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IRAQ - Gulf War 2 specialGeopolitical background, military news, comment and analysis. |
| Geopolitical Background | Our analysis of US Global Strategy, The Project For The New American Century, Pax Americana, The Bush Doctrine, US Middle East Strategy. |
| War Diary | Progress of the war. |
| Links | News resources, perspectives, geopolitical links, military links. |
GEOPOLITICAL BACKGROUND
US GLOBAL STRATEGY
The invasion of Iraq is only one stage of a US global strategy which promises to set the international agenda if not for a thousand years then at least to the end of the Bush administration.
THE PROJECT FOR THE NEW AMERICAN CENTURY
Current US global strategy is strongly associated with a group of American intellectuals, politicians and propagandists identified as 'Neocons' (Neoconservatives), of whom the father figure is Irving Kristol, a former New York Trotskyite who was editor of Commentary and Encounter. The strategy has been developed and advocated through influential think-tanks such as JINSA, CSP and William Kristol's The Project for the New American Century and found particular expression in the PNAC paper, Rebuilding America's Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources For a New Century, September 2000, which explained that: “While the unresolved conflict with Iraq provides the immediate justification, the need for a substantial American force presence in the Gulf transcends the issue of the regime of Saddam Hussein.” (Pg 14, column 2). Signatories to the PNAC's founding principles included Dick Cheney (now Vice President), Donald Rumsfeld (now Secretary of Defense) and Paul Wolfowitz (now Deputy Secretary of Defense).
PAX AMERICANA: THE PROCLAMATION OF EMPIRE
The basic premise of the Neocon/PNAC position is that the United States should capitalise on its victory in the Cold War to turn the 'New World Order' into permanent world hegemony, guided by the pursuit of American "values and interests". Some Neocon supporters have even gone so far as to proclaim an "American Empire". An article by Max Boot in William Kristol's The Weekly Standard in Autumn 2001 was entilted 'The Case for American Empire' and subtitled 'The most realistic response to terrorism is for America to embrace its imperial role'.
THE BUSH DOCTRINE
In a speech at West Point on 1 June 2002, President Bush presented a new doctrine, subsequently outlined in a state paper, The National Security of the United States of America. This extended the principle of pre-emptive attack under threat to the concept of 'pre-emptive defence' - launching pre-emptive strikes against potential future threats.
ANTI-EUROPEANISM
The implication of PNAC policy naturally precludes the emergence of potential rivals, and while oil is an obvious economic-strategic driver for domination of the Middle East, it has also been argued that the current war is not just a question of oil but of the currency in which oil is traded. Iraq moved from the US Dollar to the Euro in the Autumn of 2000. Iran expressed interest in following suit, and North Korea switched at the end of 2002. This trend undermines the status of the US Dollar as the world's primary reserve currency and threatens the American economy. With Iraq within its sphere of influence, the US can break the OPEC monopoly, return Iraq to the Dollar area and forestall the advance of a Euro bloc embracing Eurasia.
Strategic rivalry with the European Union also taps into a strong current of cultural anti-Europeanism which has risen to the surface after French-led opposition at the United Nations to the US-UK attack on Iraq. Richard Perle, chairman (now ordinary member) of the Pentagon's Policy Advisory Board, declared that France was no longer an ally of the United States and that the NATO alliance "must develop a strategy to contain our erstwhile ally..." (Reported in the Washington Times, 5 February 2003).
GEOPOLITICAL IMPERATIVES
America's global strategy did not begin with the PNAC but can be traced back through the development of US geopolitical theory, most notably in the works of Zbigniew Brezinski, and particularly his book The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy and Its Geostrategic Imperatives, 1998 (available from Amazon.com in the USA, and Amazon.co.uk in the UK).
Brezinski was head of the National Security Council under President Carter. The Amazon.co.uk synopsis reads: "This work presents Brzezinski's provocative geostrategic vision for American preeminence in the 21st century. Central to his analysis is the exercise of power on the Eurasian Landmass, which is home to the greatest part of the globe's population, natural resources, and economic activity. He argues that the task facing the USA is to manage the conflicts and relationships in Europe, Asia and the Middle East so that no rival "superpower" arises to threaten their interests or well-being." The book is reviewed in armed-combat.com.
US MIDDLE EAST STRATEGY
US Middle East policy is driven not only by concern for oil, but also by a special relationship with Israel, America's primary regional ally. The resulting Arabic/Islamic hatred of America is particularly provoked by the USA's apparent acquiescence in Israeli occupation (and settlement) of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. About 200,000 Israelis live in 150 settlements in these areas (The Times 25 March 2003). The settlements are typically constructed on hill-tops with the houses arranged in concentric rings, and they render impossible the creation of a contiguous Palestinian state in the West Bank. Donald Rumsfeld has sided strongly with Israel in its hold on captured Arab lands and has questioned whether Israel is obligated to stop building settlements.
The Neocon hawks have a stong pro-Israeli bias and are so closely identified with the hard-line policies of Ariel Sharon's Likud party that they are known as 'Likudniks'. Israel and the United States actually share some of the same strategic policy makers. In July 1996 the Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies commissioned A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm to provide policy recommendations for the incoming government of Likud Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (Sharon's predecessor). The contributors included Douglas Feith, Undersecretary of Policy at the US Department of Defense; David Wurmser, a senior adviser at the State Department; and the ubiquitous Richard Perle (see above). The new strategy for Israel focused on destabilising Syrian control of the Lebanon and removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq.
Lt. Gen. Jay Garner, the man set to govern Iraq in the event of a US victory, is connected with the Neocon hawks driving US policy. In 1998 He visited Israel on one of JINSA’s annual sponsored trips for retired US military men, and in October 2000 he signed a JINSA statement blaming Palestinians for the outbreak of Israeli-Palestinian violence and saying that a strong Israel was an important security asset to the United States.
THE INVASION OF IRAQ
Following the events of 9/11, the Neocon hawks seized the opportunity to launch their strategy to take control of the Middle East. Even at that stage, Bush was under pressure to attack Iraq rather than go after Al-Qaida in Afghanistan, but was apparently dissuaded by British Prime Minister Tony Blair. After the invasion of Afghanistan and the crushing of Al-Qaida and the Taleban (actions widely supported by the international community), the war party turned its attentions on Iraq by reviving the long-standing issue of Iraq's alleged possession of chemical and biological weapons. UN weapons inspectors returned to Iraq in November 2002 backed by a UN resolution threatening "serious consequences" if there was a "material breach" of its terms. In March 2003, the chief weapons inspector Hans Blix reported that Iraq had accelerated its cooperation but said that inspectors needed more time to verify Iraq's compliance.
Despite the potential for a peaceful settlement, the US war party was determined to take military action arguing that the Iraqis were both hiding 'weapons of mass destruction' and were linked to Al-Qaida. In reality, of course, the Ba'athists (the ruling political tendency in both Iraq and Syria) are socialist and secular and regarded as heretical by Islamic Fundamentalists. But such was the power of this propaganda that some 50 per cent of the American public were brought to believe that the Iraqis were directly responsible for 9/11 even though there was no evidence of any such connection! But the rest of the world was not convinced, and in order to overcome opposition to the war from British public opinion and his own political party, Blair persuaded Bush to seek a new UN resolution endorsing a military attack on Iraq. This was resisted by France, Germany and Russia, so the Americans and British resolved to attack Iraq without UN endorsement.
In order to provide cover for what was essentially unilateral action Bush assembled a nominal 'Coalition of the Willing'. This was dubbed a 'Coalition of the Billing', as it was largely composed of minor powers bribed or bullied into providing moral support for US action. Borne along by Tony Blair's neo-Wilsonian messianicism, the UK was the only significant military participant. Although not supported by public opinion or his own party, Blair was able to fall back on the opposition Conservative Party, which has long had a strong Atlanticist tradition, and a small but influential coterie of 'British Neocon' propagandists in the Press such as Michael Gove (Assistant Editor of The Times), Stephen Pollard (The Times, Sunday Telegraph, Wall Street Journal Europe, New Statesman, Centre for the New Europe) and Melanie Phillips (Daily Mail).
Having failed to produce any evidence of weapons of mass destruction or links to Al-Qaida, the US-UK propaganda offensive moved over to the idea of liberating Iraq from an oppressive regime.
On 17 March 2003 Bush gave Saddam 48 hours to leave Iraq or face an invasion. The war began on 20 March 2003 with a missile strike to assasinate the Iraqi leader. The course of the war is traced in our War Diary.
IRAQI AS A SPRINGBOARD
The conquest and occupation of Iraq will place the US in a pivotal strategic position dominating the Arab/Moslem world and its oil, and will facilitate invasion or at least containment of both Syria and Iran, top priorities on the US hit-list for 'régime change'. With Iraq in American hands, Syria would be boxed in by four American allies. Pressure on Syria might force it to vacate the Lebanon, allowing Israel to eliminate Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad. Now that "a substantial American force presence in the Gulf" has been established, Damascus (the capital of Syria) is only a drive away. Iran could also be invaded from both west (Iraq) and east (Afghanistan), though it is more likely that US forces will simply launch an air attack on its nuclear infrastructure. Even before the shooting has stopped in Baghdad, strong indications have been given of the next stages in the USA's quest for global empire.
The danger for the US in its current strategy is that instead of bringing greater security from terrorism, it may destabilise the whole Islamic world and propel the US into a perpetual, escalating and geographically expanding imperial role challenged by a regional quagmire of guerrilla warfare and a global campaign of Intafada-style suicide bombing.
If the Vietnam experience is repeated, Americans may find they have no stomach for perpetual war and high casualties, even if the ratio of casualties is vastly in their favour. Like the Roman Empire, however, the US is moving towards a mercenary army, recruiting foreigners who are rewarded with US citizenship, so the impact on the home front is ameliorated.
THE US AND EURASIA
The establishment of an American Empire in the Middle East dominating the largest stocks of the world's most important resource, has implications far beyond the politics of the Arab-Israeli conflict. It is a development which Europe, Russia and China may come to address in 'a Monroe Doctrine for Eurasia'. Instead of being another American century, the Twenty-First Century may prove to be the anti-American century.
Many Americans are themselves opposed to US ambitions which they see not as serving American interests so much as the ambitions of a globalist elite.
© armed-combat.com 25 March 2003. Last updated 17 April 2003.
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