the change and suddenly they'll uh libya is suddenly uh coming to be an ok nation maybe for additional consistent patterns look at the regimes that US rulers have supported the ones most likely to win US favor are those that are integrated into the global system of free market corporate domination they're called pro american pro west that's it that's a buzzword for for global free market

the ones that lead their economies open to foreign penetration on terms that are singularly favorable to the transnational privatized deregulated investment the ones that adopt a neo liberal mode of maldevelopment which staves out which starves out starves out the public sector mostly right wing or right wing moving clients think that that makes them right wing is doing those kind of things free market against the public sector and like that's what right means and left means using a public sector reforms human services equalizing re-distributive politics that's what those terms right and left mean they have a very real class content they are almost never defined in america and in fact it's very interesting to how the labels always thrown around and yet the content of them are almost never discussed it's rather remarkable if you listen to what passes for political discussion in our media um such countries as chile under pinochet

the philippines under marcos ziere under mobutu that mobutu stole about four billion dollars out of ziere he stripped that now the congo republic of the congo he stripped it he died with four billion dollars that was his whole life was to be this kind of bloodsucking uh parasite uh a comparable leader ?sickle? fan followup of US global empire and so that he could do what they wanted so he can rip off all that he wanted egypt under sadat peru under fujimori south africa under aparte saudi arabia and kuwait under feudalism turkey pakistan nigeria under police state autocracy let's look at let's look at the role of the US empire in africa because africa is not all that often discussed when progressive critics

in america discuss the US empire critically they usually focus on latin america which it has been historically but africa the story in africa is is really something through the world bank and the IMF US leaders have demolished african economies including their public health and education sectors mo- and you know what it is you're in a debt now you have to pay your debt you gotta produce more and spend less spend less you gotta squeeze on your health programs education cut back on all those things but we can pay your debt your debt keeps accumulating with interest and you get trapped deeper and deeper um most african nations have sunk into a debt structure that leaves them in ?pianage? to western investors US leaders also have fueled eleven wars on the african continent since since nineteen fifty resulting in the death of some seven million people in africa with millions more facing starvation in an ever deepening poverty that's

why the africans are so poor it's not that they can't get it together is not that they don't know how to raise herds and raise crops and use the land they've been doing it for thousands of years before the white colonizers came there it's because of the way they've been ravaged and stripped and and forced down today washington has given arms and military training to fifty african countries that is to the ruling elites and thugs who ruled in fifty different countries there's only fifty three countries in all of africa so you see how they try to lock down the whole continent all this has helped africa to become the most war torn region in the world the more war ravaged the more poverty stricken that the african nations become the more ready they are to sell their labor and their abundant natural resources at rock bottom prices

to the US and other investors almost eighty percent of the strategic minerals that the US requires are extracted from africa cobalt platinum gold chromium manganese uranium ingredients needed to make jet engines automotive vehicles missiles electronic components and other things africa also accounts for eighteen percent of US oil imports as compared to twenty five percent from the middle east and new reserves are being uh discovered yet to be tapped there's a policy group washington dc's is honeycombed with what are called policy groups the semi official there's one that's called the african oil policy initiative group it announced that washington intends to establish a permanent US regional military command structure in africa quote which could produce significant dividends in the protection

of US investments this african oil policy initiative group is made up of US oil companies some foreign consultants members of congress and representatives from the bush administration semi official in the world it's been now in the old days they used to give you a glass to drink water from it's so undignified that this we get a bottle of flowing through you know all these lists all those countries i mentioned

these are all victories for the us empire it's true in some cases you see a heartening thing though you see in chile the resurgence of democratic forces so pinochet's kicked out you see him being hounded now for his crimes against humanity you see that happening all over the world some marvelous development international criminal court with the nations of the world not because these abuses that needs to regenerate is because of the force and the pressure from the people below the base and wellness any crimes against humanity shall be prosecuted against anyone who commits a crime anywhere and that's a rather extraordinary new development and the us is totally for it is natural they're against that therefore except that us military and governmental personnel have to be excluded from otherwise them for salads is the arrogance of empire of course that we are above we are above the ordinary rules

that govern ordinary people do not although these lesson not just something eye of confetti that of my own imagination all this that i've been saying to you ladies and gentlemen brothers and sisters all of this is a matter of public record although admittedly some parts of the public record are more public than other parts some parts just get just fall away but it's not enough to denounce these actions we also have to try to explain them it would believe us leaders noah says the empire fees of the republic you can't tell the republic that we just do this for the power and wealth of the few with the top to say we go in there to fight tierney we going to teach democracy were going to stop a threat to our own security as the most effective one

fight terrorism and the like what i say otherwise i say they going to maximize this free market global empire but how do you know that i mean how do you know that is what were talking about here it's a profession of intent of motive what is the motive behind us policy what are the motives they say their motives are so honorable humanitarian and so elevating i say they're so the nile and self interested and plundering no and the problem for the charming motives is that no one has ever seen a motive or intent it's a non empirical thing you can say is intent remote motive intent is something that's always described or inferred orange you did

whatever and so i mean i mean the bush bush sr can't deny invaded panama but he can profess uncertain motivate you said i'm so upset by the drug trade and noriega's involvement that's why went to panama but in fact panama you know was a was had a left military and tokyo it had all these reform programs and after butch women after the us army when the panama of all those programs were shattered unemployment went up about eighty percent the higher than it had been before all the old a redistributive politics and policies that this left military was doing were abolished the panamanian army itself was abolished so you can raise questions about a motive you can say shi this drug dealers in all these other countries guatemala is that every latin american country there are military and top political he's involved in the international cocaine trade and suddenly

panama you so upset the panama so there are ways in which you can question the motive when you see certain audie inconsistency there are ways in which you can ascribe motive with some degree reliability when you see these consistent patterns as i just been trying to show you the kinds of countries the us have supported political moments the kind that they have opposed specifically again and again the piece be so when you as rosa say they're attacking iraq because of its links to all kind of words weapons of mass destruction you can making that case an empirical refutation when us will is say that bombing yugoslavia and i treat this question in my book to kill a nation the bombing yugoslavia to stop the ethnic cleansing of kosovo we can see that the mass exodus in kosovo began after the bombing started and involved not only

albanians but serbs themselves or them trying to get away from the bombings and these refugees said they fled because of the bombings the bombings by by nato and when us who is say they bombed yugoslavia because they had to stop the genocidal slaughter of a hundred thousand albanians and then even the wall street journal runs an investigation says there's no hundred thousand bodies haven't found any bodies the trip the mines had nobody's talked about the mind shaft being filled with bodies they went there they found nothing not issue not a bill buckle not a bone nothing the bodies that materialize they found a couple thousand bodies in kosovo an area of white to twenty million people of course didn't have by people died for unspecified nationalities there had been some fighting had been killing obviously the serbs were ready and eager to pursue peace in kosovo it was to their advantage and the kale i was ready and eager to pursue war cause they knew they would bring nato in at their backs

so there are ways that you can check that the professions and the pretenses you save repeatable patterns and consistency and that's how you determine motives as i said you observe that any leader or political moment that attends to depart from the free market global system that pursued any kind of redistributive policies x for the general populace that attempts to use or advocates using its land labor capital markets and natural resources in self developing and self defined ways any such leader of movement is subjected to demonization denigrated as a brutal tyrant or tyranny be school corrupt oppressive belligerent a threat to stability and regional security a drug trafficker would just an expert a bleep anti american or anti west most recently

you hear this about what he will chavez in venezuela i get to see a new york times story about about hugo chavez was doesn't use the word mercurial the mercurial leader like he just thought i you know the other day in a sense go chronicle i heard him described as now what was it the nation's of nations was the word the pub nation's leader bob nations means fighting really looking for a fight he's looking for fights he keeps colon friendly relations in yugoslavia would i saw milosevic demonize elected president elected by the people of yugoslavia for party coalition he presided over i was in yugoslavia in july ninety nine height after the bombing stopped and i kept reading about milosevic the dictator and there's no long as all these posters opposition parties against milosevic in all that right up

a police state a brutal police state and i couldn't find any police around me to mexico city and every block a recall is a cop you go you go you go to you go to belgrade and then i could find couldn't find comes i think i was in my third fourth they're faster to policeman walked by norm or anything just little caps on guns and whistles when yugoslavia had eighty percent of its economy was publicly owned in a public health service is free education and medical care all of that's been privatized yugoslavia's been broken up into a cluster of little right wing republics which everything has been deregulated and privatized where unemployment has gone up twenty thirty to fifty percent rare it varies from macedonia to kosovo to croatia of the places where things have been the industrialized it was a country that was too independent it didn't want to join european union it didn't want to become part

of nato and at no interest and now it's learning its lesson and those people have been branded and demonize as war criminals but would serve that commit war crimes but so did the croatians so the bosnians and so did the kale albanians and kaley albanians killed among the people they kill with some of her fellow albanians want to stay in the yugoslav federation those were the first people they went after we also hear that those who target or other those who are targeted by our rule is our enemies' quote enemies out there are people who are empowered by evil impulses and that's the that's the that's the president's alike who said those things he talked about it talked about the roots of iraq as evil evil and their anti american we have at the terrace hate us because we are free and prosperous

and democratic and secular those are all things they just hate just hated it is so envious dr dan rather's a genius or dan rather's say weighty they hate us because we are winners and they are losers a man named that sort of thing well in my book super patriotism i have a couple pages in europe i actually took the trouble to go see what is the these terrorists actually do say about us i just somehow couldn't trust bill o'reilly and dan rather's and also the guys are just couldn't quite put my favorite i references the comments made by the group that bombed the world trade center in nineteen ninety three which killed about one hundred people or so nolan jail and then i read a number of statements by osama bin laden and this is what

they said you've given qualified support israel to destroy the popular movements in countries you destroying undermining our coaches are stealing our resources you come in and occupy us and trying to run our lives if you leave us alone we will leave you alone says they're at the book of sound and martin has just issued another state very similar to that and you know this thrust of the dominant forces is propaganda this whole climate of opinion is created that just keeps going up that is such that they dont suppresses come in they shut the show is common and then only giving about this is whether some of them are no say and here what he says is that wait a minute and then he just goes at all it's assumed that isn't this amusing isn't just deceptive business irrelevant as we know what this guy really has he said this war we're waiting is a retaliatory war it's not our initiative if you leave us alone we will leave you along

let's declare a truce in iraq you go home and will never bother you again a problem of course another thing when trying to determine the intent which is nowhere trying to determine causality which says scientific problem we can't test you can't test history you can't test politics all we have is observation but you can build the science on observation there's some signs that that had no testing or very little maybe some to vote no astronomy for one ironically one of the most successful science is always basic laws will work out twenty five hundred years ago by the greeks and romans renewal this and then all that suppressed by the christians for about but a part of a thousand years mandela oh copernicus daughter revising it again and it was shocking shocking how do you think that when that was all copernicus and aladdin i mean because their discovery of it of the telescope

negatively but that science wasn't was was its basic laws would just buy by sheer observation without telescopes think they will they worked out always think that's why those stars are named venus morris pluto jupiter mercury you see then i called mark matthew luke cole there are times however when history can provide a laboratory test for instance for decades we were told that the eu you united states needed enormous military budgets and it a hole global network of military bases around the world in order to contain the soviet communist menace that was an aggrandizing expanding

force and that threatened to encircle and devour us us militarism in other words was an innocent reactive necessity born of communist aggression some of us at that time argued otherwise i did in the very early book called me and they come and simple switches only out of print don't ask me i don't know where we can get a copy but we argued that when the soviet union to disappear the us would still pursue a policy of imperialist the nomination because it had these imperious interest that i've been talking about will lead and well as i said history can make its own laboratory does he was a case we've actually suddenly did remove one of the variables from the equation you could test for all the constant the soviet union didn't disappear and what do we have today

the us global empire has disappeared hasn't know it hasn't we have a us military budget bigger than ever growing at a faster rate than during the cold war think about that all the cold war weapon programs or the cold war weapons programs work continued all the military bases abroad were kept is that almost all of them know the military bases have been asked abolition in the middle east central asia and eastern europe the us has pursued wars of intervention and control more violently and more frequently than ever and host of the new enemies have been conjured up so they have it that pretty much set everything everything and i'm

going to say you can you can determine ten am by seeing these patterns of behavior an enormous consistency behind the it's not true that us policy is inconsistent and confused it's enormously well directed and and development way they're those is safe oh you're being reduction issue reducing alter just economic interests in the what about questions of it all do about strategic considerations river that question's of ideology have a class places too strategic interests are determined when you say we have a strategic interest in what is the strategic interest a nation as a strategic interests in the region because the region has some value to it or because the region as entree to another region that has some value so it's a backup or something and often that value is the economic resources or the class control considerations consider

iraq there are three basic reasons for us intervention in iraq and he's the same three basic reasons that dictate us interventions most elsewhere this first the systemic monopoly that we've been talking about the need to maintain and impose a global free market system iraq had an economy that was completely publicly owned dahl wrote rumsfeld the genius to his defense secretary defense he he ever if it i was i was rather amusing fascinated by zeus of terminology he said iraq has a as a stolen ids economy was really conjuring of stoking up the old imagery it wrought with self defining self developing not completely a free market clients they second iraq also was a bad example to other countries in the region that might want to be self defined

that's the same reason the us invaded grenada member in the in the caribbean while reagan was right ronald reagan the conqueror of grenada a nation of a hundred and two thousand people he said it's not the nutmeg that's true the us can get perfectly good nutmeg from africa high quality not make from africa but on the grenade has not made we went in there or well but we'll integrate it was to sell notice to every other nation in the caribbean but if you try this course this is what will come down on you if you get rid of these corrupt come for dog meat is law but he's an open up your country to us and you start doing these other kinds of subversive things like healthcare programs and new farming cooperative programs will that this is what you're going to get answered a grenade at unemployment is up forty sen says the us invasion and

those farming cooperatives have been turned into golf courses for the rich tourists and poverty and misery is again down there and the more you can keep people the honey you can keep him the harder they will work for less and less and the richer i get the more that child with a country the ploy was the betting sample iraq could emerge as a regional power iraq at the highest fan living in the middle east iraq was taking a different course other countries might get the same idea and we served notice in the middle east that this is how this is what's gonna happen to you and they serve notice now and this is what's going to happen to you by coming in without any resistance movement unknown and fighting back here third in the case of iraq is that straight all colonization resource plundered consideration resource plan direct colonizing

grabbing the riches of the country iraq as a hundred and thirteen billion barrels of find quality crude you know at fifty dollars a barrel were talking about close to what four to five trillion dollars i submit to you ladies and gentlemen that's not a narrow economic interest five trillion dollars is the biggest will grab in the history of the world it's a few among its broad interest so what the empire does is it teaches about our fellow citizens to have a competitive nationalistic ego is to view of the virtues of their country and it teaches them to live in fear fear of internal menaces fear of extreme or menaces

when he reaches and this isn't all toy of empires and reread you i got a quote in my book and julius caesar which is more than just the juices but the holy republic and that and this and that and the class struggles of the late republican this was written about ancient rome this was written by a conservative economist named joseph schilling played and he wrote it in nineteen nineteen to keep this in mind he wrote this in nineteen nineteen about ancient rome he says about roman imperialism rome pursued that policy which pretends to aspire to peace but an airing league generates war the policy of continual preparation for war the policy of metals and interventionism there was no corner of the known world where some interest was not alleged to be in danger or under actual attack if the interest were not roman they were those of rome's allies in rome had no allies

then allies would be invented the fight was always invested with an aura of illegality rome was always being attacked by evil minded neighbors always fighting for breathing space the whole world was invaded by a host of enemies and was manifestly rooms duty to guard against their aggressive designs they were enemies who only wanted only waited to fall upon the roman people is any that sound john forster dallas john foster dulles was a millionaire corporate lawyer for brown herrmann brothers he and his brother allen dulles allen dulles was head of the cia also rich corporate lawyer both of them and allen dulles went from his rich corporate law firm to head the cia allen dulles was secretary state under dwight eisenhower back in the nineteen fifties

and that and you know sometimes i say i argue that sometimes words speak louder than actions gratuitous cds actions but we try and determine tent and actually say it they could lead to manipulation and a disingenuousness then the words become rather precious you know this is what dulles said in a moment of committing truth here about the empire's needful for sweden manipulation quote in order to bring a nation to support the burdens of maintaining great military establishments throughout the world it's necessary to create an emotional state akin to war psychology there must be the portrayal of external menace this involves the development to a high degree of a hero nation and a villain nation ideology and be arousing of the population to a sense of sacrifice once these exist we've gone a long way on the path to war

so that he's describing imperialist mythology in the service of class power well there are some glimmers of hope through this murky dark picture i've been painting we had you know that phenomenal thing in february twenty oh three where millions of people estimated over ten million people all around the world there were fifteen twenty of re demonstrated in perfect water nation all around the world against the us war in iraq that hadn't even started now i've been to more anti war demonstrations than i care to count and this is the first time i saw people demonstrating with such widespread numbers and notes before the bombs that a bomb set ever started falling and

you look where these demonstrations took place japan finland lithuania spain italy nigeria egypt turkey mexico canada the us i mean countries like suffer some of those countries most of those countries japan mexico canada argentina isn't that countries that have a close ethnical historical cultural into iraq not at all and yet they were demonstrating for two reasons one eyed of regard for the iraqi people but two out of regard for themselves they were saying to us will is you cannot appoint yourself as rulers of the planet you cannot exercise the power of divine meineke to wage war whenever you want to decide to choose who shall live and who shall die we will now

attack you in a preventive or preemptive war because we think you might not be so friendly to us they were fighting them for their own national sovereignty for their own democratic sovereignty for their own right to be left alone the greatest basic human right of all the right to be left in peace without being victimized by the violence of others they were saying that because you have this an answerable military power that doesn't give you license to act like you're the rules of the world and also in violation of all international law of all international treaties that all human rights standards that was remarkable thing and that's still there that in fact was one of the reasons rumsfeld had sitting on those generals and hitting them down and say no i'm going with a smaller force know we got to go and with a lighter foot know we got seymour hersh documented all that a new yorker poem a year ago was the start but there's

no soviet union back in cuba anymore we get the guns we get the five hour week ago when but given the cost of this war given the fact that now that stretched so thin and this may be the achilles' heel of this empire its ground forces it really is stretched very thin they have in fact they ate a hidden conscription by not abide by extending the new listeners of of these reserves and guardsmen and such the call up of new reserves and guardsmen about one third have refused to answer respond the premise and this may be an area where the antiwar movement should be organizing besides says having big demonstrations began which really may be organizing giving backup and encouragement to reservists and guardsmen who do not want him going to go kill people in iraq

this would bijan vietnam or get them if enough numbers do that they don't get prosecutors just too many and the other thing that's happening is in listeners in the regular army are down in his volunteer at armed they really are in a bind and they don't have to go for a draft i think eventually in listeners are down and listens would down before september eleven and there was no spike after september eleven one expected or orf with the wood going to go fight terrorism center it in europe and they've just been down then dramatically dropped didn't rattle low anyway so they're having trouble getting enough of the blood they get the money from us but they've met them in trouble getting enough of the blood to go fight on these wars which means that when the attack if and when the attack iran it'll be mostly an area war of attrition as in yugoslavia

that his bomb and vomit bomb and destroy this infrastructure to kill many tens of thousands of people and bring it to its knees without going in but the reason they go wee and the reason they send troops and the reason they want to occupy is because of what's in the country iran has right after iraq the largest world's largest oil reserves saudi arabia iraq and iran amie of usable crouton you get you get it at the big reserve in alberta canada but it's it's got to wet sand in it and it's it's near it's too expensive too near worthless but usable quality stuff i don't know what they're gonna do i'd only really don't know what they're going to do in iraq with this election that bush says he's determined to have isn't that fascinating i mean is it interesting that a couple months ago when perry was ahead in the polls bush's appointment

of a point the time which gets up and says if there's an act of terrorism we might have to postpone the net november elections and a lot of us are saying what act of terrorism what magnitude would call for postponing throughout the entire country elections what will would have would be a bomb something uber trains or something gets hit and why would then postponing it to december which influences your turnout rate spreads among low income voters and such you know it that the ivory prices the turnout rate why december would be anyone would we be any safer from terrorist acts then we were in november second has always talk about well you know if it's not safe we can have these elections but here in iraq the same president is saying we have these elections iraqi can go down the block the ticket without risking getting your your your foot long offer something and yet to determine an election to determine at the elections in afghanistan national elections in afghanistan

better known as on the northwest side of kabul that's when the elections will take place so okay i'm going on too long we have to we have to organize and get back up to the people who are being conscripted and being lowered into the empire's army we have to continue our education to create a climate of opinion and conflict people say the vietnamese anti war mom didn't accomplish anything to pursue that war oh boy did it created pressure depression was the only restraint against richard nixon from using nuclear weapons nestle come out now where that that whole discussion with him in kissinger's as o henry i money is another just finished them off a note the bastards and henry says omb abbey to me into marble an end and kissinger said not just

in jazz anymore scruples about looking any body says nah mr president i would just that you would go down as a maniac and they would just cause too much disruption in dissent at home it would be to de stabilizing around the world so you see they do they do wonder and they do fit the four minute <unk> don't think that they don't and the concern about what you think of how you feel we are organizing it that not going to work with him to get behind the democratic party for this election even if you have the democratic party is less than perfect in less than what you want so we have to we have to vote in somebody who i'm self isn't about imperialists admit it but he really made it was an opening for not carry it may give us an opening and made him at least stop this reaction reactionary force were facing these are not conservatives who are in office these guys are reactionaries a conservative

is someone who opposes any reform because it might infringe on his privileges these guys are going for all sorts of what they call reforms rollbacks they're going for the third world his asian of the entire world and america included they're going for an america where there are no public services no no public pension funds know no no public education no public medical care they going for a country of what is no labor unions are protections are regulations no environmental protections as bush has shredded every environmental law one way or the other through administrative edicts and no executive orders and non enforcement and a misinterpretation sends the vividness interpretations so i know the democratic party is not your dream to me when i think of the democratic party i always think of oscar wilde when asked to walk into american people said to him we landed in europe they said oh you got to go to niagara falls this will all the newlyweds go

it's beautiful it's one of the wonders of the world us go out to destroy all way up to niagara falls he took one look at niagara falls and he said niagara falls is the second greatest disappointment that american brides experience on their honeymoon and that's the way i feel about the democratic party is the second greatest disappointment that i experienced i mean the republicans and the first of course but so where were getting screwed a not very well at that point as i said don't think for a minute they don't care about you think that all they care about that constantly monitoring you hear constantly directing their propaganda against you everything to talk about tonight is about their campaigns to develop and hold

to the national consciousness and awareness of what's happening that constantly manipulating information sources that constantly trying to create and re create the climate of opinion that constantly slogan rising and propaganda guys in the us we have to develop a count of consciousness and awareness they know they know better than a lot of our own people they know how powerful you really are they know that they're standing on your shows and they know that if the people ever really wait and shrug and organize and push doesn't have to be all in which is substantial numbers they know how shaky things get up there so when the people are ready to lead the leaders will eventually follow or they will be thrown aside as many of them deserve to be it's been