Critical flaw in neo-con military strategy

[teryang]

One thing I noticed right away about the assumptions underlying the radical new American pre-emptive strategy was that the military principle of safeguarding the lines of communcication in the Persian Gulf has been changed to a principle of seizing the natural resources at their source rather than merely protecting their movement in international commerce.

Of course this development in geo-political military strategy necessitates a certain neglect of the principle of national sovereignty. And such neglect is the cost of a mechantilist or neo-colonial strategy.

Herein lies the fault. We are a sea power. We thrive on commerce. This is why we defend the lines of communication world wide as necessary pre-requisite of international commerce. When one unjustifiably extends this principle to seize the land based lines of communication in foreign nations (referred to as infrastructure) against their will, one must be able to project sufficient land based power to secure it. We are not such a land based power. In fact, the neo-con myth of unchallengeable American military strength, simply and completely collapses at this point.

Not only are we incapable of securing Iraqi internal lines of communication, we can't even secure the road from the international airport to Baghdad. Thus, we have chosen a principle of military and political strategy that guarantees that we will fight on a battlefield where we are at a profound disadvantage. Someone needs to brush up on Sun Tzu and some pre-neo-con issues of Naval Proceedings.

The principle of national sovereignty is based upon the notion that internal security is provided by the nation state, not an empire, not a colonial occupier. The principle of international law has emerged after hundreds of years of conflict and is true, tried and tested. Radical extremist world domination theorists now occupying the executive office defied the time tested principle of national sovereignty and now we and our Armed Forces suffer the inevitable results.

How long can this truth be hidden? One of the corrollaries of the pre-emptive war strategy was that any military surprises be met with tactical nuclear responses. This too has failed as an insurance policy. No doubt the Iraqi resistance's effective response to American invasion and occupation comes as a "military surprise." Yet the nuclear response is completely irrelevant under the circumstances, just as it was in Korea and Vietnam.

[mhr]

1. There Is A Developing Policy Strategy That Defines The Use Of

Our military in terms of defending and extending globalization.

This doctrine states that the reason the US military budget is so large is because the globalized countries are willing to subsidize the US military by buying our debt, provided we protect the global economy and attendant corporations.

Further this doctrine defines the globalized world as the "Core" and the non-globalized world as the "Gap". The goal of global economic policy is to align third-world countries from the Gap with the Core.

As a means of last resort, the US military is the last line of defense to enforce this transformation.

The invasion and occupation of Iraq is now being justified within this framework. As an example of the importance that this rational is given inside the beltway, the Air Force is requiring every new Flag Officer to be briefed on this policy paradigm.

More about this policy can be learned here:

rtsp://cspanrm.fplive.net/cspan/project/ter/ter122004_barnett.rm

http://www.thomaspmbarnett.com/index.htm

http://www.nationalreview.com/books/owens200407131548.asp

[mhr]

2. Additionally - The Confessions Of An Economic Hit Man

illustrates how US Foreign policy has been shaped by global financial interests.

These interests essentially enslave third-world countries with debt which forces them to become aligned with the Core.

If the countries are unwilling to cooperate then the CIA is used for assassinations first, and the US military is the final option - all perfectly consistent with PM Barnett's thesis from post 1 above.

Interview with John Perkins aka Confessions of an Economic Hit Man

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/12/31/154...

http://play.rbn.com/?url=demnow/demnow/demand/2004/dec/...

http://www.archive.org/download/dn2004-1231/dn2004-1231...

[ComerPerro]

3. Good analysis, but I always figured that the neocon strategy

was to be at war as soon as possible and for as long as possible. That way, they can force Americans to support their twisted agendas at home and can drum up "wartime" support.

[punpirate]

4. All quite true...

... and something few are considering. Where most get confused is in trying to see a direct, obvious equivalency of what empire was in the past, and what the US is now doing. When they don't see it, they say, "oh, we're not an empire, then."

In the classic imperial model, countries such as Great Britain, as in the case of India, used trade and money to influence local governments which utilized India's own people to, in effect, subjugate themselves. All that was necessary, the British thought, from then on, was to have a rather small military force on hand to exert control over local governments and protect its own workers. It worked for some time. Overarching it all was a single dominant monopolistic corporation, the East India Company, which, through British licensing schemes was the primary conduit for extracted wealth.

The extraordinary difference, between then and now, is that the East India Company, with the agreement of the British monarchy and the Parliament (because they were making lots of money from this arrangement), had its own military. During the period from about 1750-1770, the East India Company became increasingly rapacious, and the number of uprisings increased, particularly during 1769-1770, when an extraordinary famine occurred in the area of Bengal.

Having decimated the wealth of Bengal, the East India Company suddenly started having problems with profits, because they were expending so much money on their own military to defend their operations, and because they had ruined the economy of western India. This got the attention of Parliament and the King. Hence, the Regulating Act of 1773, which effectively brought the East India Company in as a subsidiary of the government--subjecting it to government control, creating a Governor-General of India and allowing for the introduction of more troops to India to maintain order. (Interesting to note here that the second Governor-General of India was Cornwallis, beginning in 1784.) From the time of Cornwallis' tenure, Great Britain, through the East India Company, had adopted a plan to usurp control of India economically and militarily, province by province, known as the Permanent Settlement, but all still under the aegis of the East India Company. This situation continued until the Sepoy Rebellion of 1857. The East India Company dissolved in 1858, at which time Great Britain took full and complete control of India.

Today, the United States under Bush is attempting to turn that process inside-out and do it much more quickly--the neo-conservatives have always had one defining characteristic--urgency of purpose. But, it's still essentially the same process.

The first essential quality--military control of the population. Then, the East India Company's own defense forces used military advantage to exert control over local populations and to influence local governments, a bit at a time. Today, the US military is used to subjugate an entire country, at once, and to keep the lid on long enough to install a central government for the entire nation.

Second, instead of one umbrella monopolistic corporation taking control incrementally over time, acting with the tacit approval of its government, the US is installing a broad panoply of US corporations through a system of cronyism (which despite incessant talk of free trade, has effectively shut out competitors from the rest of the developed world). The seed money to do this is from the taxpayers, in much the same way as the Regulating Act of 1773 forced the British taxpayers to subsidize the East India Company when it could not be profitable without government intervention.

Third, British corporate forces, working province by province, systematically overthrew the sultans of Mysore, the Marathas and finally the Sikhs, thus consolidating control of the entire country. In each case, there were local uprisings and outright wars for government control and seizure of territory. The process was incremental, and the British took steady losses at each proposed advance. Every attempt to expand control resulted in insurgency. The US, however, chose to do the whole thing at once, in a hurry, and has met an insurgency which encompasses virtually the entire country, effectively melding individual provincial groups into one.

Thus has the US required many more troops and much more money to accomplish the same ends. Compressing the time period of events also compresses the expenditures, in blood and treasure, of the process.

Cheers.