The fact that we are here again witnessing the US, UK and France getting involved in the Middle East is both sad, disgusting, enraging and disheartening. That these nations’ leaders could decide to return with violence to that region, this time Syria, after all of their costly blunders in the past is not all that shocking.
These persons are, after all, imperialists and they have and will continue to act as imperialists have always done, that is, kill, pillage and enslave/exploit any nation that is weak enough and which has enough of what they want.
What is shocking and disappointing is how the majority of persons in these countries are seemingly ok with the actions of their leaders.
Take for example the war in Libya: The majority of the population of these countries supported that war as some kind of humanitarian intervention. They believed the media hype about battalions raping people and other stories which were propagated by their respective media houses. They were touched when they saw images of the carnage which was taking place as Gaddafi’s planes opened up on the rebels and their strongholds and as such, went to war.
The truth is that while rape did take place — this sick act has always been used in war, no nation’s army which has fought a major conflict is immune from that charge — there were no battalions raping people (the UN found those reports to be false). The truth also is that while Gaddafi’s planes were effective, he had lost two-thirds of the nation and the army was defecting at a rapid pace. In other words, the need for intervention was not really necessary, but invade they did.
As a result, Libya will probably never be functional again, they have open-air slave markets (way to go Obama), more guns than most places on earth and the country is a hotbed for the West’s favourite enemies (radical Islamic terrorists).
That these persons, who after the illegal invasion of Iraq, swore “never again”, could go to war again on such spurious charges; who can’t state often enough how appalled they are of the goings on in the Mediterranean, can ok this, is. It must be clear now that the majority of persons in those nations really have no problem with the murderous, imperialist actions of their governments.
Sure, massive amounts of persons protested in 2003 against the then looming invasion of Iraq, but opinion polls consistently showed the majority of persons believing the blatant and obvious lies which were called intelligence. Sure, persons tweeted that the Obama administration should not destroy Libya, but the polls showed that the majority again supported the bombing. It seemed that sanity was somewhat restored to those peoples in 2013 when an overwhelming show of force stayed the hand of both the British and American war-machines, but it is clear now that this incident was a one-off, a flash in the pan. Here we are, witnessing massive support in those nations for a military foray abroad.
It is not inconceivable that Assad would gas his own people, leaders do crazy things all the time. However, does it not strike these people as odd that the bombs should start falling hours before OPCW personnel were to arrive to investigate? Does it not strike anyone as weird that this took place shortly after consulting the Noble House of Saud (mortal enemies of Assad)?
That these people have fallen for the Iraq style lie (in shiny new clothes and a new tailor) after only fifteen years — and shortly after the anniversary to boot — can only point to the population of those countries either just not giving a damn or supporting the aggression.
Some may say ‘Isn’t it a bit harsh to blanket label all those citizens as disgusting?’; To that, I say no. Those persons who marched on the streets in ’03 voted for Obama in 2012 (after he had merrily expanded the US military theatres of operation) and are the same ones (for the most part) crying that a tried and tested warmonger lost to an un-tested warmonger.
These people who marched in ’03 voted for Sarkozy, Hollande, Blair, Cameron and May, persons who do nothing but epitomise the concept of imperialism and global domination.
The people of those nations, the powers of the world who are using the Middle East and the rest of the global south as some sort of chess board or wholesale where they can pick up resources on the cheap, are just as culpable for the devastation meted out to the third world as their governments. If they wish for those accusations to stop, if they truly wish that every time they go to those nations they aren’t met with bile and suspicion then they must change how their governments act.
Those persons who yearn for the third world to rise up and shake off the imperialist yoke need to do their job in their imperialist nations to bring it down or admit that they are not only benefiting from these imperial ventures but actually endorse them.
The third world is tired of your belated sympathy and 20/20 hindsight realizations that your actions were counterproductive. It does not take a genius to realize that to respond to a man ‘gassing his own people’ by bombing heavily populated areas makes no sense.
Again, this is no apology for Assad who has done ill to certain segments of the population, but the masses are within his control (territory controlled by the SAA consists of over 70% of the Syrian population and grows as persons flee rebel-held territory) and voted for him and the US and her NATO allies have no mandate to be there. So for her citizens to bay for the blood of Assad or the new Public Enemy number one I say you support Imperialism and all it means, and to those who sit at their keyboards typing in angst thinking they are subverting their state, you need to get a clue. You are part of the problem and will continue to be part of the problem until you wake up and see that your respective nation’s foreign policy hasn’t really changed that much from the 19th century for the Europeans and the 20th century for the US. Michel Briere Womens Jersey
