The current worldwide financial and economic crisis that started in the
U.S. reflects the turmoil global capitalism has been in since 2008.
Previously, the U.S. had been able to export the crises generated by
capitalist
production relations to other countries, while the U.S. remained relatively
immune to their devastating effects on populations around the world. However,
the injection in the production process of new technologies built around
electronics ultimately made it less certain that the U.S. could continue to
escape economic devastation. The recent instability in the heart of global
capitalism is proof that it is no longer possible for the U.S. to do so.
The current economic crisis has been a long time in the making. It is a
consequence of replacing human labor with computer-based production (robotics
and such). The more human labor is removed from the production process the
less demand is generated as workers can no longer pay for the goods
produced. This explains why the capitalists engineered various financial
instruments to extend credit in order to boost the demand for goods, while at
the
same time creating the fiction of a world of abundance, at least in the U.S.
Meanwhile, poverty increased in relative and absolute terms across the
globe, the U.S. included. The bubble of economic prosperity had its day of
reckoning when it was no longer possible to conceal the fact that this
prosperity was illusory, built on what were essentially Ponzi schemes that had
no
backing in real production.
What exacerbated the problem was the way in which the federal government
intervened to save the capitalists and their system. Both the G. W. Bush and
Barack Obama administrations bailed out the big banks and other financial
institutions. This led to an increase in the already high national debt
without significantly helping bail out the working class and low- and
middle-income people generally. The U.S. capitalists claimed that the policies
they
implemented through the capitalist State were to put the economy and
society back on the prosperity track. However, the main reason the capitalists
engineered those bailouts was to recover profits, while giving them time to
figure out a way to stabilize private property relations and the dominance
of the ruling class over politics and society.
The increasing use of electronic technology in production has resulted in
more permanent layoffs, led to shrinking demand, and made the capitalist
crisis ever more intolerable. More workers are being left out in the cold,
with no place for them in a shrinking economy. The imperative for capitalist
expansion has become even more urgent at a time when other middle capitalist
powers (such as the BRIC countries, Brazil, Russia, India, and China) are
expanding or struggling to maintain their share in the global market. In
such a climate of crisis, the war danger is becoming more pronounced,
especially when the U.S. is armed to the teeth and has no compunction about
maintaining its dominance through the use of force.
The Middle East in U.S. Geopolitical Strategy
It is clear, therefore, that U.S. global strategy is tied to its political
economy. The U.S. ruling class has sought to dominate global capital
unilaterally and prevent competitors from developing a serious threat to the
U.S. global economic and military position. Since the fall of the Eastern Bloc
and the USSR soon thereafter, the U.S. has increasingly perceived the
European Union, China, and India as potential threats to U.S. global
domination.
In this regard, the U.S. strategy has been to divide and conquer: seek
more cooperation with India in preparation for a potential showdown with
China.
The Middle East is critical to this vision of maintaining dominance while
expanding. Oil is essential for economic activity. Denying competitors easy
access to Middle Eastern and Central Asian oil (not to mention Venezuelan
and African oil) is of utmost importance to US geopolitical strategy. A
weaker Russian federation (both economically and militarily) is also crucial
to
U.S. interests. The U.S. has worked hard to establish military bases in
Central Asia for that purpose, as well as to improve its strategic military
position in relation to China.
Israel has been a strategic ally of the U.S. in the Middle East region
since at least 1967. Since the 1991 Madrid peace conference, which came on the
heels of the U.S. war in the Persian Gulf, U.S. strategy concentrated on
improving its already favorable position in the area, both politically and
militarily, by seeking peace agreements between Israel and individual Arab
states. That process accelerated after the 1993 Oslo Accords. Arab states
seized the opportunity to meet with Israeli representatives since the
Palestinians were portrayed as being on the verge of entering into a peace
agreement with Israel on the basis of the Oslo Accords. Arab states had hoped
to
end the Arab-Israeli conflict and generate stability in the region. For those
states, peace agreements with the Zionist regime have been the sine qua
non for their unhindered participation in global capitalism.
It appeared as though, to a large degree, things had been developing as the
U.S. intended. The U.S. had essentially secured Iraqi oil, the second
largest oil reserves in the world, through the 2003 invasion of the country,
while Israel had contained the Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and
Gaza. The next thing to do was to work for an agreement between the
Palestinians and Israelis that would open the door for Israel to the rest of
the Arab
world through peace treaties. This would improve Israel's position both
militarily and economically and perhaps become dominant in the region,
something that would be favorable to U.S. interests.
U.S. Actions Fuel Animosity in Region
However, the consequences of U.S. actions in the region and its support for
Israel were the creation of a ground swell of animosity toward the U.S.
U.S. policy in Iraq was so myopic that instead of stabilizing the country
the security situation quickly deteriorated and in a relatively short time
the resistance against the U.S. occupation multiplied. The 2007 surge in
troops was touted as a successful strategy to bring stability to Iraq, but the
security situation remained tenuous and the political situation untenable,
as witnessed in the current political crisis in which Iraq is still
without a government six months after the March 2010 Parliamentary elections.
While the U.S. withdrew most of its troops by the end of August 2010, there
are still 50,000 US troops, thousands of mercenaries (private contractors),
and a huge diplomatic and intelligence presence in the country.
The ratcheting up of US pressure on Iran to terminate its nuclear program
has raised the stakes for a wider regional conflict. Through the directive
called the Joint Unconventional Warfare Task Force Executive Order, signed
September 30, 2009, the military has sanctioned an unprecedented expansion
of covert military activity throughout the world and particularly the Middle
East region, including the insertion of secret operations units to enter
Iran to gather information for a future military operations. ("U.S. Is Said
to Expand Secret Actions in Mideast,” New York Times, May 24, 2010).
Israel's repression of the Palestinian population in the occupied
territories and its actions in the region have exacerbated the animosity felt
against the U.S. in the Middle East.
The Hizbollah attack on Israeli soldiers and the taking of two Israeli
soldiers prisoners on July 12, 2006 unleashed Israeli terror across Lebanon.
Despite the devastation it caused, Israel failed to dislodge or destroy
Hizbollah. Further, in preparation for disarming and rendering Hizbollah
useless
as a fighting force with political presence in Lebanon, Israel was unable
to isolate it from the Lebanese population. Similarly, despite its
devastating attack on Gaza in December 2008 and January 2009, Israel failed to
remove Hamas from power.
The recent meeting between Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and
President of the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) Mahmoud Abbas in
Washington, D.C. not withstanding, Israel continues with its plans. It is
continuing to build more colonies (euphemistically called "settlements" in the
occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, with the expressed intention of
remaining permanently in the Jordan Valley and unilaterally (i.e. without
negotiations) imposing a fait accompli on the PNA, and, as the recent
comments of Israeli Brig-Gen. Eyal Eisenberg indicate, destroying Hamas as an
effective force. ("Outgoing Gaza Division commander: Next War Will be Harsh",
Ynet News Online, September 24, 2010; Tanya Reinhart, Israel/Palestine:
How to End the War of 1948, 2005)
These developments bode ill for the situation in Iran, Iraq, and the
Palestinian occupied territories (the West bank and the Gaza Strip). But they
also indicate that the U.S. will occupy Iraq and remain engaged in the region
for a long time to come.
The U.S. has expanded the war to Pakistan beginning with G. W. Bush, and
Barack Obama has escalated the war in Afghanistan. These developments are
further proof that the U.S. capitalists are prepared to use war to save global
capitalism and maintain their dominance over it. The long history of U.S.
involvement in the Middle East after WWII and its direct engagement in the
region since 1967 (and more recently since Desert Shield in 1990)
demonstrate the centrality of the Middle East to U.S. global strategy.
Resisting Empire
All these machinations by the U.S. and some of its allies to save global
capitalism have generated significant resistance globally. That resistance
has followed three main trajectories: (1) the social democratic regimes
(anti-imperialist but not necessarily anti-capitalist) in Latin America
(Venezuela, Bolivia, and Ecuador are examples); (2) anti-globalization
grassroots
organizations (anti-capitalist but essentially unorganized given the huge
task ahead of them), primarily represented through the World Social Forum
and U.S. Social Forum; and (3) resistance movements in the Middle East
(primarily nationalist or Islamist, which implies that they are not
anti-capitalist, even though they are anti-imperialist). (For more on this, see
Ibrahim
G. Aoude, "Global Shifts, the Imperial Project and Resistance in West Asia,”
paper presented at the World Congress for Middle East Studies, Barcelona,
Spain, July 2010).
In the Middle East resistance to the imperial project has taken multiple
forms: working within the system while engaging in civil disobedience (Egypt
is a prime example); armed resistance against Israel while engaging in the
political process as an effective political force (Hizbollah in Lebanon);
maintaining armed resistance under siege conditions (Hamas in Gaza); and
armed Nationalist and Islamist resistance forces that engage in the political
process (Iraq). All these movements have been able to survive because of
their deep roots in their respective populations.
So it has been the resistance to U.S. (and Israeli) occupation in the
region that has thus far played a crucial role in frustrating the realization
of
U.S. strategic goals in the region despite the devastation. Resistance in
the Middle East has been critical to frustrating U.S. strategic goals on a
global scale as well.
But this diverse and growing resistance lacks a vision of building
cooperative societies as part of a global system that could meet the needs of
humanity.
Tasks of the Revolutionaries
The tasks of the revolutionaries are rather clear: recognizing the war
danger and its origins and the role of the U.S. in global capitalism, it
becomes critical to see the relationship between the domestic and
international
policies the U.S. is following. The need to impart that realization to
workers in political motion is paramount. Rallying the social forces that have
no or little stake in the capitalist system would be the first step in
organizing to defeat a vicious capitalist system that has perpetrated crimes
against all of humanity.
November.2010.Vol20.Ed6 This article originated in Rally, Comrades! P.O.
Box 477113 Chicago, IL 60647 _rally@lrna.org_ (mailto:ra...@lrna.org) Free
to reproduce unless otherwise marked. Please include this message with any
reproduction.
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