>>>Ah, folks, it's been about three years since I posted those articles from
the Wash DC Post on the Caspian Oil scamble. NOW, read this. This is a
different kind of "slick". A<>E<>R <<<
>From www.antiwar.com/justin/cheney.html
Behind the Headlines
by Justin Raimondo
Special Edition: July 25, 2000
Dick Cheney and Bush's Other Warmongers
Dick Cheney's ascension to the number two spot on the Republican ticket tells
us much about the kind of foreign policy we can come to expect if Dubya makes
it to the White House. To begin with, it means that the US will be in the
Balkans forever. As CEO of the Halliburton Company, Cheney was among the chief
profiteers of the Kosovo war: Brown & Root, a Houston subsidiary of
Halliburton, was awarded the engineering contract to house, feed, and otherwise
amuse the US "peacekeepers" plonked down in the middle of that quagmire.
But engineering is just a sideline for Halliburton, which is primarily a
company that provides services and infrastructure for oil extraction
operations. Hallliburton's interest in the oil fields of the Caucasus cast
Cheney in the role of a lobbyist, angling for the repeal of legislation that
forbids foreign aid to undemocratic regimes. The government of Azerbaijan,
ruled by an ex-Stalinist despot, has long sought to get on the foreign aid
gravy train, and Cheney has been one of their chief advocates: with
Halliburton's man in the VP's mansion, this will no longer be a problem � and
the door to US intervention in the region will swing wide open. The Bush Team
is sure to go marching through.
Many Republicans hope that the incoming Bush administration � and that's an
assumption that may be very transitory � will pull troops out of the Balkans,
and start to pull back from our global commitments � which multiplied beyond
all reason during the Clinton interregnum. The elevation of Cheney should strip
loyal GOPers of their illusions.
DUBYA DUBYA DUBYA DOT WARMONGER DOT COM
Divining the foreign policy positions of George "Dubya" Bush, the Republican
"frontrunner," based on his own statements, is an impossible task � since those
statements are so few and far between that, taken together, they amount to no
more than a few sentences. And these are not exactly oracular words of wisdom
but vague sentiments that do not easily translate into policy. What does
translate into policy, however, is his choice of foreign policy advisors � and
the news is not good.
DUBYA'S POTEMKIN VILLAGE
The three foreign policy mavens always mentioned in news stories about Dubya's
shadow Cabinet are: Condoleeza Rice, Paul Wolfowitz, and Dick Cheney. Ms. Rice,
former Stanford University provost and a low-level advisor to Dubya's father,
is often cited as the chief of this policy group, a future Secretary of State �
but this is the story being told by the Bushies, and it doesn't quite add up.
Like everything else in the Bush campaign, the foreign policy "team" assembled
by the candidate and his campaign staff has all the earmarks of a classic
Potemkin village � a phony fa�ade put up to impress those who don't bother
looking too closely. Well, then, let's look a little more closely at the
Bushies' answer to Mad Madeleine.
ALL IN THE FAMILY
Rice started out as a music major at Stanford but almost flunked out, whereupon
she switched to Soviet studies. Rice became interested in her specialty of
Soviet studies as a student of Joseph Korbel, the father of Secretary of State
Madeleine Albright. Now there is an interesting coincidence, one that
underscores the inbred nature of the foreign policy-making elite: how different
from Mad Madeleine will Secretary of State Rice turn out to be? Two years from
today will we be calling her Crazy Condoleeza?
HISTORY OF A MEDIOCRITY
Having found her niche, Ms. Rice was quickly taken in hand by the Hoover
Institution, a redoubt of the George Shultz/Bechtel wing of the Republican
foreign policy elite, where she rose quickly through the ranks. As the sole
person of color, and a female to boot, in an administration devoted to
"affirmative access" (if not action), her visibility was high. But there is
nothing in Rice's resume to suggest that she is the heavyweight the Bushies are
describing. The apex of her academic career was reached with the 1984
publication of her magnum opus, The Soviet Union and the Czechoslovak Army,
1948-1983 : Uncertain Allegiance, a dissertation no more indicative of her
capabilities as a future Secretary of State than her more recent unimpressive
contribution to an anthology on German reunification.
WHAT GIVES?
In the first Bush administration Ms. Rice was the author of no known policy
initiatives, and in the interim her career as provost at Stanford has not
exactly catapulted her into the international spotlight. So what gives? How can
we explain this strange gap between Rice's real achievements and the grandiose
future planned for her by Bush campaign operatives?
THE RACE FACTOR
It is probably unkind, and no doubt a hate crime, to call attention not only to
Ms. Rice's curious lack of qualifications but also to her race � to the
likelihood that she is an affirmative action "front." In the same way that many
companies nowadays get government contracts under affirmative action rules,
with a bunch of white guys getting blacks (or whomever) to front for them, so
it works the same way in politics, where identity politics and "diversity" are
the political coin of the realm. The disparity between Rice's resume and her
projected status in Dubya's administration is otherwise inexplicable. In an age
where political correctness has even infected the Republican Party, race is
always a key factor, not only in getting Ms. Rice where she is, but where �
perhaps � she is going.
SELLING WAR TO MINORITIES
The great advantage of having an African American Secretary of State, who would
forevermore be known as the First Black Secretary of State, is that it will
help sell interventionism among American blacks and other minorities of color.
Polls show that blacks are among the most skeptical when it comes to overseas
intervention, generally agreeing with the proposition that we ought to take
care of our problems right here at home. A black Secretary of State would help
an administration hard-pressed to sell a war for oil in the far-off
Transcaucus, or a Vietnam-style intervention against Colombian "narco-
terrorists." Another big factor is motivating the troops, what with blacks and
other minorities now making up a majority of the military rank-and-file.
BEHIND THE FACADE
But if Ms. Rice is a front, then who or what is she fronting for? Who or what
is behind the Potemkin village fa�ade of George Dubya's foreign policy task
force? The other two members of the team, former Secretary of Defense Dick
Cheney and Paul Wolfowitz, make up the two major components of the Bushian
foreign policy coalition: Big Oil and the neoconservative/Weekly Standard wing
of the GOP. While the goals of the former are relatively coherent, and well-
known � the desire for profits is universal and easily understood � the obscure
ideological motivations of that exotic sect known as the neocons is not so
easily or succinctly explained.
NEOCON POINT MAN
For those interested in a detailed explanation, I refer you to my 1993 book,
Reclaiming the American Right: The Lost Legacy of the Conservative Movement,
which traces in detail the evolution of this obscure sect from far Left to the
ostensible Right. Suffice to say here that these Cold Warriors in search of a
new enemy, have now fixated on China, and Wolfowitz, Dean of the Paul Nitze
School of Advanced International Studies, Assistant Secretary of State for East
Asian and Pacific Affairs under President Reagan, and undersecretary of Defense
in the Bush administration, is their ideological point man. If there is a war,
anywhere at any time, that Paul Wolfowitz has opposed: if there is a single
concession he ever endorsed, even one instance where he speculated that any
degree of mutual disarmament or easing of tensions ought to take precedence
over military action and preparations for war, then it has gone unrecorded. His
emergence as the policy guru on George Dubya's team signals the complete
takeover of the Bush campaign by the War Party.
THE HATE CHINA LOBBY
More specifically, Wolfowitz represents that wing of the War Party that is
focused on the alleged "threat" of China. For Wolfowitz, a former U.S.
ambassador to Indonesia, is convinced that the locus of power is shifting
definitively in the direction of Asia. With the freeing up of the Chinese
economy, and the growth of Asian markets in general, sheer numbers, he avers,
will soon point to the possibility of Asian hegemony in the world. He compares
21st century China to 19th century Germany, and speculates that Chinese
nationalism spurred on by national resentment over past wrongs will spur
Chinese belligerence. He warns that those who ignore the Yellow Peril are in
danger of making the mistake of Neville Chamberlain whom "lamented that his
countrymen were preparing bomb shelters because of 'a quarrel among faraway
peoples about whom we know nothing.' Of course, that attitude of Chamberlain's
led to a terrible war that could have been prevented, a war that Winston
Churchill called 'The Unnecessary War.'"
THE CONFERENCE OF CONSERVATIVE ANGLOPHILES
All these references to Great Britain, and particularly Wolfowitz's World War
II analogy, were meant as crowd-pleasers, for this was said in a speech to the
Atlanticist Initiative, the "conservative" equivalent of the old "Union Now"
movement of Clarence Straits. Just as the Union Now organization used to push
for a formal merger of the US and Great Britain, so the new "Atlanticists" are
the chief spokesmen for the cohesion of American and British foreign policy �
with the latter invariably taking the lead and stiffening the spine of the
often reluctant Uncle Sam. The spirit of this conference of prominent American
conservatives, and their special relationship to the Mother Country, was
symbolized by the featured speaker, Lady Thatcher, that icon of right-wing
Anglophilia. It was, in short, a meeting of the Anglophile Caucus of the War
Party, convened to discuss their relevance in the post-Cold War world.
Wolfowitz's message to them was simple and direct: the end of the Cold War does
not and cannot mean peace. War, war, and more war � that is the inevitable
albeit tragic fate of the human race, and we had better prepare for it.
THE THIRD WORLD WAR
In an extraordinarily revealing attack on Francis Fukuyama, Wolfowitz attacked
the idea that we are in an era of peace, openly ridiculing the thesis that we
are at "the end of history," and comparing the present era to the prewar years
of 1917 and the 1930s. War is not only probable, but also imminent, and we must
prepare. The role of the NATO alliance is key: to make sure that Russia stays
out of Central Asia. To underscore the seriousness of the alleged threat from
China, he even raises the possibility of a Russo-American alliance against
Beijing. Of course, this is all discussed in the manner of the value-free
"scientist" examining the unfolding of historical trends, but the policy
implications are clear and ominous enough.
NEOCONS FOR KOSOVO
As a staunch member in good standing of the neocon foreign policy brain trust,
Wolfowitz was naturally a cheerleader in Clinton's war against the Serbian
people. He was early on associated with the Balkan war lobby, notably the
Balkan Institute and the Balkan Action Council, both funded in large part by
George Soros. He signed two newspaper ads run by the neocons in the New York
Times: one full-pager calling for extended and massive intervention early on
[September 20, 1998], and another criticizing the Clintonians for not doing
enough to "win" in Kosovo once they were involved. Among his co-signers were
the usual suspects, a motley collection of Right-wing Social Democrats from the
Lane Kirkland wing of the War Party, to neoconservative Republicans such as
William Kristol and Jeanne Kirkpatrick. The ascension of Wolfowitz to the top
policy spot means that a policy vigorously opposed by the majority of
congressional Republicans � and primary voters � is going to be embraced by the
party's likely nominee. This is how our nation's "bipartisan" foreign policy of
global interventionism has managed to stay in place for half a century, without
any significant challenge � the people never get to vote on it.
DICK CHENEY AND THE SPIRIT OF MERCANTILISM
The other member of the Bushian foreign policy triumvirate, Dick Cheney, plays
a different if by no means subordinate role. As a former Secretary of Defense,
now the president of the Halliburton Company, the biggest provider of products
and services to the petroleum industry, Cheney represents the alliance of Big
Oil money and the military-industrial complex. After presiding over the Defense
Department, Cheney graduated to the world of big business, where he became
President of Halliburton. Under Cheney's leadership, Halliburton has expanded
the range of services it offers and has spent about $1 billion acquiring
companies with different niche specialties. The company bought Landmark
Graphics Corp., in 1996, a company that makes software for seismic evaluations
of petroleum reservoirs. Last year, it gobbled up Numar Corp.: their software
enables drillers to analyze subsurface rock formations in newly drilled wells
using magnetic resonance imaging. The recent acquisition of the Dresser Company
means that Halliburton has acquired strong engineering capabilities and
drilling systems to complement its strength in energy sector construction and
maintenance. Reemerging onto the political stage, Cheney is playing a major
role in what may become the biggest and most profitable deal of his private
sector career � the coming war for oil in the troubled Transcaucasus.
WHOSE NATIONAL INTEREST?
With his links to Texas oil barons, and his political connections, Cheney is
gearing up with the rest of the oil industry to cash in on the Great Caspian
Oil Bonanza. Cheney has been in the forefront of the effort to repeal US
legislation that forbids foreign aid to undemocratic regimes such as the
government of Azerbaijan. That central Asian nation, ruled by a neo-Stalinist
dictator, is where a good deal of the oil is located; it is also a key link in
the oil companies' scheme to build a trans-Balkan/Transcaucasian oil pipeline
to bring its product to market in Western Europe. Can anyone doubt that "a
quarrel among faraway peoples about whom we know nothing" in that tumultuous
region will suddenly involve "vital" US "national interests"? As Russian troops
fight Islamic rebels in Dagestan, and the Armenians and Azeris call for the US
and/or NATO to intervene, the prospect of George Dubya in the White House
begins to take on a distinctly ominous aspect.
THEORY AND PRACTICE
It used to be, not so long ago, that the interface of corporate interests and
US foreign policy was far subtler. In these decadents days of imperial excess,
however, there is a pagan shamelessness in the unseemly spectacle of revolving
doors between corporate and government institutions. A man like Cheney, who
segues so rapidly and easily from chief warmaker to chief executive officer of
a major international corporation, is the perfect symbol of the Republican
foreign policy establishment in the age of George Dubya. If Wolfowitz is the
chief theoretician of this mercantilist dogma that equates untapped oil fields
with "the national interest," then Cheney is its chief practitioner � and among
the most successful.
GETTING TO THE ROOT OF THE MATTER
The oil companies envision a pipeline that will carry their product across
Eastern Europe to customers in the West � and the Albanian end of that trans-
Balkan route is already being taken care of. It was the Houston engineering
firm of Brown & Root, a subsidiary of Halliburton, that won the contract to
build barracks not only in Bosnia, but also in Kosovo and Albania; they were
one of the biggest direct beneficiaries of the war. As Wolfowitz was signing
newspaper ads demanding the introduction of US ground troops into Kosovo,
Halliburton was busy building and outfitting the Albanian staging areas.
FOLLOW THE MONEY
The neoconservative intellectuals, like Wolfowitz, expend millions of words to
prove and reprove the necessity of their policies, of the inevitability of
perpetual war for perpetual peace, while second-and-third tier activists like
William Kristol proclaim the virtues of a "benevolent world hegemony." But in
the end it boils down to such vulgar matters as Halliburton's profit margins
and the price of oil. In an era in which wars are fought in the name of vague
and improbable ideals, such as "human rights" and "multiculturalism," it is a
safe bet to follow the money. It works almost every time.
A<>E<>R
Integrity has no need of rules. -Albert Camus (1913-1960)
+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
The only real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking
new landscapes but in having new eyes. -Marcel Proust
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The libertarian therefore considers one of his prime educational
tasks is to spread the demystification and desanctification of the
State among its hapless subjects. His task is to demonstrate
repeatedly and in depth that not only the emperor but even the
"democratic" State has no clothes; that all governments subsist
by exploitive rule over the public; and that such rule is the reverse
of objective necessity. He strives to show that the existence of
taxation and the State necessarily sets up a class division between
the exploiting rulers and the exploited ruled. He seeks to show that
the task of the court intellectuals who have always supported the State
has ever been to weave mystification in order to induce the public to
accept State rule and that these intellectuals obtain, in return, a
share in the power and pelf extracted by the rulers from their deluded
subjects.
[[For a New Liberty: The Libertarian Manifesto, Murray N. Rothbard,
Fox & Wilkes, 1973, 1978, p. 25]]
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