SHOCK & AWE

INTRODUCTION

The United States faces a growing disaster in the Middle East - A DISASTER PREDICATED ON THE INABILITY OF THE UNITED STATES TO USE ITS FULL PANOPLY of power in order to gain control of the situation and bring its murderous enterprise there to a successful conclusion. Ashley Smith of the ISR explains what happened:

"The Bush administration had aimed to use the political capital it obtained in the wake of the September 11^th attacks to pursue a more preemptive and aggressive foreign policy that had been DESIGNED TO CEMENT THE U.S. AS THE WORLD'S UNCHALLENGEABLE SUPER-POWER. After first dismantling Taliban rule in Afghanistan, the Bush administration hoped to install a sympathetic government in Iraq, conduct regime changes of a similar nature in Syria and Iran, and settle other conflicts in the region like those in Lebanon and Palestine on U.S. terms. With the region and its strategic oil reserves under its control, the U.S. hoped to hold all potential challengers that are dependent on Mideast oil, such as China, under its thumb."

Washington Post journalist Anthony Shadid captures the Bush regime's hubris and naiveté concerning its ability to pull this giant enterprise off:

"Once the dictator [Hussein] was removed, by force if need be, Iraq would be free, a taubla rasa on which to build a new and different state ... If we can change Iraq, George W. Bush and his determined lieutenants maintained, we can change the Arab world, so precariously adrift after decades of broken promises of progress and prosperity. This rhetoric - idealistic to Western ears, reminiscent of century-old colonialism to a Third World audience - envisioned the dawn of a democratic and just Middle East, guided by a benevolent United States."

Of course, all the talk of "democracy" and "progress and prosperity" was just that - TALK. Again, what the U.S. ruling elite was really after was the area's oil - as former Fed Chief Alan Greenspan recently admitted - and the reduction of the nations of the Middle East and Central Asia to "client-state" status in the American Empire. [Please see our August, 2002 report, "The Coming War in Iraq: What It's Really All About."]

Smith continues:

"The U.S. won the war easily ... [But] contrary to expectations ... U.S. troops were not greeted as liberators. The U.S. coalition deployed only 145,000 troops, nowhere near the number of troops needed to control a country of 25 million."

As a result, Smith says, things turned out differently:

"The Bush administration has spent close to two trillion dollars, has sacrificed more than 3,600 soldiers, and has maimed and psychologically damaged tens of thousands more in this war against the Iraqi resistance that wasn't supposed to exist, only to find itself stuck in what is routinely referred to now as a Vietnam-style 'quagmire' ...

"It has also lost the support of the majority of Americans for its war in Iraq ... Today, 70 percent of Americans oppose the war ..."

THE REASON FOR ALL THIS

As Smith explained, the reason the war turned out so disastrously was that the Bush administration tried to conduct the war "on the cheap," and with a military that had been decisively "downsized" at the end of the Cold War. In the wake of America's victory over the old Soviet Union, it had become impossible for the elites to argue any longer that a huge standing military was necessary, and so-called "liberals" prevailed in their demands to reduce military expenditures by reducing the standing army and shifting spending to social welfare programs.

As a result, the army that was available to the administration of Bush II was no longer the huge, standing army that Bush I had used to crush Iraq in the First Gulf War - an army that had easily been able to "field" over 500,000 troops in Iraq with thousands and thousands more in reserve. The most that Bush II could "field" in the second Gulf War was 150,000 troops (give a little here and there). As Smith says, this was more than enough troops - given America's overwhelming technological superiority and its air and naval preeminence - to decisively win the war; but it was not enough troops - given the fact that American soldiers were not greeted as liberators - to "occupy" the country and reduce its population to subservience.

CONSTRAINTS ON U.S. POWER

Now one must understand something: the reason for America's failure here is not American weakness per se, as some believe; nor is it that the U.S. bit off more than it can chew (all other things being equal), as others believe; it's that the U.S. is constrained "artificially" -

1. by a U.S. population that is unwilling to support a larger military - and the draft of its sons and daughters that such a broadening of the military would require [please see our article "The Draft: You Had Better Get Ready"], and -

2. by a population that is unwilling to sanction the use of TOTAL WAR (genocide) as a war tactic - at least as an OPEN, "in-your-face" war tactic.

Naturally enough, the unwillingness of the American population to support a larger military - again, which of necessity would mean re-instituting the draft - and the use of genocide as an open, "in-your-face" war tactic has put the entire American enterprise in the Middle East and Central Asia in danger; indeed, it is jeopardizing the very existence of the American Empire itself.

OTHER PRESSURE

And its not just pressure in the Middle East that is imperiling the American New World Order System, but also what's occurring on America's southern border; specifically, in Mexico.

While what's happening in Mexico is little reported in the American press, the American oil elites know perfectly well what's occurring there and they are terribly alarmed by it. One well-known security analyst for Bloomberg and Forbes (Dantes Peak) writes:

"In my annual new years predictions, I said that the most significant, and surprising, development of 2007 will be the collapse of both Mexico’s economy and its very existence as a viable Nation-State ..."

Now one should note here, he is not saying that the collapse of Mexico as a viable state is a case of "if," but rather it's a case of "when" - AND HE PREDICTS THAT IT WILL BE SOMETIME THIS YEAR OR EARLY IN 2008. He pins the blame on "leftists" bent on overthrowing the Mexican oligarchy and establishing a Marxist state on America's southern border - a nightmare for the American elites that would make what's occurring in the Middle East pale in comparison. It would mean the end of NAFTA and the resurgence of communism in Latin America on a massive basis. James McKinley reports on what's occurring:

"For the third time in three months, saboteurs blew up several pipelines belonging to Mexico's state oil monopoly, disrupting service to dozens of factories and ... rattling financial markets, officials said."

THE IMPORTANCE OF MEXICAN OIL

While most Americans are only minimally aware of these events - THESE ATTACKS ON MEXICO'S OIL INFRASTRUCTURE ARE THE MAIN REASON THAT THE PRICE OF CRUDE OIL ON THE WORLD MARKET IS APPROACHING $100.00 A BARREL, not the Iraq War (which was long ago already "priced" into the cost of crude oil).

LEFTIST ATTACKS ON
MEXICAN OIL INFRASTRUCTURE

McKinley continues:

"The oil company, Petróleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, issued a statement saying that someone had deliberately detonated bombs at six points along four natural gas pipelines and one oil pipeline in the eastern state of Veracruz early Monday morning.

"Later in the day, The Associated Press reported that the state police in Veracruz had evidence implicating the Popular Revolutionary Army, a ... [leftist] guerrilla movement formed in the 1990s, in the attacks ...

"In July, the same guerrilla group claimed responsibility for similar attacks on two major gas pipelines supplying the cities of Querétaro, Salamanca and Guanajuato. Carried out on July 5 and July 10, those attacks shut down the flow of gas to dozens of factories for more than 48 hours. At the time, the rebel group promised in a communiqué a campaign 'against the interests of the oligarchy and of this illegitimate government' ...

"The six explosions sent flames and plumes of smoke into the sky just before dawn. At least 21,000 people were evacuated from their homes as a precaution, Pemex officials said ...

"The sabotage of the gas pipelines has punctuated a turbulent political season in Mexico, where it has become clear that the wounds of last year’s hotly contested presidential race still have not healed.

"Leftist politicians, who do not regard Mr. Calderón’s razor-thin win as legitimate, recently used parliamentary rules to keep him from giving his annual address to Congress, and they boycotted a ceremony during which he delivered his address in writing.

"In the meantime, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, a leftist firebrand and a former mayor of Mexico City who lost to Mr. Calderón, continues to insist he is the 'legitimate president'. He argues that the election was riddled with fraud and dirty campaigning, orchestrated by big business [specifically, American oil interests] ..." [Please see our articles, "The Bolivarian Revolution Reaches America's Southern Border" and "Obrador's Parallel Leftist Government In Mexico City & The Spread Of 'Chavezism'."]

AND IT'S NOT JUST WHAT'S HAPPENING
IN VERA CRUZ AND CHIAPAS ...

And it's not just what's happening in Vera Cruz (and the other oil production regions in Mexico), and Chiapas. [Please see our article. "Chiapas: The Effect of the New World Order on the Poor."] Take what's occurring in Oaxaca: The ISR reported on the uprising in Oaxaca last year:

"The Oaxaca uprising began June 14, 2006, when the hated state governor, Ulises Ruiz, ordered a bloody pre-dawn attack by 3,500 state police against the strike of the Oaxaca teachers’ union, whose protest camp had occupied a large part of downtown Oaxaca since May 22. The 40,000 strikers and their supporters fought back, and after several hours they drove the police out of the city. Two days later 300,000-400,000 people -- well over half the population of the city and 10 percent of the population of the state -- came out for a mass march in support of the strike, building on two previous mass marches in June. The next day, June 17, organizations supporting the strike convened the first meeting of the Popular Assembly.

"Oaxaca is the poorest state in Mexico and has the country’s largest indigenous population, over 60 percent of the state’s people. The teachers’ strike won mass support by demanding a higher minimum wage for all of Oaxaca -- Mexico’s reactionary system of 'zonification' of states sets lower minimum wages for poorer states. This minimum wage demand, more than the wage demands for the teachers themselves, was most intolerable to Ulises Ruiz and the state government.

"APPO [the "Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca," the leftist guerilla movement in the area] and the teachers’ union have taken over government buildings and set up barricades around the city to stop attacks by vehicles full of government-backed thugs. They have taken over several of Oaxaca’s radio stations, and a women’s march on August 1 seized control of Oaxaca’s official state TV and radio stations. For three weeks the strikers and their supporters controlled the state TV broadcasts. Ulises Ruiz’s forces could not take back control of the TV station, so they attacked it with automatic weapons, destroying equipment and knocking it off the air August 21. While Ruiz does not have the forces to challenge the Oaxaca uprising directly, ambushes and drive-by shootings by paramilitary forces have killed at least five supporters of the uprising. A number of strikers and members of APPO were still being held as political prisoners."

Clearly, Mexico stands in great jeopardy of a "leftist" revolution, and the fact that this is little reported in the American press can do little to make the danger disappear.

But what can the American elites do to confront this crisis: very little at all, especially in light of the fact that its army is tied down in what appears to be a never-ending war in the Middle East?

THE AMERICAN ELITES MUST FIND A WAY AROUND THEIR
INABILITY TO USE THE FULL POWER OF THE MILITARY

Very obviously, the American elites must confront their inability to marshal enough RAW military power to confront these threats - both the one in the Middle East and the one on its southern border. But to do this, it must find a way around popular "grass-roots" opposition in the United States to expanding the military (which, in essence, means the re-establishment of the draft), and the use of TOTAL WAR (genocide) as a means of dealing with its adversaries.

It is precisely here that Naomi Klein's book, The Shock Doctrine, proves illuminating as to just how the elites are most likely to confront this dilemma. Jeremy Scahill writes concerning The Shock Doctrine:

"The Shock Doctrine is the defining, covert history of our era, the work of a journalist embedded not with the militaries of the powerful, but with the poor, the tortured, and those who fight for justice against all odds."

Chalmers Johnson writes:

"Naomi Klein's expose of neoliberal economics [i.e., the policies of the American New World Order System] is certain to be sensational. She rips away the 'free trade' and globalization ideologies that disguise a conspiracy to ... grab public property [both foreign and domestic] for the rich few. Klein's is a long-needed analysis of our headlong flight back to feudalism under the guise of social science and 'freedom'."

Arundhati Roy writes:

"Naomi Klein has written a brilliant, brave and terrifying book. It's nothing less than the secret history of what we call the 'free market' ..."

Howard Zinn writes:

"This is an important book, one of the most important I have read in a very long time."

And, finally, Tim Robbins - whom the Right never tires of defaming and denigrating, but who is a person I deeply admire - writes:

"A revelation! With unparalleled courage and clarity Naomi Klein has written the most important and necessary book of her generation ... "

VERY SOON NOW ...

Very soon now, Shock Doctrine will be applied to the people of the United States, and when it comes, IT WILL COME SUDDENLY and the world as we know it will pass away forever - AND THEN WHAT WILL YOU DO?

God bless you all,

S.R. Shearer
Antipas Ministries