Forming A Political & Intellectual Identity
Advice on how to look at U.S. foreign policies ...

In my personal observation of so-called 'U.S. policy supporters', they are incapable of thinking in a broader sense. In other words, these people have no knowledge of the world beyond what they see on the news, what their parents tell them, Bush's stand on abortion, and his conviction to being a Christian. It's not so much that they support U.S. policies, it's that they see George W. Bush as a bridge to achieving domestic social goals they view to be proper. This applies to many other leaders in the world regardless of what their political leanings are.

 

First of all, if you don't look beyond what you see on the news you're just asking to be misinformed and irrational. You are more apt to be affected by generalities that 'images' give out and you'll automatically narrow your frame of thinking. Secondly, judging by his actions, George W. Bush is far from being a Christian. Thirdly, while my stance on social issues like gay marriage or abortion is considered 'conservative', my outlook of the world and the policies that keeps it functioning (or quickly destroying it) doesn't necessarily need to be conservative. In other words, the question of  whether or not something should be allowed in the legal sense is determined by many different factors beyond personal objection to something like gay marriage. To have it any other way would be ignorant, selfish, and destructive. As long as it is not imposed on others or transgresses into disrespect then it should be allowed for those individuals. People should not equate Bush's fight against terrorism with his fight against abortionists. While something like abortion is definitely an important issue that incites passion in people, to have the world revolve around a single issue is beyond stupid and destructive.

 

In terms of my political and economic beliefs, I'm far beyond being liberal to a point of being a radical. Of course, that's according to the standards of North America. Anyone who talks about U.S. atrocities in other countries or speaks about how our form of 'predatory capitalism' is far from what Adam Smith espoused is labeled radical despite the historical record being far from controversial. Documents about U.S. atrocities in East Timor are readily available to the public and even a monkey who reads up to about 10 pages in the Wealth of Nations can figure out that Adam Smith would condemn the system of capitalism we have today (which is just "large scale mercantilism").

 

All that said, just because you consider yourself a "Liberal" or a "Conservative" doesn't mean you need to accept every single principle associated with that political label. Ignorance is not a product of 'not' being an academic. You don't need to be an academic, or even read a single book, to be informed about the world. You can be an informed person by just reading the newspaper, talking to people, listening to political songs, listening to AM radio, or watching the news. As long as you can put the puzzles together in your head and make sense of everything beyond what is said on CNN or some politician bent on pushing a personal agenda then you're fine. What matters is how you fill the gaps. It's obvious that ignorance is the product of a narrow framework of thinking but as it relates to U.S. foreign policy this 'framework' is a lot more specific, concrete, and easily identifiable. Regardless, the fact that it's easy to identify doesn't make it any easier to get pass it.

My concern in this article is not to analyze any specific event or conflict in detail. What I'm concerned with in this article is: how to 'counter' such an intellectually and morally regressive framework and how to properly mature politically. I will just give the necessary examples to elaborate on my advice here. I don't want to go in-depth about my examples, I'll do that some other time. 

 

These three aspects are particularly important when analyzing U.S. international policy whether it be in Latin America, the Caribbean, or the Middle East:

 

1.) Look At Internal Government Records

 

When I read the 'Pentagon Papers' I was surprised at what these documents reveal. It boggles my mind how the government can say one thing but their intelligence task force is totally saying another thing. For example, the government would be claiming that the 'Vietcongs' during the Vietnam War did not have any support while the Pentagon was quite aware that they were surviving due to widespread support in North and South Vietnam. It's not that there's a problem with how intelligence is being passed around (the very idea is absurd), it's that 'facts' that doesn't support government actions are put aside for better ones. What gets me scratching my head even more is when government officials today still allude to the same illusions and lunatic arguments to describe U.S. involvement in Vietnam. Of course, easy parallels can be made today about Iraq which I prefer to comment on some other time.

 

2.) The Timing of Events

 

If you pay close attention to what government officials, the corporate media, and their likes say, you'll notice that they love to confuse 'cause' and 'consequences' of events. In other words, they pull a switch-a-roo of the timeline of events to justify their current actions (or that of an ally) and to cover-up their own participation in crimes as well. For example, soon Saddam Hussein will be charged for the gassing of Kurds in Halabja in March 1988. While he's definitely a monster and no one can deny that, this is not the reason why the U.S. chose to bomb Iraq. It's a cynical fraud when you hear: We need to get him out because he did this and that. It's not so much that they 'tolerated' Saddam, as George W. Bush claimed before the war, they outright supported him. There's a huge difference between the two. In fact, the United States and UK extended their support right after his greatest atrocities. Shipments of biological materials continued at least until November 1989 according to a Senate Banking Committee report in 1994. In addition, Hussein is also being charged for the violent suppression of the 1991 rebellion that could have overthrown him. What is not being mentioned in the news is the fact that the U.S. refused to give the vital support this rebellion due to their extremely warm relations with Saddam at the time. The U.S. refused to give to the rebels the weapons they captured from Iraqi forces at the time.

 

3.) Extreme Similarities of Policies Around The World

 

If you look at United States policies in Indochina (around the 1940's), Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala (in the 1980's) and the Middle East (in the present), you'll notice striking similarities. The only thing that changed pretty much is that the 'pretext' of actions can no longer be laid at the doorstep of the USSR and the fear of Communism -- claims that are absurd in their own rights. Long story short, intervention is a reaction to the fear of independent people thinking they can control their own lives whether they be Palestinians, Nicaraguans, Vietnamese or Filipinos. To pacify this fear hundreds of thousands have died, and continually to do so, as a direct result of U.S. intervention. Countries like Nicaragua are devastated forever. Today Nicaragua is in debt for some 7 billion dollars due to the terrorist actions of the U.S. -- as the World Court and the rest of the world charged it as -- against Nicaragua. In fact, the United States is the only country EVER to be charged for 'terrorism'.

 

In 1988 the U.S. invaded Panama to arrest Noriega citing self-defense against the Russians and the fact that he's a criminal. While there's no doubt that he was a criminal, he committed his worst crimes while he was on CIA payroll. He only became a criminal when he acted too independently and refused to cooperate properly in the U.S. war against Nicaragua. As I already mentioned before, Saddam was considered a 'moderate' until he disobeyed (or perhaps misunderstood U.S.) orders by invading Kuwait in 1990.

 

Conclusion:

 

Observing the world around us can be an extremely difficult task, but it's important not to be intimidated by hysterical and irrational ranting. We have to do our best to stay as close as we can to the path of truth. Once we achieve this rudimentary task then the task of finding solutions to the most pressing problems we are all facing today becomes that much easier.