Listen to a reading of this article: ❖ The US government is reportedly close to securing a deal with Pakistan that will ensure its ability to continue military and intelligence operations in Afghanistan, the nation where the Biden administration proudly "ended" a decades-long war.
"The goal of the empire is to be able to topple governments and dominate the globe without incurring a negative perception among the inhabitants of the US and its client states. It has been doing this with a combination of (A) shifting to more "light touch" interventionism which doesn't garner as much negative attention as full-scale ground invasions and (B) a global perception management campaign of historically unprecedented scale and sophistication."
(C) Militarizing US police forces to ensure groups opposed to the Empire are silenced.
And perhaps...
(D) Buying off any political obstruction: ie Sinema. (Although, Ryan Grimm kind of nailed that today)
Russia and/or China need to supply Afghanistan with sophisticated air defenses. Or, I remember a few years back Iran brought down a US drone with electronics. Either way is fine with me. I don't want any more Afghans slaughtered.
Our military doesn't represent us; our politicians don't represent us; and our media don't represent us. Not to get all Fundamentalist, but our Declaration of Independence is pretty clear about what to do when this sort of situation arises.
There are those who argue that blaming the troops is wrong; it's just the rotten civilian leadership who is to blame. I disagree. Who do you suppose will be transporting, maintaining, and piloting those drones -- Kamala Harris?
Imagine the shock, horror and demands for massive retaliation if, say, Cuba, Venezuela or Bolivia were to openly conduct military and intelligence operations in, say, Florida. Capitalist USA (and the term should be used as often as 'Communist China' used to be) imagines that only it has the right to do as it wishes anywhere on the planet.
I can be a bit of a smarty pants, a know it all, so it’s good when someone gives me a jolt - this one gave me a jolt. How very simple, the withdrawal is optics, the campaign continues, that escaped me (and I don’t mean the bungled departure).
Imran Kahn knows better, though the zionists will do everything and anything to corrupt and/or blackmail him into submission. plus, China and Russia must have a few tricks in their bag too against further troubles on their borders.
I, too, am disturbed at notions or actuality of 'empire' or even 'empire building', regardless of how it manifests.
I, too, am disturbed at the lives physically lost by both military personnel and civilians, as well as the dispossession, destruction of community, loss of freedoms, poverty, ill-health & other effects of war, armed conflict, militarism, hard-line ideology, fanatical religious belief and greed driven ideologies.
I don't have status, position or power, nor any incisive or extraordinary intellect. However, I do recognise, (or at least believe that I recognise), the considerable influence that social conditioning, religious indoctrination, cultural legacy, warped recounting of history and probably many more insidious factors are the major contributors to or even causes of non-natural disasters and major harmful events and situations in which human-beings find themselves throughout the World but particular in what has long been deprecatingly known as the 'third world', i.e. the majority world.
At the same time , (and please believe that I am not making some sly attempt at apologia for empire and its like, I am also aware that this type of activity has been present throughout human history. No, I do not say that we ought to accept it or that its continuous existence makes it right or even acceptable. What I think I am saying or perhaps suggesting is that it seems to be a characteristic of humanity.
My experience is that much simplistic comment and rabid accusations exists across social media platforms, on sensationalist news channels and elsewhere. Almost all of it seems to be severely biased against either the 'mighty power' or against the 'terrorist' and in neither case exhibits any nuanced or even informed understanding of cultural, religious, ideological, political, military or social context and history.
So, I wonder, when human innovation and invention in the technological domain has come so far, why is it that in the humane domain we have still not progressed beyond the level of childish schoolyard argument and bullying and stubborn insistence that right exists on whichever side we prefer?
If commentators are so opposed to oppression, whether manifested through open physical abuse or through largely hidden, insidiously infectious propaganda, why do they so rarely, if ever, offer any substantive, credible and potentially achievable solution to this entrenched failing of humanity? Why do they, in effect, simply indulge in rhetorical diatribes that are very much reflective of exactly what they purport to oppose?
May I add a "(C)" to your list?
"The goal of the empire is to be able to topple governments and dominate the globe without incurring a negative perception among the inhabitants of the US and its client states. It has been doing this with a combination of (A) shifting to more "light touch" interventionism which doesn't garner as much negative attention as full-scale ground invasions and (B) a global perception management campaign of historically unprecedented scale and sophistication."
(C) Militarizing US police forces to ensure groups opposed to the Empire are silenced.
And perhaps...
(D) Buying off any political obstruction: ie Sinema. (Although, Ryan Grimm kind of nailed that today)
Remember folks even when F-35 Bernie was still sheep dogging about a “political revolution” he was still all for drone warfare…
Russia and/or China need to supply Afghanistan with sophisticated air defenses. Or, I remember a few years back Iran brought down a US drone with electronics. Either way is fine with me. I don't want any more Afghans slaughtered.
Our military doesn't represent us; our politicians don't represent us; and our media don't represent us. Not to get all Fundamentalist, but our Declaration of Independence is pretty clear about what to do when this sort of situation arises.
There are those who argue that blaming the troops is wrong; it's just the rotten civilian leadership who is to blame. I disagree. Who do you suppose will be transporting, maintaining, and piloting those drones -- Kamala Harris?
We need a national strike.
Imagine the shock, horror and demands for massive retaliation if, say, Cuba, Venezuela or Bolivia were to openly conduct military and intelligence operations in, say, Florida. Capitalist USA (and the term should be used as often as 'Communist China' used to be) imagines that only it has the right to do as it wishes anywhere on the planet.
Very good piece, simple clear concise.
I can be a bit of a smarty pants, a know it all, so it’s good when someone gives me a jolt - this one gave me a jolt. How very simple, the withdrawal is optics, the campaign continues, that escaped me (and I don’t mean the bungled departure).
Imran Kahn knows better, though the zionists will do everything and anything to corrupt and/or blackmail him into submission. plus, China and Russia must have a few tricks in their bag too against further troubles on their borders.
I, too, am disturbed at notions or actuality of 'empire' or even 'empire building', regardless of how it manifests.
I, too, am disturbed at the lives physically lost by both military personnel and civilians, as well as the dispossession, destruction of community, loss of freedoms, poverty, ill-health & other effects of war, armed conflict, militarism, hard-line ideology, fanatical religious belief and greed driven ideologies.
I don't have status, position or power, nor any incisive or extraordinary intellect. However, I do recognise, (or at least believe that I recognise), the considerable influence that social conditioning, religious indoctrination, cultural legacy, warped recounting of history and probably many more insidious factors are the major contributors to or even causes of non-natural disasters and major harmful events and situations in which human-beings find themselves throughout the World but particular in what has long been deprecatingly known as the 'third world', i.e. the majority world.
At the same time , (and please believe that I am not making some sly attempt at apologia for empire and its like, I am also aware that this type of activity has been present throughout human history. No, I do not say that we ought to accept it or that its continuous existence makes it right or even acceptable. What I think I am saying or perhaps suggesting is that it seems to be a characteristic of humanity.
My experience is that much simplistic comment and rabid accusations exists across social media platforms, on sensationalist news channels and elsewhere. Almost all of it seems to be severely biased against either the 'mighty power' or against the 'terrorist' and in neither case exhibits any nuanced or even informed understanding of cultural, religious, ideological, political, military or social context and history.
So, I wonder, when human innovation and invention in the technological domain has come so far, why is it that in the humane domain we have still not progressed beyond the level of childish schoolyard argument and bullying and stubborn insistence that right exists on whichever side we prefer?
If commentators are so opposed to oppression, whether manifested through open physical abuse or through largely hidden, insidiously infectious propaganda, why do they so rarely, if ever, offer any substantive, credible and potentially achievable solution to this entrenched failing of humanity? Why do they, in effect, simply indulge in rhetorical diatribes that are very much reflective of exactly what they purport to oppose?