By Madibeng Kgwete: written on 08 November 2006
The defeat of United States President George W. Bush’s Republican Party in the recent midterm elections has been welcomed from various corners of the world, including Britain, where Bush has drawn most support for his widely-criticised “war on terror”.
The new Democratic majority in the US Congress is expected to bring about a shift in the superpower’s foreign policy, bearing in mind the US’s damaged international reputation, resulting primarily from the war against Iraq, denialism over climate change, the undermining of the United Nations, hostile role in trade negotiations, etc.
Those hoping for a new paradigm shift in US foreign policy would better ask themselves whether the Democrats have a problem with US world dominance, or just the ruthless manner in which the Republicans have stamped US authority on the international stage.
Just like the Republican Party, sometimes referred to as the Grand Old Party (GOP), the Democratic Party places security high on its agenda, stating on its website that it has a security plan “that is comprehensive -- from repairing our military, to winning the war on terror, to protecting our homeland security, to ensuring success in Iraq”.
Just like Bush, the Democrats are eager to expand US domination, but have a more moderate plan to go about expanding the same imperialist agenda whose aggressive implementation has reduced Bush’s conservatives to a congressional minority.
Whatever purposes the Democrats will use their new congressional powers for, one can be sure of one thing: all decisions with international implications will be geared towards preserving US interests, shielding the world power from economic and military competition.
The US congressional power is in new hands, but the mission is the same old one of domination and control, of military power and hanging on to undemocratic votes in multilateral institutions such as the United Nations Security Council, the International Monetary Fund, etc.
For as long as the Democrats believe that there is a way of “ensuring success” out of the war in Iraq, one is adamant that the liberals are equally committed to domination, even through such extreme measures as military occupation.
Throughout his path to the 2004 presidential victory, Bush successfully managed to portray and ridicule Democratic Party leader John Kerry as inconsistent with regard to the war in Iraq.
Introducing Bush at the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York, Governor George Pataki said of Kerry’s alleged flip-flopping: “He was for the war [against Iraq] and then he was against the [same] war. Then he was for it but he wouldn’t fund it. Then he’d fund it but he wasn’t for it”.
The allegations against the Democrats, though made in the context of competing for voters, create a strong impression that, with them as the new decision-makers in the US Congress, all that may change is the tactics, but the strategy remains the same.
One of the US’s own academics, Prof. Samuel Huntington of the Harvard Academy for International and Area Studies, suggests in his paper, “The Lonely Superpower”, that: “It is in U.S. interests to take advantage of its position as the only superpower in the existing international order and to use its resources to elicit cooperation from other countries to deal with global issues in ways that satisfy American interests”.
We should not be surprised when the US fails to retreat in its campaign to unilaterally rule the world despite new leadership in Congress: the country only has new faces, with the same old mission to dominate.
The defeat of United States President George W. Bush’s Republican Party in the recent midterm elections has been welcomed from various corners of the world, including Britain, where Bush has drawn most support for his widely-criticised “war on terror”.
The new Democratic majority in the US Congress is expected to bring about a shift in the superpower’s foreign policy, bearing in mind the US’s damaged international reputation, resulting primarily from the war against Iraq, denialism over climate change, the undermining of the United Nations, hostile role in trade negotiations, etc.
Those hoping for a new paradigm shift in US foreign policy would better ask themselves whether the Democrats have a problem with US world dominance, or just the ruthless manner in which the Republicans have stamped US authority on the international stage.
Just like the Republican Party, sometimes referred to as the Grand Old Party (GOP), the Democratic Party places security high on its agenda, stating on its website that it has a security plan “that is comprehensive -- from repairing our military, to winning the war on terror, to protecting our homeland security, to ensuring success in Iraq”.
Just like Bush, the Democrats are eager to expand US domination, but have a more moderate plan to go about expanding the same imperialist agenda whose aggressive implementation has reduced Bush’s conservatives to a congressional minority.
Whatever purposes the Democrats will use their new congressional powers for, one can be sure of one thing: all decisions with international implications will be geared towards preserving US interests, shielding the world power from economic and military competition.
The US congressional power is in new hands, but the mission is the same old one of domination and control, of military power and hanging on to undemocratic votes in multilateral institutions such as the United Nations Security Council, the International Monetary Fund, etc.
For as long as the Democrats believe that there is a way of “ensuring success” out of the war in Iraq, one is adamant that the liberals are equally committed to domination, even through such extreme measures as military occupation.
Throughout his path to the 2004 presidential victory, Bush successfully managed to portray and ridicule Democratic Party leader John Kerry as inconsistent with regard to the war in Iraq.
Introducing Bush at the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York, Governor George Pataki said of Kerry’s alleged flip-flopping: “He was for the war [against Iraq] and then he was against the [same] war. Then he was for it but he wouldn’t fund it. Then he’d fund it but he wasn’t for it”.
The allegations against the Democrats, though made in the context of competing for voters, create a strong impression that, with them as the new decision-makers in the US Congress, all that may change is the tactics, but the strategy remains the same.
One of the US’s own academics, Prof. Samuel Huntington of the Harvard Academy for International and Area Studies, suggests in his paper, “The Lonely Superpower”, that: “It is in U.S. interests to take advantage of its position as the only superpower in the existing international order and to use its resources to elicit cooperation from other countries to deal with global issues in ways that satisfy American interests”.
We should not be surprised when the US fails to retreat in its campaign to unilaterally rule the world despite new leadership in Congress: the country only has new faces, with the same old mission to dominate.
No comments:
Post a Comment