I believe the war in Iraq is about these three things:

1. A Permanent Base in the Middle East

Starting in the 1950's, the CIA had two foreign policy goals in the middle east. 1- Destabilize the region and 2-Get a permanent base in the region. Notice that neither of these things have anything to do with Democracy or human rights, things the US pretends to care about. One of the ways the US successfully destabilized the region was to secretly support both Iraq and Iran during their long bloody war. The US didn't care how much innocent Iraqi and Iranian citizens suffered from a decade of war, we just kept selling both governments more weapons and supplying them both with tactical information. Our goal was to keep them fighting, because the longer they were at war, the less stable they would be. They would be weaker and poorer at the end of it, and that would give us greater opportunities for establishing a military base and thereby controlling the flow of oil and exerting our influence on those markets. We supplied Iraq with chemical weapons during this war, and looked the other way when they were used to gas the Kurds in the north. The blood on Hussein's hands is on our hands too.

Our big chance to establish a semi-permanent military base came in the early 90's, when Iraq invaded Kuwait. At the end of the Iran-Iraq war, both countries were deeply in debt, particularly Iraq. At that moment, Kuwait chose to hike oil production which drove Iraq even deeper in debt. A little bit about Kuwait: it was basically part of Iraq until the 1920's (part of the Ottoman Empire for over 300 years). Britain controlled Iraq's oil for many years, but when they were forced out in the 20's they decided to give themselves a little parting gift. They carved out the area known as Kuwait and declared it an independent country, which they would still control, of course. They had been meddling in that southern region since 1899 and encouraging it to break away. At that time, Kuwait's oil was not listed as an asset, but it was a strategic port that Britain desperately needed if it was to hang on to its far-flung empire. How convenient for the British. They kept the majority of Iraq's coastline, leaving Iraq almost completely landlocked, with only a tiny outlet to the sea. As you can imagine, Iraq was good and pissed about this for a really long time, so when they saw a chance to take back what they considered theirs, they went for it. The interesting thing is, the US essentially gave them the Green Light to do it.

Iraq was in no position to act without US approval. Hussein was our good pal, or so he thought, and probably figured that if the US was o.k. with his warmongering, he could do it safely without punishment. Iraq moved to invade Kuwait and the US, seeing yet another opportunity to destabilize the region, explicitly stated in a White House briefing that the US had "no obligation" to defend Kuwait in the event that Iraq invaded. We didn't tell Iraq to attack, but we said that if they did, we wouldn't respond. So Iraq invaded, and, unexpectedly, the US was at the front of the pack condemning the invasion. Iraq offered to negotiate and withdraw its troops. The US ignored their offer and instead lied to the Saudi government about the extent of Iraq's military. The US told the Saudis that Iraq was building up a huge military front along the Saudi border and convinced them that we needed to set up a military base inside Saudi Arabia to 'protect' them from this huge Iraqi army that was certainly going to attack them next. It wasn't true, but the Saudis were convinced. We got our base, for the time being, but we were only there with the permission of the Saudi government, and soon enough our welcome was wearing thin. That action (setting up a military base on Muslim soil) went a long way toward fueling radical Islamic groups like Al-Qaeda.

So, part of our strategy was fulfilled. We had a military base in Saudi Arabia, along with bases in the tiny island nations of Qatar and Bahrain, but the catch was, we could only keep our bases in the region as long as Hussein was in power. With Hussein removed from power we had no excuse to stay in Saudi Arabia and exert control over the region. Our options were either allow Hussein to stay in power for a while and bide our time in Saudi Arabia (a less desirable plan- let's call it Plan B), or else overthrow Hussein, occupy Iraq, and install a government that would allow the US to keep a permanent military base on Iraqi soil. That was plan A- that was what we really wanted. We knew the Saudis didn't really want us there, world opinion was against Iraq, and the US had momentum on its side, so the decision was to go ahead and get rid of Hussein and put someone more pliant in his place.

The problem was that the US underestimated the hatred that ordinary citizens had for Hussein. They wanted him out of power even more than the US did. All those years the US was sending him aid and supplying him with weapons, treating him like a friend and looking the other way while he butchered his own people. Part of US global strategy is to support a dictator while he is at his worst and then when we get tired of him, we can always count on the people he terrorized for decades to help get rid of him. What the US didn't count on was how quickly the people would rise up- not just against Hussein, but against the US as well. The US thought it could just occupy the country and subdue the nationalists, but before US troops even made it to Baghdad, 14 out of 18 provinces were controlled by rebels. At that point, the US was screwed. The last thing the US wanted was for the country to be controlled by its own people, who would set up a strong independent Iraq and who would not tolerate US influence, much less occupation or a permanent military base. The US would rather let a dictator stay in power, than to let the Iraqi people set up their own government. Time for Plan B.

So, the US suddenly called for a cease-fire, much to the amazement and confusion of the rest of the world- and to the amazement of the US military who had Baghdad in their sights. The White House allowed Hussein to stay in power and put down the rebellion. My sister, who was in the Air Force at the time, says "I don't understand why we didn't get Hussein when we had the chance." A lot of people have wondered the same thing. For the next two years Hussein essentially had free reign to conduct bombing raids in the northern and southern provinces where the strongest uprisings were occurring. Between '92 and '95, the US refused to support any of the groups who were trying to overthrow Hussein, and they were brutally crushed by Hussein's National Guard. We didn't care about the Iraqi people who had suffered and were still suffering under Hussein. We never did, and we still don't. If we cared, we would not have followed a military doctrine earlier this year known as "Shock and Awe" which deliberately and illegally targeted civilian populations. If you need further proof of our complete disregard for the rights of ordinary Iraqi citizens, learn a little bit about the sanctions we imposed.

We decided to not allow Iraq to import basic necessities like food and medicine, the result of which is that between a million and a million and a half innocent Iraqis have died in the last decade, most of them children. Add to that the effects of depleted uranium (the US military uses depleted uranium in its "bunker buster" bombs- which are essentially mini-nuclear bombs) which causes severe birth defects and skyrocketing cancer rates, especially in children, and what you have is Genocide. That is completely immoral and totally illegal. Targeting a civilian population like that was outlawed by the Geneva Convention in 1951, after it studied the horrors of the Nazi regime. If these charges were brought before the International Criminal Court, Bush Senior, Clinton and Bush Junior would all be put in jail for crimes against humanity, along with other world leaders who went along with the US-led sanctions, including Tony Blair. Conveniently enough, the US doesn't recognize the legitimacy of International Criminal Court, and has declared that the Court cannot investigate US actions. If somehow information comes to light about illegal US activities, the US has declared itself exempt from prosecution. The official US line on the sanctions is that their purpose was to weaken Hussein and rouse the people to rebel and overthrow him, the idea being that if they were hungry and miserable enough they would blame him and try to get rid of him. That's all bullshit, of course, since we know that the last thing the US wanted was for Hussein to be overthrown by his own people. The US was also aware that the sanctions were making Hussein stronger and keeping him in power, which again, was good for the US since it would justify our continued presence in Saudi. It didn't matter to us how powerful Hussein became- his military would never be any match for ours. Also, during this time US corporations made about a BILLION dollars per MONTH selling arms in the middle east.

So if the purpose of the sanctions wasn't, as the US claimed, to weaken Hussein or to rouse the people to rebellion, what was the purpose? Well, we can look at two things to determine that: 1-What we know of US strategy, and 2-The end result of the sanctions. As for strategy, we know that the US did not want the Iraqi people to gain control of their own government. We wanted to remove Hussein and install a puppet we could control. Getting rid of Hussein was never a problem, we could do that at any time, but controlling the Iraqi people was a major obstacle. They needed to be subdued. We can see how the end result of the sanctions furthered that goal. We wiped out an entire generation of Iraqi children and murdered hundreds of thousands of innocent people. The US can't claim they didn't know this was happening. Madeline Albright, Secretary of State under Clinton, was interviewed on 60 minutes and asked about the fact that 5,000 Iraqi children were dying every month as a direct result of the sanctions. Her response- speaking on behalf of the US administration- was "On balance, we think it's worth it." [Note: this footage has since been censored by CBS at the request of the White House. Apparently they were not happy with the fact that she admitted on live television that the US was openly and willingly participating in genocide].

The goal of the sanctions seems clear to me: it was to deliberately cripple the people of Iraq so that the next time the US mounted an invasion there would be significantly less resistance. For a while it seemed to have worked. This time, at least at the beginning, the rebel groups still functioning within Iraq knew better than to rise up, notably the Kurds, who promised earlier this year not to fight for independence and re-create their own country in the north, if only the US would please grant them limited autonomy. The sanctions, along with ten years of US bombing runs in the "no-fly zones," seemed to have accomplished what they were meant to do. The US invaded with a force half the size of the one used a decade earlier and took Baghdad with little resistance. The average Iraqi, starved into submission, welcomed an end to Hussein's rule and an end to the sanctions. Now, just because they welcomed an end to an American- supported dictator and American-supported sanctions, doesn't mean they want Americans to occupy their country or set up their government for them.

My nephew said that he spent most of his time in Iraq passing out food to starving people, when he wasn't dodging bullets. I know that he is a good person and he needs to believe that he did a good deed, but it isn't enough to say "They were starving and we gave them food, so it was good that we invaded." You have to know WHY they were starving and who is responsible for that. Yes, no more Hussein and no more sanctions are both good things, but we could have ended the sanctions and gotten rid of Hussein any time we wanted to. As you will see, we have no intention of stopping our abuse of Iraq. I want to give you a quick example of how the US uses certain types of military activity to mask their intervention.

In the 1920's, and into the 1930's, there was a popular movement in Nicaragua against British and US corporations. At the time, these corporations controlled almost every aspect of the Nicaraguan economy. The banana and timber exports, the mining rights, the coffee plantations, the ice trade, key shipping ports, and the banking industry were all controlled by US and British corporations. The profits flowed right out of Nicaragua and into US and British treasuries, leaving Nicaraguans in poor and miserable conditions. A peasant leader named Sandino vowed to put the government back in the hands of the people. He wanted to get rid of the puppet government that was supported by US and British money, and institute a real Democracy. The US sent the Marines to Nicaragua under the pretext of protecting US property from vandals and revolutionaries. From the outside it seemed reasonable enough, especially to capitalists in the US who wanted to see a return on their investments and didn't care much about the Nicaraguan people. I mean, it doesn't sound violent, right? They're just protecting Americans from the peasant rabble who wanted to run them out. Only they weren't just standing around "protecting" Americans, they actually launched an offensive against the Nicaraguan peasant groups and chased them into the hills. The US was engaged in a clandestine guerilla war on foreign soil. If you look at it that way, it doesn't sound as good, and the PR people had to scramble to spin it and make it look better. How could they justify the presence of US Marines in the mountains of Nicaragua? They decided to make it sound like a humanitarian mission.

Some of the Marines were put to work on 'feel-good' projects. They helped build bridges and they cleared roads and distributed food along the way to hungry peasants. I'm sure the average Marine felt like he was doing a good thing and probably didn't know any better, although there were a few who left the Marines to join the Sandinistas, but unless you look at the larger picture you don't see the damage that was done. What could possible be wrong with feeding hungry people and helping build up their infrastructure? Well, ultimately the bridges and roads were used by the military to push deeper into peasant territory. Without those roads and bridges they had a hard time moving their equipment. And rather than allow Sandino and the peasants to control their own government and set up a democracy which would allow the wealth to remain in Nicaragua, the US was promoting a system where the peasants would be reliant on hand-outs from a foreign-sponsored government. Rather than allow small farming cooperatives to flourish, which they did for a while when Sandino was able to institute reforms (before he was murdered), they perpetuated a system of favors and obedience. They wanted to keep the peasants powerless and obedient, and in exchange for their obedience they were given scraps of food.

This is standard colonial practice, and it's basically what happened under Hussein during the 1990's when the US let him remain in power. He did exactly what we needed him to do. He hunted down the Nationalists, kept the poor people in line by starving them and depriving them of real power, then gave them hand-outs in exchange for their obedience. We're just taking over where he left off. We will not allow the Nationalists to govern their own country, we will not allow the Iraqi people to have real power. The most we're willing to do is grant them our table scraps in exchange for their obedience.

In Iraq, the US seems to have, once again, underestimated the Iraqi people's desire for autonomy. The Nationalists that survived Hussein's regime did not simply disappear; they went underground or re-grouped in other countries. The Iraqis want their own country. They don't want another US-supported dictator. They don't want a governing council chosen by the US or a fake constitution with a US stamp of approval. They don't want a permanent US base in Iraq. You probably know that a few months ago the US completely closed down its base in Saudi Arabia and, from what I can tell, moved everything to Iraq. The US has no intention of leaving Iraq, unless it's in the hands of a US puppet like Ahmed Chalabi. I guarantee you there will never be real Democracy in Iraq. That has never been the intention of our foreign policy there, or anywhere else. The governing council currently in place in Iraq was hand-picked by the US, not elected by the Iraqi people. When there are "free" elections I can guarantee they will be manipulated by those in power. We don't even have free elections here. Do you know how many people- mostly poor and black- were denied the right to vote in Florida during the last presidential election? The only government the US will ever allow in Iraq is one that will let us keep a sizeable military force on the ground, at all times, in order to use Iraq as a base for launching future military operations, and allow us to control their flow of oil....... Which leads me to my next point......

2. Oil

Some people seem to think that oil isn't all that important- that it's sort of a nice little prize that Bush administration will take advantage of because it happens to be there, but that it wasn't a major factor in the decision to go to war. To some extent I'll agree that the decision to go to war at this moment in time wasn't necessarily motivated exclusively by oil, but if we take a look at the broader picture we can see that since WWI, oil is one of the main reasons we've been interested in the region. Iraq was a handy target because it has been the focus of eight decades of foreign intervention and destabilization. If Iraq suddenly had no oil, I believe we still would have invaded for the reasons I mentioned above, but if there were no oil in the region we probably would have left it to its own devices decades ago and not made it such a focus of our foreign policy. Also, the fact that Iraq has the second largest oil reserve in the world is not something we can just ignore, especially if we look at what has been done in the name of oil over the last 80 years.

The 1920's kick off the first 80 years of US & European oil exploitation in the Middle East. During WWI, it became clear to western leaders that a secure and steady flow of oil would be needed to power the economies of their newly industrialized nations. All of our big dirty machines needed a lot of foreign oil or else our economies and our war planes were going to grind to a halt. During WWI the British landed in Iraq and occupied Basra. At this time there were 3 provinces that made up Iraq: Mosul in the north, Baghdad in the middle, and Basra in the south (which, at this time, still included Kuwait). By 1918, all of Iraq was under UK military occupation. Iraqis hoped for freedom and independence, but were held in the grip of colonialism by the British. In 1920, the League of Nations put Iraq under UK administration, which gave the British the right to raise and spend Iraqi money, appoint government officials, and make and enforce laws. The Iraqi people revolted against these greedy foreign rulers, and an armed rebellion spread across the country. The British responded by "ordering aerial bombardments, the machine-gunning of rebels and the destruction of whole towns."

When news of the destruction filtered out, even the British press turned against the administration. Realizing that trying to openly control Iraq wasn't going to work, they decided to set up a constitutional monarchy, like the one they had in Britain. In 1921, they hand-picked a prince to rule Iraq. This man, Faisal, had never set foot in Iraq before, but in exchange for his rise to power he would bend Iraq to suit Britain's desires. They rigged an election in an attempt to prove that the common people supported their new king, but despite an impossible 96 percent of the vote, he had little popular support. The year after Faisal was installed, Sir Percy Cox, the UK High Commissioner for Iraq, decided to carve out Kuwait in the southern province of Basra and make it completely independent from Iraq, as I mentioned earlier. Kuwait would remain under Britain's thumb until 1961. Cox gave the majority of Iraq's coastline to Kuwait. I have conflicting figures that give Iraq either 12 or 16 miles of coastline, compared to Kuwait's 310. I believe that after the first Gulf War, Iraq lost more coastline. Either way, it is incredibly landlocked.

For the next decade, Britain indirectly ruled Iraq. They had King Faisal sign the Anglo-Iraq Treaty which gave British officials a "veto over legislation" and gave the UK the right to influence Iraq's financial and international decisions. In 1932, the League of Nations mandate that had been granted to the UK in 1920 officially ended. Iraq was granted independence and a seat at the League of Nations table, but it would still be dominated by the UK for the next 30 years. The bulk of Iraq's oil wealth went to Britain from 1920 until 1958, when the monarchy was overthrown. There was intense resentment on the part of the Iraqi people, not just because the Iraqi government was full of British advisors and because the British controlled Iraq's oil wealth and because the British controlled Kuwait, but also because the British Air Force controlled bases around Baghdad and Basra.

In 1958, the army, under the leadership of General al-Qasim, overthrew the monarchy and established a republic. Agrarian reform laws broke up feudal land holdings and attempted to spread the wealth of the land more equally among Iraqi citizens. King Faisal had signed the anti-Communist Baghdad Treaty in 1955, but in 1959 al-Qasim withdrew from the pact. The US was in the midst of the Red Scare and was freaking out about communists, so they paid more attention to al-Qasim and watched closely as Iraq began to align itself with the Soviet Union. The US wasn't about to let Iraq and its oil fall into Soviet hands, so they decided to conspire with the British to get rid of al-Qasim.

In 1959, the CIA authorized a six man squad to assassinate al-Qasim. One of the six was a young Saddam Hussein, even then described as a common "thug" and a "cutthroat." The assassination attempt failed and Hussein fled to Beirut and then Cairo, his living and travel expenses paid by the CIA. Al-Qasim remained in power for another 4 years. In 1961, Kuwait gained its independence from the British, but was still aligned with and protected by them. Al-Qasim threatened to annex Kuwait and the British said, basically, 'no way in hell- you do it and we're going to war.' Al-Qasim backed down, but the US and UK knew it was just a matter of time before they were shut out of Iraq completely. Al-Qasim remained in power until 1963, when he was overthrown in a coup led by Colonel 'Arif that, some say, was backed by the CIA and sanctioned by Kennedy.

From '63 to '68, Iraq was headed by 'Arif. He didn't last long after he sided with the Arabs in the Israeli/Arab conflict. 1967, Iraq declared war on Israel after Israel occupied the West Bank, Gaza strip and Golan Heights. Iraqi troops were sent to reinforce the Israel/Jordan border, and Iraq subsequently severed all ties with the US. I suspect the US was behind the next coup as well.

In 1968, General al-Bakr led a faction of the Ba'ath party in a coup, overthrew 'Arif, and named himself president. Saddam Hussein, a Ba'athist, became head of al-Jihaz a-Khas, the Iraqi version of the CIA. The Ba'ath party was in the process of hunting down communists, so the CIA happily provided Hussein with a list of suspected communists and sympathizers, and then looked the other way while Hussein presided over mass killings at Qasr al-Nehayat, "The Palace of the End."

In the 1970's, the Ba'ath party began to focus on economic problems within Iraq and began to align itself with the Soviets as al-Qasim had done, much to the dismay of the US and UK. In 1972, al-Bakr and Hussein kicked out all of the US and UK oil companies that were draining away Iraq's wealth and nationalized the oil industry. They were the first nation in the middle east to successfully nationalize their oil outright. Iraq's revenues rose eight-fold over the next three years and then tripled over the next five years. These new profits were put toward 'capital development' projects and investments in education, health, transportation, agriculture and industry. Iraq rose quickly from a third-world nation to a nation with one of the highest standards of living in the world. The Iraqi people were profiting from Iraq's oil. The US and UK were not, and they were not happy about it.

I want to give you some idea of what happened when Iran nationalized its oil industry in the early 1950's. Iran's oil had long been controlled by the British. They "built the world's largest oil refinery at Abadan on the Persian Gulf and made huge profits there. Their Anglo-Iranian Oil company was supposed to be a partnership with Iran, but Iranians were not permitted to audit the books... Abadan was a colonial outpost, with swimming pools and tennis courts for the British administrators and slum housing for tens of thousands of Iranian workers. Buses, cinemas, and other amenities were reserved for the British." When Mohammed Mossadegh became Prime Minister in 1951, he tried to nationalize Iran's oil. Mossadegh was truly loved by the Iranian people. He had extremely high moral standards, was charismatic and intelligent, had a genuine love for his country, and refused to compromise when it came to the integrity of Iran. He would not stand by while the Iranian people suffered at the hands of the British. He firmly believed in freedom of the press and the rights of citizens to demonstrate, and was often moved to tears when he learned of injustice. The US and UK despised him.

To his credit, President Truman would not o.k. a coup against Mossadegh, but shortly after Eisenhower was elected, he gave the conspirators the green light. In 1953 the US sent in the CIA and provided hundreds of thousands of dollars to CIA operatives so that they could bribe Iranian street thugs and military traitors to participate in the overthrow. It was carried out by Kermit Roosevelt, grandson of Teddy Roosevelt (who, interestingly enough, was aided by General H. Norman Schwarzkopf, father of the Schwarzkopf who led US troops in the first Gulf War). The coup restored the Shah of Iran to power and for the next 25 years the Shah ruled Iran with an iron fist. The US and UK liked to refer to the Shah as a "benevolent dictator," but according to Amnesty International, the Shah was one of the worst human rights violators in the world. Did the US care about that? No. Does the US ever care about that? Only when it is convenient.

In 1979, the Shah was overthrown and the Islamic fundamentalist Ayatollah Khomeini came to power. It is no coincidence that revolutionaries carried portraits of Mossadegh through the streets when the Shah was chased out. They wanted revenge for the US-led coup in 1953. When Carter allowed the Shah to enter the US after he was chased out of Iran, Iranian radicals exploded in rage and responded by storming the American embassy in Tehran and holding 52 Americans hostage for over a year. There was a great deal of fear amongst Iranians that the US would try to put the Shah back in power, the way the US had done in 1953. Our actions in Iran directly gave rise to anti-western fundamentalism, and it isn't difficult to trace a line from the 1953 coup to the September 11th attacks. We reap what we sow.

I hope that little overview of modern Iranian history is helpful for you in understanding what lengths the US and UK will go to when Middle Eastern nations attempt to control their own resources. Now back to Iraq... In 1979, al-Bakr resigned and Hussein became president. For the next ten years, Iraq was mired in a long bloody war with Iran. Ayatollah Khomeini had called for Hussein's overthrow because the Iraqi government was too secular and "anti-Islamic." In 1980, the Iran/Iraq war officially began. In a strange line-up, Iran's allies were Syria, Libya, China, North Korea, and Israel. Iraq's allies were Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Egypt, Jordan, France, the Soviet Union, and the US. It seems odd that the US would suddenly jump into camp with Iraq, but there was no way we would support Khomeini. He was virulently anti-American and fostered Muslim extremism in Iran. Anyway, the US only appeared to be supporting Iraq, but in reality was supplying both sides with arms and information. The US wanted a protracted inconclusive war that would hurt both nations. In 1988, the UN mediated a cease-fire. There was no clear victor. The US instituted its "dual containment" strategy, which left Iran mostly untouched. I believe that the US decided that, at this point, Iraq was more vulnerable than Iran, and so would try to topple Hussein first.

Shortly after this, Iraq invaded Kuwait and the events described in an earlier section took place.

So throughout this brief history of Iraq, you can see how the US and UK continuously meddled in Iraqi affairs, supporting coups and taking revenge when Iraq denied us access to their resources. The government side of the US power structure was more concerned with the political aspects of intervention, mostly keeping the communists at bay and away from US markets, and the corporate side of the US power structure was more concerned with the commercial aspects of intervention, mostly making money from the sale of oil and weaponry. It is like a two-headed beast, each side has its own agenda, but they work in conjunction.

If you still don't think oil is enough of a reason for the US and its corporations to interfere with foreign governments and wreak havoc, consider what has happened in Nigeria recently.

*In May 1998, young non-violent protestors in Nigeria took issue with the fact that Chevron was polluting their land and water and had unfair labor policies. Chevron responded by using their private helicopters to fly in members of the Nigerian military, who fired on the protestors. Those who weren't killed were taken to jail where interrogation and torture took place. Chevron officials have admitted the protestors were unarmed, but refuses to take responsibility for the deaths. Chevron extracts over 400,000 barrels of oil per year from Nigeria.

*In December 1998, two thousand young people staged a non-violent demonstration in Nigeria to call attention to the destruction caused by oil operations. They led a procession of people through the streets, singing and dancing. The military (in partnership with Chevron) opened fire with rifles, machine guns and tear gas, imposed a curfew, banned meetings and set up roadblocks where residents were beaten and detained. Soldiers invaded homes, terrorized people with beatings, and raped women and girls.

*In January 1999, Chevron transported soldiers in helicopters and speedboats to two Nigerian communities where they fired indiscriminately at villagers. Innocent people were murdered, entire villages burned to the ground, livestock killed, and churches destroyed.

These things happen every day, all over the world. For what? For oil. Just oil. It is that important. If you'd like to learn more about the great lengths oil companies will go to in order to keep themselves in business, read a book called Savages by Joe Kane. It tells the story of the Huaorani of Ecuador, a native tribe on the verge of extinction, who have fought for years to keep oil developers off their land. These oil companies would destroy the Huaorani way of life, pollute their land and bribe or murder their leaders, just to gain enough oil to support US energy needs for 13 days.

Also, take some time to find out about the U'wa tribe in Colombia and their struggle against Occidental Oil. You may be interested to know that Al Gore's father sits on the board of Occidental and Gore's campaign was partially financed by oil money. I'm not partisan- most Democrats are just as bad as most Republicans. Money and power corrupt people across party lines, and when some of the richest corporations in the world spill innocent blood in their quest for oil, politicians who accept money for their political campaigns choose to look the other way.

For the US to keep up with current energy demands over the next 20 years, it will need to control the energy resources of Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Colombia and Venezuela. We know what's going on in the middle east, but what about in the Western Hemisphere? Every year the US sends billions of dollars in 'aid' and military hardware to Colombia in order to help the pro-IMF right-wing Colombian government fight its phony "drug war" against leftist guerrillas. Drug war? It's not about drugs. It's about controlling their resources and imposing our economic policies. What about Venezuela? In April of 2002, the CIA supported a failed coup to overthrow Hugo Chavez, Venezuela's democratically elected leader. US officials made premature statements in support of the right-wing businessman who declared himself Chavez's replacement, and they all looked pretty stupid a few days later when Chavez was back in power with the support of the people of Venezuela. Why does the US want Chavez out of power? The usual... he nationalized Venezuela's oil. Now, instead of 40 billion dollars a year going to Shell, British Petroleum (formerly known as the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company), and Standard Oil, the money is being used to lift ordinary Venezuelan people out of poverty. He is another Mossadegh, loved by ordinary people and hated by the rich, both in the US and in his own country.

There will always be Presidents like Chavez and Mossadegh and Allende who are true national leaders, who have their people's best interests at heart, and as long as those people get elected, the US will be right around the corner, waiting to take them down. The US government veered off course a long time ago, and is currently heading down a path that the world may not be able to recover from. The only way to "rid the world of evildoers" is to start right here at home. Some of the world's worst crimes have been committed by US corporations in collusion with the US government. The world has never seen an Empire as large and completely out of control as this one. The only way for Americans to avoid more terrorist attacks is to exercise what rights we still have left, and demand and end to US imperialism and profiteering at the expense of innocent people. When democratic channels close, the only way for people to be heard is to take to the streets. People are doing this all over the world, and they are doing it in almost every community in the US. You may not hear about them in the mainstream media, except in a dismissive or disparaging way, but they are dedicating their lives to the struggle for justice.

3. Global Domination

I believe this is a key reason why the US went to war when it did, particularly why it went to war without UN approval. The US intends to control the world with force. This isn't a surprise, since the move toward a Global Empire has been attempted by many nations throughout history. The surprising part is that the US now openly admits to it. The White House released the newest version of the National Security Strategy last September. Mixed in with flowery phrases about ridding the world of Evil and promoting Democracy, which is laughable if you look at the record of the US over the last 100 years and count the number of democratically elected leaders that were overthrown and replaced by US-friendly dictators, they've snuck in a few key strategies that totally go against international law. They wanted to make it clear with this invasion that they will not obey international treaties and will disregard the United Nations and anyone else who stands in the way of their foreign policy goals. The invasion of Iraq was the global 'debut' of this new strategy and it reveals the ugly side of US intervention.

This new National Security Strategy has little to do with Democracy and human rights. It mentions these things as a matter of course, mostly as a way to justify the rest of the rotten things they've snuck in there. They've declared they will act unilaterally. This means that if the rest of the world says that what we're doing is wrong, we're going to do it anyway. Now, if the Entire Rest of the World is condemning our actions, maybe (just maybe) we're doing the wrong thing. Do we really think that we're so much smarter than the rest of the world? Consider the fact that US citizens have the highest illiteracy rate of any industrialized nation in the world, and we work more hours for less money and fewer benefits than workers in Europe and Asia. Most Americans are too busy working to put food on the table and lack the tools needed to do the research that is necessary for making informed decisions. We are forced to rely on sound bytes from mainstream media, which is controlled by companies like Clear Channel that consistently censor information. Should we trust NBC and CBS, knowing that they are owned by General Electric and Westinghouse, two of the world's largest nuclear weapons manufacturers? In Iraq, they didn't want to let independent journalists in to report on what was happening. The ones who went anyway and refused to be 'imbedded' with the military were harassed and sometimes killed. They've admitted that journalists were being censored and the American people were not being shown the ugly truth about what was going on there.

Bush has said the US military will act pre-emptively, which doesn't just go against international and domestic law, it goes against common sense. It's like saying you're going to arrest and sentence someone before they commit a crime. That's illegal. You can't just assume someone is going to do something based on some 'secret information' you have, and then go ahead and punish them for it. In the case of Iraq, the US government tried to make the case that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and planned to use them against us. Iraq had been contained for over a decade and posed no new threat. There was no proof of WMDs, in fact all of the evidence indicated that the bulk of their weapons had been destroyed. UNSCOM inspectors were ready to clear Iraq in 1997, but then Richard Butler became Executive Director and began to manipulate the agency. If it had not been for this political shift in the agency, Iraq would have been officially cleared.

When imaginary WMDs weren't enough of a reason to satisfy the international community, the US switched tactics and instead of blaming them for something they hadn't done yet, they blamed them for something they had nothing to do with: the September 11th attacks. There is absolutely no connection between the Iraqi government and Al-Qaeda, there never was and there still isn't, but that didn't stop Bush from making that allegation in several of his public speeches. Unfortunately there are a lot of people who believe that if the President says it, it must be true, despite the fact that there was and is nothing to back it up. Most people are too busy working overtime and trying to pay their bills, so they don't have the tools or the time to do the research. If they did, they would know that acting 'pre-emptively' is not only illegal, it's immoral. The funny thing is, there are plenty of reasons why Hussein should have been removed from power, but all the horrible things he did were done with US support and approval. If we were to punish him for those things, we'd have to admit to our own complicity and accept the same punishment. Rather than admit our own role in his actual crimes, we invented other crimes that he may have committed in the future and then resolved to stop him before he committed them. Bizarre? Yes. Illegal? Yes. Consistent with US foreign policy? Absolutely.

Some people have said 'Well yes, we behaved rottenly in Iraq and we have a lot to make up for. We are guilty of so much, but now we have had a change of heart. Instead of behaving the way we did in the past in Iraq, the way we are still behaving elsewhere in the world, THIS TIME we are really there to help the average person.' This argument is made whenever there is US intervention, and there will be people who will believe it every single time. They do not want to confront the reality of what the US is actually doing. Even though we live in the Matrix, we have a choice. We can take the Blue Pill and believe the illusion, or we can take the Red Pill and accept some hard truths.

In this same National Security document, the US pledges to:

-Expand globalism ("free-trade") which means that US corporations can do whatever they want, wherever they want to do it, without regard to environmental standards or worker's rights.

-Give money to agribusiness, which means supporting large corporate farms while running small family farms out of business

-Support the biotech industry, the industry responsible for GMOs (genetically modified crops) that pollute naturally grown foods and have caused serious allergic reactions in people.

You may wonder why a security document would specifically address these economic issues, but it makes sense when you consider that we use our military primarily to back up our economic policies. Our military is almost never sent to a region that we have no economic interest in. The Marines, in particular, have been used in several countries to 'protect' US business interests. This was the case in the Dominican Republic and Nicaragua in the 1920's, and all over Latin America over the last hundred years. We want access to other markets, and if foreign governments don't go along with our economic program, we get rid of them, as we did with Salvador Allende in Chile, Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala, Mossadegh in Iran, etc. If that doesn't work, we "pry them open with a crowbar" as one US official has said, using agencies like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund which create modern slavery in the third world. These are just a few examples, and there are many many more. Our policies are clear: the world has to agree to follow our economic policies or else we send in the troops to force them to comply.

This show of military force was meant as a warning for the rest of the world. The US has openly declared itself the biggest bully in the world, it intends to use the spoils of its victories to keep it at the top of the heap, and it is using the same tactics that can be found on any playground: 'I want what you have so I'm taking it. I'm bigger and stronger than you and I'll knock your teeth out if you get in my way.' The fact that the US is now going back to the UN and asking for help doesn't mean that anything has changed. The US is doing just as it pleases, and basically only wants to spread the costs of the invasion around to other nations. Of course we want them to send peace-keeping troops; the US has always been better at starting wars than ending them. If getting other nations to clean up our mess means Colin Powell has to do a little ass-kissing, so what? It doesn't mean the US is going to let the UN have any real control over events in Iraq, and it doesn't mean the US won't do exactly as it pleases the next time it sees an opportunity.

Let me leave you with this quote: "To wash one's hands of the struggle between the powerful and the powerless is to side with the powerful, not to remain neutral." -Paolo Friere

Sources:
All the Shah's Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror by Stephen Kinzer
The Hidden Wars of Desert Storm (video: www.hiddenwars.org)
"Iraq's Unruly Century" by Jonathan Kandell, Smithsonian May 2001: Vol 14, No 2
The Murder of Allende by Rojas Sandford
Necessary Illusions by Noam Chomsky
Project Underground (information about Chevron and Nigeria- www.moles.org)
"Saddam Key in Early CIA Plot" by Richard Sale, United Press International, 4-16-03
The Sandino Affair by Neill Macaulay
"US Grand Strategy: Global Rule by Force" by Noam Chomsky (1-27-03, Audio Recording)
The US National Security Strategy, September 2002, published by the US Government
When the Borders Bleed: The Struggle of the Kurds by Ed Kashi