Nearly 3/4 of the World’s Dictators Receive US Weapons and Military Assistance
original.antiwar.com
original.antiwar.com
I'm always nervous when our country makes new treaties or agreements with the US, there is always a sting in the tail.
Look people, who is going to keep the lower classes in the outer parts of the empire down? We can't do that directly, it's too expensive, annoying, there's press conferences, sometimes CNN starts broadcasting about international news to the populace. All annoying and counterproductive to the voting powers and their corporate lords.
And of course, who's going to shadow fund all your actual wealth while you pull down a meager (by elite western standards) 175k salary in congress? The Saudis only care about the big fish like presidents (that's why there's a presidential visit TO Saudi Arabia near the end of every US President's administrations).
Oh, sure, it's "illegal" to get that money. Fine, let us just use Citizens United to funnel the money to your lobbying buds who will totally set you up.
The world is a complicate place. We prefer that people have basic freedoms, but that's not always going to be the case.
Singapore is an 'autocracy' and so was Korea up until recently. So is Kuwait.
We want 'order' first, which can enable a bit of prosperity, and then the slow grind to basic freedoms, it's generally the only path. Almost all revolutions end up with fairly bad tyrannies.
Singapore is much better managed that India or Russia, which are both nominal democracies.
Why did you invade Iraq then plunging it into total chaos and support ISIS in Syria against the Assad regime? Why did you overthrow the Gaddafi regime in Libya. All of these actions have led to an incredible destabilization and power vaccuum in the entire region, completely destroyed the 'order' you claim you want, led to the rise of terror groups in the region and to a migration crisis of epic proportions.
Both of these governments were attempting to sell oil for something other than US dollars. Threats to the Petrodollar system are NOT tolerated by the Galactic Empire.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2003/feb/16/iraq.theeur... https://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~norman/CurrentAffairs/DeeperNew... https://thenewamerican.com/gadhafi-s-gold-money-plan-would-h... https://www.rt.com/news/economy-oil-gold-libya/
Iraq was already destabilized with daily NATO air missions overhead for a decade, Libya and Syria were plunged into civil war long before any kind of intervention.
The Americans don't like it when you mess with their petrodollar, but they're not going to fight a war over it.
FYI not answering the complicated questions about 'why USA invaded Iraq', but rather pointing out the 'Petrodollar' conspiracy is a canard. If you're looking for an indirect strategic issue to talk about you can just say 'Energy Security' was a factor, which of course it is, but it's still only one factor.
And of course, the US did and does not control the Oil Fields in Iraq, they didn't cut a deal (like with Saudi) for access to the Oil, all of the energy benefits go to other nations. So in this case, there's scant evidence 'it was about Oil'.
And the Petrodollar is a small thing, it's a side show.
Air missions which didn't prevent Saddam from switching from dollars to euros.[1] Clearly a more permanent solution was needed. General Wesley Clark stated as early as September 2001, leveraging post-9/11 sentiment, the US had decided to invade Iraq.[2]
>>>Libya and Syria were plunged into civil war long before any kind of intervention
The Libyan protests evolved into armed conflict/open revolt roughly around February 21st, when Qaddafi's Air Force bombed Tripoli.[3] Operation Odyssey Dawn began on March 19th, less than 30 days later.[4] In Syria, we didn't take overt interest in regime change, we merely occupied the most oil-rich portions of the country, which the central government lost control of early anyway.[5] Assad can't threaten the Petrodollar if he doesn't have oil to sell, and regime change would mean threatening Russia's access to the warmwater port in Latakia, arguably the reason Russia intervened. That would be an escalation with the Ruskies that I don't think we are prepared to risk.
>>>The Americans don't like it when you mess with their petrodollar, but they're not going to fight a war over it
Sure we will. Even the French will go to war to prop up the sphere of influence of their currency.[6]
[1]https://www.cnn.com/2000/WORLD/meast/10/30/iraq.un.euro.reut...
[2]https://www.salon.com/2007/10/12/wesley_clark/
[3]https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libyan_Civil_War_(2011)
[4]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Odyssey_Dawn
[5] https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/who-bene...
Your comments about Libya are not relevant and add nothing to the argument. There was an uprising, eventually it became violent, Qaddaffi ordered an incursion into E. Libya in which he publicly declared the intention of massacre, which practically forced the hand of observing parties. We could be on one wide or the other, there were no good outcomes.
Your speculation about Assad is fabricated, and historical assertions equally so.
1) The US did not 'occupy' any part of Syria.
2) Your claims about Assad's inability to sell Oil in other denominations due to his lack of control of Oil Fields is clearly disproven by the fact that he controls those areas right now, at this time. By your logic, he should be warring against the Petro dollar?
The conflict in Syria has nothing to do with the Petrodollar.
"Even the French will go to war to prop up the sphere of influence of their currency.[6]"
Despite the obvious flaw in your premise in that the French do not have a currency , your claim is not remotely substantiated by the link you provided.
You do understand that providing links to irrelevant information doesn't help your case?
Stop with the fictional conspiracy fantasies and reading as evidence bits of information that have little or nothing to do with the situation.
So rather than comprehend the second and third order effects of a major oil exporter not adhering to the US's strategic imperative in the oil markets, your debate position is to stick your fingers in your ears and say "Not listening"?
>>>Your comments about Libya are not relevant and add nothing to the argument.
Nice attempt to move the goalposts. You stated: "Libya and Syria were plunged into civil war long before any kind of intervention". We intervened less than 30 days after the commencement of hostilities. So your statement is false. If you are going to step into the conversation calling another's post "total nonsense" in your first sentence, you should probably have the details dialed in, lest ye embarrass yourself.
>>>1) The US did not 'occupy' any part of Syria.
How do you debate with someone who can't even agree on the meaning of words? What else do you call it when SOF and Marines maintain bases IN SYRIA in vicinity of high-value terrain for years? Our presence there is denying the sovereign government usage of those economic assets.
https://taskandpurpose.com/analysis/military-us-troops-syria...
>>>2) Your claims about Assad's inability to sell Oil in other denominations due to his lack of control of Oil Fields is clearly disproven by the fact that he controls those areas right now, at this time.
Why do you persist in making such blatantly-false statements? The "Syrian Democratic Forces", aka "Kurds with the backing of embedded US SOF", control the territory east of the Euphrates. https://kurdpress.com/en/news/1863/US-troops,-SDF-hold-joint... https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/23/world/middleeast/syria-as... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Syrian_Civil_War_deta...
At any rate, that wasn't the original argument I was trying to make but I can see the source of confusion: @datenarsch mentioned 3 countries (Iraq, Syria, Libya). I commented on the Petrodollar with respect to two of them: (Iraq, Libya), without articulating that Syria's strategic considerations had centered around other problems (Qatari natgas pipelines, Shia crescent, etc...).
>>>Despite the obvious flaw in your premise in that the French do not have a currency , your claim is not remotely substantiated by the link you provided.
I'll admit I completely garbled my point on that one. Qadafi originally stockpiled gold for his African dinar project. The email leak shows that Libyan threats to influence over Francophone Africa were sufficient for French leadership to take military action. So it stands to reason that the world's pre-eminent military power (America), would factor economic incentives into its Use of Force calculus. But don't take my word for it; I'm sure Alan Greenspan is better informed than either of us on the subject: https://books.google.co.jp/books?id=7QUoBM3p87MC&lpg=PA119&o...
The reality is that there is seldom a great choice in many places. It's usually choosing between two or more dictators.
When the US supported South Vietnam, it's not that they condoned everything south vietnam did, but had to make a tactical choice between lesser evils.
I guess my takeaway is there is a pragmatic versus idealistic debate here. Ideally America really does want liberal democracies -- if every other nation was a France or Korea, we would be better off.
But there is a pragmatic reality that funding non-free leaders may be a local maximum of stability.
But why get involved at all? The US didn't have to do anything.
Most of the reason the U.S. gets involved in anything has to do with geopolitics. If there are human rights issues or "freedom" issues then this is just a bonus for justification purposes.
I highly recommend the Ken Burns documentary "The Vietnam War". I'm old enough to remember all the propaganda we were fed, it is just amazing how much we were lied to.
supporting a dictator means no other voices / opinions come out in that country i.e ensuring it's all good there and no secret societies / enemy forces will ever ally in that place.
democracy is a liability for the developed nations unless the local public opinion is soaked into the western ideas.
there is no reason for the US or anyone to have good intentions for any "other" country and even when they have they have no right to intervene in the local politics and good intentions doesn't include supporting dictators
bringing order is not better for the people of that place it's only good for the safety of the US or whomever is supporting that dictator not to mention the enormous power the US holds that can literally in a year or so just assassinate the dictator and put a liberal one.
I think there were wikileaks about hijacking Iran's elections and putting Khomeini seamlessy that without that leak nobody's would have probably even knew about it.
assuming the US is interested in the wellbeing of other nations is really just naive and silly. the US itself has millions of people in the streets, drug addicts, homeless etc.. they could have started to help these people if they had any good intentions the money, the power, and the brainwashing machines - the media - all exist and can help these people.
but yet again, things don't work like that and never had been.
the capitalists don't care if a million or 2 or 4 are homeless. they know the US us under their complete control. other regions, might not be. so offering help, humanitarian aids or such. is only a way of changing the public opinion to look good. supporting a dictator on the other hand is a way to eliminate any possible opposition that might pop up.