Overview of the crisis
Summary
Whatever happens on the military front, the movement
for world reform has a historical opportunity. Let's seize it.
Of course it is not possible to predict the future or even be sure of what is happening in the opresent. It is a truism that the first casualty of war is the truth, and in this war one protagonist has not even identified itself and the other side, `our` side contain groups with very different war aims, from removing Al Quaida to pursuing the third world war against most of Islam.
Here are the key players on the world stage today.
1. Militant Islamicists. They are seen by our media as the main enemy, so one must describe them with extreme caution. They appear to be a quasi fascist bunch of women-haters and bigots intent on imposing their values on the Islamic world, but probably not the world beyond that. They were mostly financed by the Western powers and their allies, particularly the Saudis as a way of undermining the progressive revolutioaries. This is reminiscent of the rise of fascism in Germany. (Book ref Who Financed Hitler)
2. The New World Order. I take this to mean the movement fuelled by bigoted economists known as neoliberals. These people live in a world of three centuries ago, before the days of capitalism, before the days of giant corporate cartels, before the days of big government. This movement has largely taken over the key economic centres of power, but not the political ones, which are influenced indirectly by it through the power of money and political corruption. Its weakness is that it doesn't work and corporations are beginning to realise that and turn to social democracy.
3. Social democracy. This movement has been the main target of the New World Order. As a compromise between marxism and capitalism it attracts moderates the world over. It is still dominant in Europe. It believes in social justice and economic pragmatism. Its strength is that it is what most people want, its main weakness is that in the global context it is hard to pursue social justice for those who have no vote and its leaders have not recognised the threat from neoliberalism. Its political leadership uses strategies of consensus building which are not appropriate to any sort of a war.
4. The Western fundamentalists. These are often confused with the New World Order with whom some have been in an unstable alliance (the Reagan coalition). They are Christian fundamentalists in the US and Jewish fundamentalists in Israel. Each group has embedded itself in its respective political system and they are in alliance. Their key strategies are syphoning off and appropriating state funds and in Israel using discreet terrorism to provoke counter terrorism. This was a key element of the success of National Socialism in Germany incidentally.
5. The progressive revolutionaries. A major force in the twentieth century, they flourish where a peaceful road to justice and social democracy is closed. They have evolved successful strategies often involving terrorism for overthrowing failing governments without appealing to fundamentalism in eg Nicaragua, Mexico, N Ireland, Russia. They have a more realistic understanding of neoliberals and western fundamentalists than social democrats, but their ruthless methods can lead to tyranny and where they fail they can be taken over by fundamentalists eg in much of the arab world today.
6. Anarchists and pacifists Their principle objection is to big organisations, particularly corporations and governments. They recognise that state violence occurs on a far greater scale than terrorist violence, big is ugly, in particular that organisations are stupider that individuals, and that size inhibits the progress that could be easily achieved on the back of scientific advance. Their weakness is that they are prone to make short sighted alliances with any of the other groups.
7. The terrorists and secret societies. They can come from any of the above groups, depending on your definition of terrorism and conspiracy. Social democrats are the least terrorist, but can get drawn into it eg during the cold war and today in Colombia. When terrorist groups control the government eg Israel they tend to cover it up and confuse it with legitimate policing, when in opposition they tend to proclaim it openly. Because of the secretive nature of such players, it is not normally possible to be certain of who they are or what their ultimate goals are. This has been recognised at least since Roman times when the test was established : `who benefits?` Unfortunately by the time this is clear it is often too late. The classic example of this is the Reichstag fire in Germany, carried out by nazis, blamed on communists.
The situation prior to September 11 was that the New World Order, always in control in Washington, had largely enlisted governments and apparently lately social democrat leaders in its globalisation project. This was opposed by practically everyone else, particularly ordinary social democrats, anarchists and progresive revolutionaries. The neoliberals were probably right that within their narrow monetary terms on average globalisation was benefitting people. The problem was that on a true, broader view of value the costs to the global ecology, quality of life and social structures were devastating and even in monetary terms the average hid vast areas of intense impoverishment. Worse still, by forcing an undemocratic destructive homogenisation of the world community, globalisation was creating a clash of cultures if not of civilisations which was benefiting only the fundamentalists.
By September 11 virtually any attack on the New World Order was likely to be received sympathetically by large numbers of people throughout the world, and this was clear to most politically aware people. However, the NWO had developed means of heading off most foreseeable attacks. Systems has been developed for bankruptiong and overthrowing resistant governments abroad, the western media was brought under a degree of corporate control establishing levels of de facto censorship not seen since the days of newspaper licensing, and the rise of television had enabled governments to openly control the most prevalent information medium. The business cycle had been used to control most of the western population by the carrot of easy credit and slight financial gains while with the stick of recession and unemployment trade union power was eroded.
Nonetheless anarchists, social democrats and progressive revolutionaries were fighting back. A reformed social democracy, the Green Movement was sweeping up activists into a modern analysis, the internet was revolutionising communication and the right wing anarchist project of fostering small business was opening up spaces of economic survival for the dissidents. Progressive revolutionaries in Mexico, Libya, Northern Ireland were joining the popular front for social justice whose most surprising member was perhaps the Pope.
Into this picture exploded the events of September 11. The atrocity was an attempt by the terrorists and warmongers to recapture centre stage. The authors could have been Islamic fundamentalist terrorists, as the West believes, trying to capture the leadership of the arab world, they could have been Jewish fundamentalist terrorists trying to destroy the Oslo process, they could have been right wing anarchist or Christian fundamentalist terrorists (the Militias) building on Oklahoma, or they could have been a classic provocation by the coalition who achieved Bush's illegal accession to the Presidency, the arms dealers and oil barons, eying the vast reserves in central asia which would free the west from dependence on Saudi oil. Certainly these will be those `who gain` .
If there is indeed to be a sustained war, the omens are mixed for the NWO which is probably the target. Wars can be determined by new tactics, new weapons and economic power. The new tactics are clearly devastating at least on the propaganda level, the new weapons are civilian airliners, biological and possibly nuclear devices. The NWO's economic success, such as it is, is based to a large extent on the fact of America as the lender and savings bank of last resort, and as the most successful economy. This has been a result of vast natural resources, now largely exhausted, and a smoothly running low cost economy. Just as the US enters a recession it is now faced with effectively a massive terrorism tax.
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