Well, that projection actually extends previous tendencies, the so-called neo-liberal period, the period thats sometimes called globalization. The term doesnt mean much. The last 25 years or so have been marked by a very notable deterioration in almost every aspect of economic development: growth of economies, productivity, investment, even growth of trade. And thats true pretty much world-wide: United States an almost everywhere else. The only real exceptions being the countries that didnt follow the rules. And so theyre predicting thats going to continue.
The military planners make pretty much the same predictions. So Clinton-era planners also published expectations of the future. There are many but this one is the most interesting. Its called Visions For 2020. Its actually meant for the public so you should look at it. They predict a growing gap between the haves and the have-nots and they predict that the have-nots will become disruptive and itll be necessary to control them in the interests of whats called stability.
Stability is a technical term that means everybody follows orders. You can have perfect stability but if theyre not following orders you have to get rid of it, destabilize it in the interest of stability. Actually Im quoting, believe it or not.
As thats described by the National Intelligence Council, the same prediction, they say that as globalization proceeds, deepening stagnation will foster political, ethnic, ideological and religious extremism along with violence, much of it directed against the United States. Okay, so thats the anticipation from the success of what they call globalization. Thats part of the motive, a good part of the motive between the vast expansion of US military power even before September 11th. The US vastly outspent any conceivable collection of adversaries and allies and the figures are misleading because it does not count other things; for example the United States has an offshore military base in the Middle East called Israel [applause] . which there, in Israel, they call it .
The reason is, a very good military correspondent in the mainstream rightwing newspaper reporting the views of the military described Israel not as a state with a military but a military with a state. And the military is actually a branch of the US military so thats probably the way to look at it. Its a small country, but since it has become essentially a US military base, it has a very powerful military force which is not counted in US military strength, though it should be. And its not small. They estimate that theyre own air and naval forces are larger and more technologically advanced than any NATO power outside the United States. And the same is true of their armored forces.
Britain which theoretically is called an independent country approximately in the sense Ukraine was independent under the Soviet Union, thats the major military force in NATO outside the United States. So we have the United States, Israel, Britain. Forty years ago a senior Kennedy adviser described Britain as our lieutenant. The fashionable word is partner. The British like to hear the fashionable word, but its nice to know the way theyre thought of internally. All of this is part of the US military, so yes, its enormous.
September 11th was used as a pretext for rapid expansion of military spending, and a pretext. I mean the spending has essentially nothing to do with the spread of terrorism, just as the military doesnt. The plan is, and in fact the reality, to make the United States so overwhelmingly dominant that it is in a place of world control without challenge. The Presidents recent national security strategy spelled this out rather starkly, and it goes way back.
Going back to the Vision For 2020, the Clinton-era document. This happens to come from Space Command, but its general. They give a historical survey explaining why this has to happen, and its pretty accurate. They say in the past countries like the United States had to develop armies for self defense. We need an army for self defense as the US was taking over the national territory. It was self defense against what the Declaration of Independence calls the merciless Indian savages who were brutally attacking the innocent colonists who just wanted to live in peace and had no other thoughts in mind. And you needed an army in self defense until the national territory was conquered. And [the] country also established navies, later air forces, in order Im quoting it now in order to protect commercial interests and investments. Of course Britain was in the lead back in the old days, but when Britain developed a navy to protect its global interests and investments incidentally funding the navy from the greatest narco-trafficking enterprise in human history [Opium Wars, 1839-42 and 1856-60]; thats a large part of the history of empire and involves part of the conquest of India and the break-in to China; it was really extraordinary. But they did have the navy, thanks to narco-trafficking primarily. But it could be countered by others, so Germany could construct a navy to counter the British navy with consequences in the 20th century we dont have to talk about. But the Clinton planners point out that this time its going to be different. The US is going to have such overwhelming power that there will be no counterforce, and in particular thats going to be true of what they call the next frontier, namely the militarization of space which is what theyre specifically interested in and they say that it necessary to protect US interests, markets and investments, and of course to control the growing number of have-nots as the globalization proceeds with deepening stagnation and a widening economic divide which is going to foster extremism, violence, so therefore well need a whats going to be called, as it has been for the last 20 years, a war on terror. And anyone who has a good University of Pennsylvania education knows that when you hear war on terror you mean terrorist war which is exactly what its been for 20 years, including the new phase which was re-declared on September 11th.
THE LAST ACT
The most ominous part of these general projections actually has to do with militarization of space. Its not talked about much but its very critical. This is still Clinton-era planning; its been escalated by Bush. The idea is to put highly destructive weapons in space, probably nuclear powered; they gotta be on hair-trigger alert, automated, which raises a very high probability of whats called in the trade, normal accidents. Normal accidents re the accidents that unpredictably take place in any complex system. So if you have a computer, you know about normal accidents. Things happen in complicated systems which are unpredictable. When a normal accident takes place under militarization of space, you can say goodbye to your friends and children and people overseas and so on because thatll probably be the last act. But thats the plan and it requires violating another treaty which isnt talked about much, the Outer Space Treaty of 1967. Though it isnt talked about much here, its well known around the world. The UN general assembly has for the last couple of years brought up the Outer Space Treaty, which has so far been observed. They brought it up just for ratification, just reaffirmation. The US doesnt vote against it, it abstains; its passed unanimously with US and Israel abstaining. I think once maybe, Micronesia.
The UN disarmament committee has been meeting the last couple of years and the major focus of it is to try to abandon expansion of military development into space. Thats been pressed by just about everybody. The US has been blocking it consistently so nothing has happened, and the reasons are the background ones Ive just described. Theres total silence about this you read nothing about it. I guess the reasoning in the editorial offices is that its not a good idea to let citizens know of plans that may bring to an end biologys only experiment with higher intelligence. At lot of this is concealed as missile defense, but again when you hear the word defense you interpret it as offense. And thats the way its understood by planners, so, for example, the Rand Corporation which is the main sort of analytic and advisory research agency more or less for the Pentagon. The Rand Corporations reports on missile defense happen to be almost verbatim the same of the pronouncements of the Chinese government protesting missile defense. Both of them say in almost the same words that, quoting it, Ballistic missile defense is not simply a shield but rather an enabler of US actions. That is, provide the United States with absolute freedom in using or threatening to use force in international relations, cementing US hegemony and making Americans the masters of the world.. Its not going to work, but thats another story. Talking about their thinking. Missile defense is supposed to . Im quoting now, provide the United States with absolute freedom in using or threatening to use force in international relations, cementing US hegemony and making Americans the masters of the world. Im quoting military analysts in the conservative and liberal press.
In the liberal press they point out that liberals are wrong when they oppose missile ballistic defense. Theyve got matters backwards. They should be in favor of it because its going to enable the US to use military force without any concern and thatll enable the US to carry out the humanitarian intervention everywhere that liberals are in favor of, and the logic . so therefore they oughta be in favor of missile defense and a huge military build up and weapons in space and everything else. The logic is completely impeccable as long you accept the basic principle of religious doctrine, namely that anything the United States does is uniquely in history and uniquely, in the current word, is benevolent. If you accept the fundamental theological principle, everything else follows. And that one cant be questioned. If you raise a question about that, youre labeled as someone who hates America or some other insult.
Thats the reasoning behind the long-term global planning that was recently announced. Its true that the current administration takes an extreme position on the spectrum, but you have to bear in mind that its a pretty narrow spectrum. Thats why I was quoting Clinton-era documents. Noam Chomsky, Oct. 3, 2002, U. of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia]
by Ron Harvey
Looking forward, whats likely to happen in the years ahead, I think a good place to start is with expectations of the masters of the world, the expectations of the powerful: what do they anticipate? And I think the Middle East should be viewed within that context.
Actually, theyve helped us out on that. There is an interesting study which I urge you to read if you havent, published by the US National Intelligence Council, thats the CIA and the other intelligence agencies. The publication was put together jointly with representatives of the business world and the academic profession. It came out pre-September 11th so its .nothing much has changed in that respect. Its called Global Trends 2015 so theyre projecting what the expect to happen the next 15 years. The main prediction is that what they call globalization will continue on course. Im quoting. Its evolution will be rocky marked by chronic financial volatility and a widening economic divide. Thats the basic prediction.