[mobglob-discuss] Fwd: Halting U.S.-driven Armageddon - George Salzman

[Tom_Childs at Douglas.BC.CA]

Subscribers, 
Here's a strategy for you.  It will likely be one that we will work on and
be involved in for the rest of our lives.  A good read here from George
Salzman.    Salud comrados, Tom
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
  ----- Forwarded message: -----
Delivered-To: infoshop-news at flag.blackened.net
From: "Tom Wheeler" <twbounds at pop.mail.rcn.net>
To: "Infoshop" <infoshop-news at infoshop.org>
Subject: [Infoshop News] Call to stop the U.S. government's drive
                   for global domination
Date: Sat, 19 Oct 2002 09:52:14 -0400


http://site.www.umb.edu/faculty/salzman_g/Strategy/Discussion/2002-09-30Call
ToStopUS.html

Call to stop the U.S. government's drive for global domination

Introduction

There is a stark and critical difference between the vast majority of
American people and the United States government. It is the ruling
governmental clique, the cabal now in power, that is determined to pursue a
course of world domination. This cabal is driven by an unquenchable lust for
power, privilege and wealth, and, because of the collapse of the Soviet
Union, the apparent opportunity to rule the whole world. Ordinary American
people are not lusting for global empire. Our ambitions, like those of
ordinary people everywhere in the world, are to manage somehow to live
decent honest lives, to see our children and grandchildren able to thrive,
to be respected for what we are, and to live ordinary lives of dignity --
with their normal joys and inevitable sorrows -- among our families,
neighbors and acquaintances, lives of peace, friendship, and self-respect.

Americans are neither monsters nor fools, although many are very misinformed
by the ocean of propaganda of the corporate media and of the government.
Nevertheless, far more of us oppose the dictates of the ruling cabal than
the mass media reports. This was confirmed by a telephone poll of U.S.
senators' and representatives' offices reported on Pacifica Radio's
"Democracy Now" program on September 27, 2002. Calls, faxes, e-mails, and
letters to these legislative offices were overwhelmingly opposed to the U.S.
attacking Iraq, which the ruling clique is clearly intent on doing. This
rapidly growing overt popular opposition is being largely, probably
deliberately, ignored by the corporate mass media. Unfortunately we do not
determine U.S. government policy. The U.S. is in reality not a democracy.
It is a plutocracy, governed by money, by an oligarchy of the plutocrats. In
this sense it is not our government.

The ultimate goal of this call to action is to force the United States
government to give up both its imperial drive for world domination and its
role as universal enforcer of global capitalism. Determined, massive actions
by the American people and/or international sanctions that impose economic
isolation on the U.S. are probably the most effective means to do this. The
focus of this call is, however, limited to possible international sanctions.

Unless the nations of the world can be mobilized to stop the United States,
or we, the people of the United States, act decisively, the lives of
hundreds of millions -- or billions -- of people will continue being
dehumanized and destroyed, and the biosphere itself -- the source of all
life -- will continue to be ravaged. A brief list of possible international
actions is proposed in what follows. If a campaign to implement such actions
can be successfully initiated -- and that of course is the crucial
question -- if it can, then there are ample grounds for believing that the
goal will be achievable, not in the immediate future, but within a
generation. A livable, humane, sustainable world can be salvaged for future
generations.

Background

For almost a century now the United States has played a dual role as: 1) the
most aggressive and successful imperialist nation-state, and 2) the major
enforcer of world capitalism. The U. S. became the most powerful
nation-state in the world by the end of the First World War in 1918. It has
maintained its place as the world's most powerful economic center since that
time. With the formal collapse of the Soviet Union in December 1991 the
United States suddenly became indisputably not only the world's most
powerful military force but also the only superpower.

Assaults by the United States have never truly been against "Godless
Communism", never against "the plague of drugs", and are not now against
"international terror." U.S. military and economic attacks -- currently
increasing in intensity and ferocity -- have always been, and continue to be
an ongoing war of the giant capitalists, by the giant capitalists and for
the giant capitalists, an unending war against the poor people of the world
(including those in the United States) to further enrich the already
inordinately wealthy. This war -- and it is truly a war -- can be stopped
only by the American people or by refusal of the rest of the world to
continue supporting the American empire. This is a historic moment, because
the U.S. is currently the unchallenged towering force imposing the system of
global capitalism on the world.

The brazen arrogance of George W. Bush Jr. and his cabal in their
determination to lauch their next war against Iraq has brought world-wide
condemnation. We have heard unusually harsh judgements of the war plans from
Nelson Mandela, Kofi Annan, and Desmond Tutu, to mention only a few
prominent persons who usually offer their criticisms in the most
circumspect, diplomatic language. The thermometer that measures world rage
at the U.S. government's apparent blind determination to gain absolute
global domination at whatever the cost to the rest of the world is getting
to a high enough level to suggest the possibility of broad international
support for the campaign here envisioned.

The proposed campaign for sanctions against the United States

A successful global campaign to achieve the following actions, not just more
ineffective appeals and declarations, would ensure an immediate and
permanent end to all U.S. aggressions.

Diplomatic, juridical and military actions

1. The United Nations relocate its headquarters out of the northern
hemisphere to a suitable venue, perhaps to one of the most impoverished
nations in the world, certainly not to a so-called first world country.

2. Nations close U.S. embassies and consular offices in their territories.

3. Nations declare U.S. officials persona non grata and expel them.

4. Governments and international jurisdictions undertake massive indictments
and prosecutions of C.I.A., F.B.I., State Department, U.S. military, etc.
employees (present or former) who are or were engaged in promoting terrorist
activities by the U.S. government or by other governments or paramilitary
forces.

5. Nations deny use of their territory, territorial waters, and air space to
U.S. military forces, and insist that the U.S. immediately relinquish and
evacuate U.S. bases on their territory.

Economic Actions

6. Oil-exporting nations place a total ban on oil (and natural gas)
shipments to the U.S. and its colonies.

7. Nations close all branch offices of U.S. banks in their territories, and
freeze all assets of U.S.-based financial, industrial, and commercial
corporations in their territories.

8. Nations ban commercial activities with U.S.-based financial, industrial,
and commercial corporations.

Why such forceful actions are needed

Until now the American people have not had the will or ability to change the
disastrous course of the U.S. government. No single nation-state can act
against it without facing devastating U.S. economic and/or military attack.
Therefore, what is needed is that the rest of the world "walk away" from the
U.S. and isolate it. Its arrogant assumption of global hegemony should be
scorned and repudiated.

It is well past time to abandon the pseudo-measures one hears discussed:
supposed attempts to persuade the U.S. from attacking Iraq militarily, and
to pressure Israel to stop its U.S.-backed slaughter of innocent Palestinian
Arabs. Sharon, the Israeli prime minister, if not a tool of Washington, is
completely subservient to the U.S. and must dance to the tune Bush whistles.
Israel, a client nation-state, complies with any dictates from Washington.
Thus, as an example of a pseudo-measure, Germany's announcement (this past
winter or spring) that it would not sell any more arms to Israel was totally
ineffective. It did not even pretend to challenge the controlling power,
U.S.-based capital, on whose behalf the Bush cabal carries out its bloody
game! The idea of Germany voluntarily opening the market even wider to U.S.
arms manufacturers by withdrawing (temporarily) from the competition in the
sale of lethal weapons was a macabre joke!

Unless the American people rise up forcefully to oppose the U.S. government,
or enough of the world acts collectively by taking real actions (like those
listed above), all the wringing of hands, the appeals to the governing
politicians, the moral outrage, the massive demonstrations, the singing of
songs for peace, all the puppets and drumming and dancing and so on will be
for naught. The juggernaut will roll on, spilling ever more innocent blood
and savaging the biosphere, on a scale that is already utterly terrifying.
We are living (and many are perishing) in Armageddon, and our task must be
to put an end to this catastrophe.

Diplomatic, juridical and military actions in the proposed campaign

Action No. 1, United Nations relocation.

Moving the headquarters of the United Nations to the southern hemisphere
would have enormous symbolic importance. It would signify a total reversal
of perspective. Not only because the most publicized and obvious focus of UN
activity would shift to the southern hemisphere, but also because it would
impact on the functioning of the organization itself. Instead of UN
personnel living amidst the wealth and enjoying the personal privileges, the
rich selection of fine dining, museums, concerts, opera, art galleries,
theatre, libraries and universities, fancy expensive psychiatric treatment,
medical expertise, etc. that New York City offers them, they would live in
an environment that provided less diversion from the real misery in which
most of the world's people are forced to subsist. It ought to be their task
to focus more of their energies on ending that misery, and less on their
positions in the UN bureaucracy and their personal prestige within the
organization.

There is, in fact, no compelling reason why UN headquarters should be
maintained as a single centralized compound. It was, of course, set up that
way initially, and placed in its majestic palatial architectural structures
in New York City in order to give the United States major control over the
organization. Even there, however, most of the employees interact
face-to-face on a daily basis with only a small fraction of the personnel,
those who work in the same department. And with modern communication
technology it is entirely feasible to have different parts of the
organization working at geographically separate locations from one another.
It might be preferable to have various regional centers, for example one in
Africa, one in southern Asia, one in Latin America, one in the Middle East,
one in the western Pacific. Groups of nations in a given region might be
more truly united in their goals than is now the case for the entire UN,
because they face many of the same problems, which are somewhat different
than those faced by nations in other regions. Possibly it would be
preferable to have, for each region, its own secretariat, its own secretary
general, etc.

Actions Nos. 2 and 3, cutting diplomatic contacts.

Implementation of the call for nations to close U.S. embassies and consular
offices in their territories, and simultaneously to declare that U.S.
officials are persona non grata in their countries and must leave at once
would serve not only to isolate the United States diplomatically but also
would go a long way towards eliminating the enormous network of clandestine
terrorist activities that operate under so-called diplomatic cover. There is
every reason for nations to wish to prevent agents of the U.S. military, the
C.I.A., the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency, and other U.S. terrorist agencies,
among which is the state department itself, from operating in their
countries. It's interesting to note that Cuba, a nation long targeted by the
U.S., recently considered closing the U.S. Interests office in Havana. That
proxy office for a U.S. embassy, if closed, would of course automatically
eliminate any diplomatic privileges accorded to the personnel it now
harbors.

Action No. 4, extending juridical accountability.

The call upon governments and international jurisdictions to indict and
prosecute C.I.A., F.B.I., State Department, U.S. military, etc. employees
(present or former) who are or were engaged in promoting terrorist
activities by the U.S. government or by other governments or paramilitary
forces, simply advocates broadening the scope of international legal
accountability to include all U.S. government agents involved in terrorist
activities. Precedents for individual accountability are numerous, including
the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals, the trials in Israeli courts of
individuals involved in crimes against humanity, the trial in a special
tribunal of Slobodan Milosevich, and others. In opposition to the United
States, the United Nations recently established a permanent Internation
Court of Justice, convincing evidence that there exists widespread, almost
universal international support for supernational accountability for the
most horrendous crimes.

One of the most publicized and notorious of U.S. war criminals, Henry
Kissinger, has been indicted in the Chilean courts and is being pressed by
several suits to such an extent that his ability to travel has been
impaired. Although still protected by the arrogant government he served, his
guilt of unpardonable crimes, as that of Pinochet, is not in doubt in world
opinion. Of course these two are only the tip of the iceberg. Bill Clinton
and George Bush Senior, the latter along with his son, are right up there
too. The roster of the guilty is vast. They should all be held accountable.

Action No. 5, refusing military access.

Denying the U.S. any military presence on national territory, territorial
waters or air space, is one of the most effective actions that nations can
take. U.S. military power is established not only by "Fortress America", the
over-militarized homeland, but by the existence of numerous installations
throughout the world. The ability of the U.S. to prepare and mount attacks
against other countries relies, to a great extent, on its ability to deploy
troops and war equipment to this vast network of "off-shore" facilities:
airfields, storage depots, port facilities and so on, comprising a huge,
aggressive military infrastructure on other nations' land and territorial
waters, and at times utilizing their air space, all of which are parts of
the supposedly sovereign domains of these nations.

Precedents already exist for denying the U.S. use of sovereign territories
by other nations. Venezuela, targetted by the U.S. with a coup intended to
overthrow its popular, democratic government, does not allow U.S. use of its
territory for the war against the insurgency in neighboring Colombia. It
remains an open question whether Saudi Arabia would allow the U.S. to use
its territory to attack Iraq. Clearly, U.S. military operations based in
China are unthinkable; they would not be allowed. Many other nations would
likewise not permit U.S. military in their territories or air space. Every
nation that truly wants to contribute to ending U.S. imposition of global
terror should likewise deny any use of its territory to the U.S. armed
forces.

Economic actions in the proposed campaign

Action No. 6, fossil fuel embargo.

The oil and gas embargo would likely be the most immediately effective
action of all those listed. However, it is unlikely to be the first action
to be implemented, for several reasons. A cutoff of all petroleum (crude and
refined), and natural gas shipments to the U.S. and its colonies would force
a mammoth change in the U.S. economy. Nothing is more basic to the operation
of a contemporary industrialized economy than fossil fuel. The most
profligate use of fossil fuel is by the United States. The entire U.S.
physical infrastructure has been built, and the culture of being wasteful of
energy, as of all other resources has been cultivated, to an extent that
makes it almost impossible for people in the U.S. to think rationally about
how to secure a sustainable social order. The sole "solution", and it is
only a pseudo, short-term solution, that is conceived is to gain control of
the world's rapidly dwindling oil and gas reserves in the Middle East, in
Latin America and Canada, in the Caspian Sea region, and so on. Control is
secured by force: economically and militarily, brutally and unmercifully as
U.S. power is extended to every corner of the globe. It is a mammoth thrust
against any possibility of having a civilized world, a truly barbarian
onslaught.

Because of the towering dependence of the U.S. on fossil fuel imports, a
severe cutoff would be tantamount to a body blow to its entire culture.
Energy use consideration would have to become a top issue on the national
agenda. Even those who now are in control in the U.S. would be forced to
think of something else than their own short- and long-term profits and lust
for power. It would become, overnight, a radically different "ball game." A
dream? Yes, of course it's a dream. A dream of a world in which no children
would be born to face lives of slavery, of torture, of terror, of premature
death from preventable or easily treatable diseases, of being murdered
because they want human dignity. But it is more than that. It is a dream
that extends not only to the immediate generations to come, but to all
generations until the end of time. And it is even more than that. Because
if it is not realized, if global capitalism, spearheaded by the U.S. is not
halted, the inevitable, unique outcome will be the utter destruction of our
world, and quite possibly of all forms of so-called highly evolved animal
species.

Impact on the rest of the world of a fossil-fuel cutoff to the United States

The foremost consideration must be preventing U.S. military attack on
participating nations. It is clear that the U.S. rulers will see a
developing economic boycott as an act of war, and their first impulse will
be to destroy the perpetrators. That is the main reason why cutting off
fossil fuel exports to the U.S. cannot be safely undertaken until a
substantially unified group of petroleum- and gas-exporting nations is
prepared to act in unison. It is not essential that the group include all,
or even most of the world's exporters, but it is crucial that the group be
large enough, and rich enough in combined natural resources to stand on its
own feet, apart from the U.S., and to make its own way in the world. That
world will continue for some time to be one of primarily capitalist economic
relations.

I previously advocated such unified "break away" action for Latin America
(see
http://site.www.umb.edu/faculty/salzman_g/Mexico/Essays-G/LetterToFox.html

which would qualify on all three counts: a population of over half a billion
people, enormous natural resources, and a widespread desire among the bulk
of the population to halt U.S.-led destruction of their national patrimonies
and the dignity of their shared Latin American cultures and lives. If a high
degree of unification were achieved among the nations of Latin America, with
pacts of mutual aid and strengthened economic relations, and the strong
sense of polarization between the U.S. and Latin America continues to
develop, then the U.S. would be strongly inhibited from attacking any one of
the Latin American nations, because the result would be to further isolate
it and to strengthen the unity of the entire bloc opposing its dominance.
Moreover, with such a development among the Latin American nations, there
would be a strong incentive for nations in other continents, who also suffer
from U.S. dominance, to affiliate themselves with the group and to enter
into treaties of mutual aid with Latin American nations, and with one
another.

Quite apart from warding off a military attack from the United States, a
move to isolate the U.S. economically, even by imposing "only" an oil and
gas embargo, would have an enormous economic impact on all the countries
that trade with the U.S. Because of the lopsided world economy, and the
monetary pressures of the international financial institutions, dominated by
the U.S., much production in Latin America is currently for export to the
rich countries. For example, Mexico's major trading partner is the United
States. Production now exported to the U.S. would have to be redirected to
other trading partners, consumed internally, or replaced by production of
more useful products. And all the essential imports from the U.S. would have
to be replaced either by imports from other countries or by producing them
internally.

Replacing the lopsided world economy (global capitalism) with an economy
oriented towards mutual aid is of the greatest importance. Both the
imposition of poverty upon billions of people and the destruction of the
biosphere are direct results of the need for the capitalist system to
produce profits, which it can do only by exploiting human labor and the
resources of the natural world. The nations of Latin America (as well as all
the world's nations) ought, as a highest priority, become food
self-sufficient.

The benefits to be gained from moving in this direction are manifold,
particularly if the mode of agriculture shifts, as it should for the best
results, away from agribusiness geared to distant consumption towards
smaller-scale local cultivation geared to local consumption. Adequate
nutrition and freedom from chemical pollution of foods are possible with
largely organic methods. Attention to soil enrichment with non-agrochemical
inputs such as manures and vegetable wastes will also help to reverse soil
loss and erosion. Reforestation also ought to be a major objective.

Rebuilding ecological communities and human communities naturally go
together. But the challenge here is enormous. To meet it in Latin America
would take the energies, imaginations, planning, mutual education and
communal wills of these half-a-billion-plus people. The effort needed is
gargantuan, but not from any one person. And the goal, to avoid the
Argentinization of all of Latin America, indeed of all the world, and to
unshackle ourselves from global capitalism and U.S. imperialism is truly a
civilizational project. It would involve not only revolutionary political
and economic changes, but also freeing ourselves from dependence on fossil
fuels, and in fact, to a substantial extent from near-total reliance on
mechanical energy forms, shifting instead to greater use of metabolic
energy, both human and animal. Bicycles instead of automobiles!

As acknowledged earlier, a cutoff of oil and gas to the United States,
although it would be the most dramatic and forceful act possible, is
unlikely to be the first of the proposed actions. It's interesting to note,
however, that Iraq, which had already been targetted by the U.S. shortly
after September 11, 2001, imposed an oil embargo in response to the
U.S.-supported assault of the Israeli government on the Palestinians, but
gave it up after one month when it failed to gain support from other
oil-exporting nations. Calls for an oil embargo in other Middle East nations
whose peoples were outraged at Israel's attacks were ignored by those
governments.

Actions Nos. 7 and 8, other proposed economic sanctions.

These proposed actions aimed at preventing U.S.-based financial, industrial
and commercial activities outside the U.S. are, like the proposed fossil
fuel embargo, unlikely to be implemented at an early stage. However,
imposition of these sanctions would also strike enormous blows to the U.S.
economy, and their imposition deserves to be strongly advocated throughout
the international arena.

Conclusion. The magnitude and long-duration of the required effort

Halting the U.S.-driven Armageddon will be a formidable, long-time effort.
We should have no illusions that it can be done rapidly. But if we, the
world's people, do not stop the U.S., the world will be faced with an
endless series of almost unimaginable horrors, as we have been since the end
of World War II. So how do we begin? Most governments will not immediately
implement such drastic but effective measures as those listed above.
Everywhere (with very few exceptions -- Cuba, Venezuela, maybe eventually
Argentina, hopefully at some point Brazil and Chile) the servile politicians
and ruling class forces are plainly in commanding positions and simply 'on
the wrong side'. They are in favor of capitalism, of their own power, and of
corruption to benefit themselves and their cronies, at whatever the cost to
other people and the biosphere. The forces of the wealthy and privileged
=E9lites, with few exceptions, will not rise to a moral and rational
imperative. Only the great majority of the world's people, most of whom are
poor in terms of money, can be counted on to be the driving force to compel
the U.S. (and the corporations for which it stands) to abandon its endless
war.

Although we cannot expect most governments to act by imposing sanctions
against the U.S. in the immediate future, some might acquiesce to forceful
popular demands of their citizens and adopt some sanctions. Others might be
compelled by workers in their petroleum industries to agree to boycott
fossil fuel exports to the U.S. We should remember the power of the working
people. We should remember that the Shah of Iran, the local darling of the
U.S., installed by the C.I.A. when it overthrew the elected government of
Mossadegh and as faithful to the master as any lap dog, was finally removed
by the concerted actions of the Iranian people, among whom the oil workers
played a crucial role.

Let's start organizing and propagandizing for real, forceful actions. Among
other effects, the impact, on the ruling class of the U.S., of a widespread
international effort to begin sanctions could be far greater than even a
million people going to Washington and calling upon the rulers to change
course. But we should not count on influencing the U.S. ruling class.
Rather, we should focus on allying our efforts with those of poor people
everywhere, including those in the United States. The poor people of
Venezuela might be the first to support joining anti-U.S. sanctions, in view
of U.S. efforts to bring down their own elected, very popular government.
Venezuela is one of the many countries being attacked by the United States
for the benefit of global capitalism. We can of course expect immediate and
widespread popular support for sanctions throughout the Middle East and
Central Asia, and in most of Latin America and much of Africa.

The urgency of stopping the assault of global capitalism on the world's
peoples and on the biosphere is so great that drastic measures are needed.
The attack is headed by the United States, which must be stopped.

George Salzman, September 30, 2002

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Tom Childs - Audio/Visual Resources
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     "There's no way to delay, that trouble comin' everyday."
	  				--Frank Zappa