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Wednesday, September 24, 2008 |
IrishTimes: "The US military sees the next 30 to 40 years as involving a state of continuous war against ideologically-motivated terrorists and competing with Russia and China for natural resources and markets, writes Tom Clonan.
Further evidence of America's future military intentions is contained in recently published strategy documents issued by the US military.
Under the auspices of the US department of defence and department of the army, the US military have just published a document entitled 2008 Army Modernization Strategy which makes for interesting reading against the current backdrop of deteriorating international fiscal, environmental, energy resource and security crises.
The 2008 modernisation strategy, written by Lieut Gen Stephen Speakes, deputy chief of staff of the US army, contains the first explicit and official acknowledgement that the US military is dangerously overstretched internationally. It states simply: 'The army is engaged in the third-longest war in our nation's history and ... the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT) has caused the army to become out of balance with the demand for forces exceeding the sustainable supply.'
The document reveals a number of profoundly significant - and worrying - strategic positions that have been adopted as official doctrine by the US military. In its preamble, it predicts a post cold war future of 'perpetual warfare'.
According to its authors: 'We have entered an era of persistent conflict ... a security environment much more ambiguous and unpredictable than that faced during the cold war.'
'We face a potential return to traditional security threats posed by emerging near-peers as we compete globally for depleting natural resources and overseas markets.'
This thinly-veiled reference to Russia and China will, perhaps, come as little surprise given recent events in Ossetia and Abkhazia. The explicit reference in this context to future resource wars, however, will probably raise eyebrows among the international diplomatic community, who prefer to couch such conflicts as human rights-based or rooted in notions around freedom and democracy.
The document, however, contains no such lofty pretences. It goes on to list as a pre-eminent threat to the security of the US and its allies 'population growth - especially in less-developed countries - [which] will expose a resulting 'youth bulge'.'
This youth bulge, the document goes on to state, will present the US with further 'resource competition' in that these expanding populations in the developing world 'will consume ever increasing amounts of food, water and energy'.
It states explicitly that the US military is preparing to fight continuous resource wars 'for the long haul'."
The above army document admits that our world resources are becoming scarce and it is based on the premiss that it is right to rob other nations of their resources. In short, the above document is based on a fascist ideology.
Gordon Brown yesterday in one sentence of his speech confirmed his resolve to continue supporting the US and the imperialist wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Never before have so few in such a criminal way decided on the fate of so many.
John le Carré: "Britons have been stripped of civil liberties.
We have been taken to war under false pretences, and stripped of our civil rights in an atmosphere of panic. Our lawyers don't take to the streets as they have done in Pakistan.
Our MPs allow themselves to be deluded by their own spin doctors, and end up believing their own propaganda."
ACLU: "A federal court today ordered the Department of Defense to release photographs depicting the abuse of detainees by U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.
'This is a resounding victory for the public's right to hold the government accountable,' said ACLU staff attorney Amrit Singh, who argued before the court. 'These photographs demonstrate that the abuse of prisoners held in U.S. custody abroad was not aberrational and not confined to Abu Ghraib, but the result of policies adopted by high-ranking officials. Their release is critical for bringing an end to the administration's torture policies and for deterring further prisoner abuse.'
The government claimed that the public disclosure of such evidence would generate outrage and would violate U.S. obligations towards detainees under the Geneva Conventions."
How cynical can they get? Citing the Geneva Conventions to prevent the publication! When they have breached all national and international laws, including the Geneva Conventions all those years!
11:38:39 AM 
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© Copyright 2008 Hetty Litjens.
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