August 19, 2016
by Carl Boggs
You haven’t heard much from
the Democrats lately about foreign policy or global agendas – indeed virtually
nothing at the Philadelphia convention and little worthy of mention along the
campaign trail. Hillary Clinton’s many liberal (and sadly, progressive)
supporters routinely steer away from anything related to foreign policy, talk,
talk, talking instead about the candidate’s “experience”, with obligatory nods
toward her enlightened social programs. There is only the ritual
demonization of that fearsome dictator, Vladimir Putin, reputedly on the verge
of invading some hapless European country. Even Bernie Sanders’
sorry endorsement of his erstwhile enemy, not long ago denounced as a tool of
Wall Street, had nothing to say about global issues. But no one
should be fooled: a Clinton presidency, which seems more likely by the day, can
be expected to stoke a resurgent U.S. imperialism, bringing new cycles of militarism
and war. The silence is illusory: Clintonites, now as before, are truly
obsessed with international politics.
A triumphant Hillary, more
“rational” and “savvy” than the looney and unpredictable Donald Trump, could
well have a freer path to emboldened superpower moves not only in Europe but
the Middle East, Central Asia, and the Pacific. While the candidate has not
revealed much lately, she is on record as vowing to “stand up” to Russia and
China, face off against Russian “aggression”, escalate the war on terror, and
militarily annihilate Iran the moment it steps out of line (or is determined by
“U.S. intelligence” to have stepped out of line) in its nuclear agreement with
global powers. Under Clinton, the Democrats might well be better
positioned to recharge their historical legacy as War Party. One of the great
political myths (and there are many) is that American liberals are inclined
toward a less belligerent foreign policy than Republicans, are less
militaristic and more favorable toward “diplomacy”. References to Woodrow
Wilson in World War I and Mexico, Harry Truman in Korea, JFK and LBJ in
Indochina, Bill Clinton in the Balkans, and of course Barack Obama in
Afghanistan (eight years of futile warfare), Libya (also “Hillary’s War”), and
scattered operations across the Middle East and North Africa should be enough
to dispel such nonsense. (As for FDR and World War II, I have written
extensively that the Pearl Harbor attacks were deliberately provoked by U.S.
actions in the Pacific – but that is a more complicated story.)
In something of a political
twist, the “deranged” Trump candidacy – with its almost daily flow of bizarre
utterances and proposals – actually serves Clinton’s neoliberal/neocon mission
nicely, providing a foil to her outwardly more sane persona. Trump, of course,
is far too irrational, too narcissistic, too unstable to assume the role of
Commander-in-Chief. Who knows what might happen once his shaky hands get near
the “nuclear trigger”? Worse yet, here is a bona fide challenger for the White
House who has reportedly cozied up to that imperialist dictator, that great
enemy of national sovereignty, Putin! No need for any discussion or
debate here. It follows that Hillary will be more reliable (even if more
“untrustworthy”), more in command – clearly the best option to manage imperial
affairs. Why else would all those neocons and Republican super-hawks be so
happy to sign on to the Clintonite project. The alliance of Hillary
and foreign-policy hard-liners has, however, scarcely dampened the enthusiasm
of her phalanx of liberal and progressive boosters, who endlessly talk, talk,
talk about her amazing “pragmatism”, her ability to “get things done”. (That
she can “get things done” in the realm of foreign policy is beyond question.)
A new Clinton presidency can
be expected to further boost the U.S./NATO drive to strangle and isolate
Russia, which means aggravated “crises” in Ukraine and worrisome encounters
with a rival military power in a region saturated with (tactical, “usable”) nuclear
weapons. Regime change in Syria? Hillary has indeed
strongly pushed for that self-defeating act of war, combined with an illegal
and provocative no-fly zone — having learned nothing from the extreme chaos and
violence she did so much to unleash in Libya as Secretary of State. There are
currently no visible signs she would exit the protracted and criminal war in
Afghanistan, a rich source of blowback (alongside Iraq, Syria, Libya, Yemen,
and Israel). Increased aerial bombardments against ISIS in Iraq, Syria, Libya,
and elsewhere? More deployments of American troops on the ground?
Such ventures, with potentially others on the horizon, amount to elaborate
recipes for more blowback, followed by more anti-terror hysteria, followed by more
interventions. Uncompromising economic, diplomatic, and military support of
Israeli atrocities in Palestine? Aggressive pursuit of the
seriously mistaken “Asian Pivot”, strategy, a revitalized effort to subvert
Chinese economic and military power – one of Clinton’s own special crusades? No
wonder the Paul Wolfowitzes and Robert Kagans are delighted to join the Hillary
camp.
No wonder, too, that
billionaire super-hawk Haim Saban has pledged to spend whatever is needed to
get the Clintons back into the White House, convinced her presidency will do
anything to maintain Palestinian colonial subjugation. Meeting with Saban in
July, Hillary again promised to “oppose any effort to delegitimate Israel,
including at the United Nations or through the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions
movement.” She backs legislative efforts begun in several states to silence and
blacklist people working on behalf of Palestinian rights. For this her
celebrated “pragmatism” could work quite effectively.
Democratic elites say little
publicly about these and other imperial priorities, preferring familiar
homilies such as “bringing jobs back” (not going to happen) and “healing the
country” (not going to happen). Silence appears to function
exquisitely in a political culture where open and vigorous debate on
foreign-policy is largely taboo and elite discourse rarely surpasses the level
of banal platitudes. And Hillary’s worshipful liberal and
progressive backers routinely follow the script (or non-script) while
fear-mongering about how a Trump presidency will destroy the country (now that
the Sanders threat has vanished).
Amidst the turmoil Trump has
oddly surfaced to the left of Clinton on several key global issues: cooperating
instead of fighting with the Russians, keeping alive a sharp criticism of the
Iraq war and the sustained regional chaos and blowback it generated, ramping
down enthusiasm for more wars in the Middle East, junking “free trade”
agreements, willingness to rethink the outmoded NATO alliance. If Trump,
however haphazardly, manages to grasp the historical dynamics of blowback, the
Clinton camp remains either indifferent or clueless, still ready for new armed
ventures – cynically marketed, as in the Balkans, Iraq, and Libya, on the moral
imperative of defeating some unspeakable evil, usually a “new Hitler” waging a
“new genocide”. Who needs to be reminded that Hillary’s domestic promises, such
as they are, will become null and void once urgent global “crises” take
precedence? The Pentagon, after all, always comes first.
Trump is of course no great
bargain, a combative warrior looking to slay dragons lurking about in a dark,
menacing world – something of a high-level Rambo figure – and this he happily
and repeatedly advertises. Like the mythic Rambo, he is also an uncontrollable
maverick, eccentric, prone to hare-brained “solutions” — much to the dismay of
even Republican officialdom. And he is emphatically and unapologetically
Islamophobic. At the other extreme, Clinton emerges in the media as
the most “rational” and “even-tempered” of candidates, ideally suited to carry
out the necessary imperial agendas. A tiresome mainstream narrative is that
Hillary is “one of the best prepared and most knowledgeable candidates ever to
seek the presidency.” And she is smart, very smart – whatever her
flaws. All the better to follow in the long history of Democrats
proficient at showing the world who is boss. The media, for its part,
adores these Democrats, another reason Trump appears to have diminished chances
of winning. Further, the well-funded and tightly-organized Clinton machine can
count on somewhat large majorities of women, blacks, and Hispanics, not only
for the march to the White House but, more ominously, to go along with the War
Party’s imperial spectacle of the day. Most anything – war, regime change,
bombing raids, drone strikes, treaty violations, JFK-style “standoffs” – can
escape political scrutiny if carried out by “humanitarian”, peace-loving
Democrats. Bill Clinton’s war to fight “genocide” and “ethnic cleansing”
in the Balkans, cover for just another U.S./NATO geopolitical maneuver,
constitutes the perfect template here.
There is a special logic to
the Clintonites’ explosive mixture of neoliberalism and militarism. They, like
all corporate Democrats, are fully aligned with some of the most powerful
interests in the world: Wall Street, the war economy, fossil fuels, Big Pharma,
the Israel Lobby. They also have intimate ties to reactionary global forces –
the neofascist regime in Ukraine, Israel, Saudi Arabia, other Gulf states.
Against this corporatist and imperialist backdrop, the “deluded” and “unhinged”
Trump becomes far too unreliable for entrance to the Oval Office; he could too
easily bungle the job of managing U.S. global supremacy. In March 121 members
of the Republican “national security community”, including the warmongers
Wolfowitz, Robert Kagan, and Brent Scowcroft, signed a public letter condemning
Trump for not being sufficiently dedicated to American (also Israeli?)
interests. Trump compounded his predicament by stubbornly refusing to pay
homage to the “experts” – the same foreign-policy geniuses who helped
orchestrate the Iraq debacle. A more recent (and more urgent) letter with
roughly the same message has made its way into the public sphere.
Predictably, Trump’s “unreliability” to oversee American global objectives has
been an ongoing motif at CNN, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and Wall
Street Journal.
Returning to the political
carneval that was the Democratic convention, amidst all the non-stop flag-waving
and shouts of “USA!” Hillary made what she thought would be an inspiring
reference to Jackie Kennedy, speaking on the eve of her husband’s (1961) ascent
to the White House. Jackie was reported as saying “that what worried President
Kennedy during that very dangerous time was that a war might be started – not
by men with self-control and restraint, but by little men, the ones moved by
fear and pride.” We can surmise that JFK was one of those “big men”
governed by “restraint”. History shows, however, that Jackie’s
esteemed husband was architect of probably the worst episode of international
barbarism in U.S. history – the Vietnam War, with its unfathomable death and
destruction – coming at a time of the Big Man’s botched CIA-led invasion of
Cuba and followed closely by the Cuban Missile Crisis, where the Big Man’s
“restraint” brought the world frighteningly close to nuclear catastrophe. As
for “fear” and “pride” – nothing permeates JFK’s biography of that period more
than those two psychological obsessions.
Could it be that Hillary
Clinton, however unwittingly, was at this epic moment – her breakthrough
nomination – revealing nothing so much as her own deeply-imperialist mind-set?
Carl Boggs is the author
of The Hollywood War Machine, with Tom Pollard (second edition, forthcoming),
and Drugs, Power, and Politics, both published by Paradigm.
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