karlof1’s Geopolitical Gymnasium
KARL SANCHEZ

Members of the "White Empire" dividing the world.

US Imperialism is and was always in charge of itself in the sense that it didn’t listen to others and made its own decisions, good or bad, as it went along. That its behavior along the way was savage is correct, and it’s also correct it projected that savagery onto those it exterminated—a trait it learned from its European parents well before it gained independence in 1783. In 1890 when the Frontier was officially declared closed, consternation arose within the elite class as to what would be next, although that direction was already in motion as the earlier illegal annexation of Hawaii proved. Low-hanging fruit was seen everywhere, and the nascent US Empire already had a doctrine ready to launch thanks to Alfred Thayer Mahan’s The Influence of Sea Power upon History: 1660–1783 published in 1890 that provided the template for what were to become known as Maritime Empires past and present. Mahan’s ideas were expanded by Halford Mackinder into the first formulations of geopolitics, which Theodore Roosevelt had already put into action by stealing Panama from Colombia, elbowing the Empire way into the Unequal Treaties imposed of China via the Open Door policy that still exists today, and prosecuting the remaining massacres of the American War on Spain. It was in the Philippines where the US Empire began to again rely on terrorism as its main weapon to deal with “savages” not wanting to be colonized.

Woodrow Wilson has been canonized by imperialist historians, but in reality, far from democracy champion, he was a highly hypocritical authoritarian.

The Liberty Narrative imposed on the world beginning with the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago, AKA Chicago World’s Fair initiated the gaslighting of the global public about US intentions. Conduct against its substantial German-American population during WW1, the lies that enabled Wilson to say he was for peace when he wanted war, and the Massive Assault on person liberties during the Palmer Raids and Red Scare coupled with the passage of the unconstitutional Espionage Act were far more illustrative of US Values than giving women the vote and allowing for the direct election of Senators. Of all those, the vast repression of German-Americans has been very nearly erased, far more so than Jim Crow history.

Insistence that Europe repay its war loans directly caused the Great Depression, while prior to that event during the 1920s the US Empire engaged in a form of imperialism known as Dollar Diplomacy where a loan was tendered to a foreign nation who then, unable to pay, had its ports invaded by US Marines who collected import fees to be sent to the bankers as payment. All of that was done in Mexico, Carribean, and Central America where no other nation could interfere. General Smedley Butler’s War is a Racket stem s from all that and more. Clearly, doing whatever it wanted whenever it wanted was a cornerstone of US Imperial behaviour that had moved from the continent to the seas and lands beyond.

Much of the above is known to most but needs reviewing in light of what’s happening today in West Asia most specifically where all too many are under the impression that the Zionists are the Boss instead of the Zionists acting as Agents of Empire. The Zionist enclave in Occupied Palestine was supported by the Outlaw US Empire after WW2 but not decisively so as it had another much more powerful proxy in the region from 1954 to 1979—Iran. Many people forget that very important fact. Iran, however, was more of a tool in the Anti-Communist Crusade than in trying to wrest control of West Asia oil, which was actually very much under the control of the Seven Sisters (Majors) then and still to a degree today. Until the Iranian Revolution in 1979, the Outlaw US Empire had 100% control over West Asian oil—even during the oil embargoes, it still had control as the Majors loved the price increases that boosted their profits greatly. But the Iranian Revolution put all that under threat as all the comprador governments were correctly seen as vulnerable to similar revolutions.

As mentioned, Iran was used as a tool against the USSR, not against Arab states. What was seen as the tool to use against the Arab states was the Zionist enclave, which were seen as a huge problem beginning in the late 1950s with the rise of Pan-Arab Nationalism in the persons of Nasser and Ghaddafi. In the mid-1960s prior to the 1968 Arab-Zionist War, the Fascistic Outlaw US Empire had eliminated its president only to find it confronting a nation that had no stomach for Imperial War or Neocolonial terrorism of the sort waged in Central and South America. Juxtaposed to that was a core of Nazi and Trotsky influenced members of the Democrat Party who installed like-minded people into positions in the State and Defense Departments along with the National Security Council—the CIA needed no alteration because it was fascist from the outset and imbued with Exceptionalism, Megalomania and Pleonexia. This is where we as objectivist consumers of history deeply concerned about where current events are leading need to turn to the few still remaining form those early 1960s when the current foundations for today were formed. And that leads us to today’s Alastair Crooke’s essay, “Israel does what it does; it was always planned this way,” where he distills several long narratives provided by Dr. Michale Hudson that I’ve urged people to watch/read into one complete narrative telling us the how and why and the who. (The two specific podcasts are here and here, while I strenuously suggest reading all his September transcripts.) What’s important for the current debate is the basic relationship between the two—the Boss and its Agent—and how it was formed and has remained ever since. Too many think the Neocons only surfaced in the 1990s or perhaps during Reagan’s term in the 1980s, but both assumptions are incorrect—the posture and policy is a direct result of the Outlaw US Empire’s desire to control the world after WW2 without the interference of any other nations. Here’s Crooke:

With the assassination of Sayed Hassan Nasrallah and a number of the Hizbullah senior leadership in Beirut – expressly without prior warning being given to the Pentagon – Netanyahu fired the start gun on an implicit Israeli widening of war to – using Israel’s term – the ‘octopus’ tentacles’: Hizbullah in Lebanon; Ansarullah in Yemen; the Syrian government and the Iraqi Hash’ad A-Shaabi forces.

Well, after the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh and part of Hizbullah’s leadership cadre (including a senior Iranian general), Iran – demonised as the ‘octopus head’ – entered the conflict with a volley of missiles that targeted airfields, military bases and the Mossad HQ – but intentionally caused no deaths.

Israel thus made the U.S. (and most of Europe) partners or accomplices to a war now definitively cast as neo-imperialism versus the whole of the non-West. Palestinians – the global icons of the aspiration for national liberation – were to be annihilated from historic Palestine.

Further, the bombing in Beirut, and Iran’s riposte to it, now ranges Israel backed and materially supported by the U.S. vs Iran, backed and materially supported by Russia. Israel, the military correspondent of Yedioth Ahronoth warns, ‘must go crazy and strike Iran – because striking Iran “will end the current war”’.

Plainly, it marks the end to ‘playing nice’ – of incrementally escalating, one calculated step after another – as if playing chess with an opponent who calculates similarly. Both now threaten to take a hammer to the chess board. ‘Chess is over’.

It seems that Moscow too, understands that ‘chess’ simply cannot be played when the opponent is no ‘adult’, but a reckless sociopath ready to sweep away the board – to gamble all on an ephemeral ‘great victory’ move.

Looked at dispassionately, either the Israelis are inviting their own demise by over-extending across seven fronts. Or their hope lies with invoking the threat of their demise as the means to bring in the United States. As with Zelensky in Ukraine, there is ‘no hope’ unless the U.S. adds its fire-power decisively – both Netanyahu and Zelensky assume.

So, in West Asia the U.S. is now supporting, no less, than a war against humanity per se, and against the world. This clearly cannot be in America’s self-interest. Do its power-broker Panjandrums realise the possible consequences for it to stand against the World in an act of gross immorality? Netanyahu is betting his house – and now the West’s – on the outcome of his roulette table ‘bet’.

Is there a sense amongst the Panjandrums that the U.S. is betting on the wrong horse? Whilst it seems there are some contrarians placed at a high level in the U.S. military who do have reservations – as in every ‘war game’ the U.S. loses in the Near East – their voices are few. The wider political class clamours for revenge on Iran.

The dilemma of why there are so few opposing voices in Washington has been addressed and explained by Professor Michael Hudson. Hudson explains that matters are not so simple; that context is missing. Professor Hudson’s reply is paraphrased below from two long commentaries (here and here):

“Everything that’s happened today was planned out just 50 years ago, back in 1974 and 1973. “I worked at the Hudson Institute for about five years, 1972 to ‘76. I sat in on meetings with Uzi Arad, who became Netanyahu’s chief military advisor after heading Mossad. I worked very closely with Uzi there … I want to describe how the whole strategy that led to the United States today, not wanting peace, but wanting Israel to take over the whole Near East, took shape gradually.

“On one occasion, I brought my mentor, Terrence McCarthy, to the Hudson Institute, to talk about the Islamic worldview, and every two sentences, Uzi would interrupt: “No, no, we’ve got to kill them all”. And other people, members of the Institute, were also just talking continually about killing Arabs”.

The strategy of using Israel as the regional battering ram to achieve U.S. (imperial) objectives was worked out essentially in the 1960s by Senator Henry “Scoop” Jackson. Jackson was nicknamed ‘the Senator from Boeing’ for his support for the military-industrial complex. And the military-industrial complex backed him to become chair of the Democratic National Committee. He was too twice an unsuccessful candidate for the Democratic nomination for the 1972 and 1976 Presidential elections.

Well, he was backed by Herman Kahn too, who became the key strategist for U.S. hegemony in the Hudson Institute.

Initially, Israel didn’t really play a role in the U.S. plan; Jackson (of Norwegian descent) simply hated communism, he hated the Russians, and had a lot of support within the Democratic Party. But when all of this strategy was being put together, Herman Khan’s great achievement was to convince the U.S. Empire builders that the key to achieving their control in the Middle East was to rely on Israel as its foreign legion.

And that arms-length arrangement enabled the U.S. to play the role, Hudson says, of the ‘good cop’, whilst designating Israel to play its role as ruthless proxy. And that’s why the State Department turned over management of U.S. diplomacy to Zionists – to separate and distinguish Israeli behaviour from the claimed probity of U.S. imperialism.

Herman Khan described the virtue of Jackson for Zionists to Professor Hudson as precisely that he was not Jewish, a defender of the military complex and a strong opponent of the arms control system that was underway. Jackson fought against arms control – “we’ve got to have war”. And he proceeded to stuff the State Department and other U.S. agencies with neocons (Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Pearl, Douglas Fife, among others), who, from the beginning, planned for a permanent worldwide war. The takeover of government policy was led by Jackson’s former senate aides.

Herman’s analysis was systems analysis: Firstly, define the overall aim and then work backwards.“Well, you can see what the Israeli policy is today. First of all, you isolate the Palestinians [into] strategic hamlets. That’s what Gaza had already been turned into for the last 15 years”.

“The aim all along has been to kill them. Or first of all, to make life so unpleasant for them that they’ll emigrate. That’s the easy way. Why would anyone want to stay in Gaza when what’s happening to them is what’s happening today? You’re going to leave. But if they don’t leave, you’re going to have to kill them, ideally by bombing because that minimizes the domestic casualties”, Hudson notes.

“And nobody seems to have noticed that what is happening in Gaza and the West Bank now – is all based on the “strategic hamlets” idea from the Vietnam war: the fact that you could just divide all of Vietnam into little parts, having guards at all the transition points from one part to another. Everything that Israel is doing to the Palestinians in Gaza and elsewhere throughout Israel was pioneered in Vietnam”.

If you analysed these neo-cons, Hudson relates,

“they had a virtual religion. I met many at the Hudson Institute; some of them, or their fathers, were Trotskyists. And they picked up Trotsky’s idea of permanent revolution. That is, an unfolding revolution – whereas Trotsky said began in Soviet Russia was going to spread around the world: The neo-cons adapted this and said, “No, the permanent Revolution is the American Empire – it’s going to expand, and expand and nothing can stop us – to the entire world”.

The Scoop Jackson neo-cons were brought in – from the beginning – to do exactly what they’re doing today. To empower Israel as America’s proxy, to conquer the oil-producing countries, and make them part of greater Israel.

“And the aim of the United States was always oil. That meant the United States had to secure the Near East and there were two proxy armies to do it. And these two armies fought together as allies, down to today. On the one hand, the al-Qaeda jihadis, on the other hand, their managers, the Israelis, hand in hand”.

“[W]hat we’re seeing is, as I said, a charade that somehow what Israel is doing is “all Netanyahu’s fault, all the fault of the Right-wing there” – and yet from the very beginning they were promoted, supported with huge amounts of money, all of the bombs they needed, all the armaments they needed, all the funding they needed … All of that was given to them precisely to do exactly what they’re doing today”.

“No, there can’t be a two-state solution because Netanyahu said, “We hate the Gazans, we hate the Palestinians, we hate the Arabs – there cannot be a two-state solution and here’s my map,” before the United Nations, “here’s Israel: there’s no one who’s not Jewish in Israel – we’re a Jewish state” – he comes right out and says it”.

Hudson then gets to the bottom of it all. He points us to the fundamental game-changer: Why it is difficult for the U.S. to change its approach – the Vietnam War had shown that any attempted conscription by western democracies was not viable. Lyndon Johnson in 1968 had to withdraw from running for election precisely because everywhere he would go, there would be non-stop stop-the-war demonstrations.

The ‘bedrock’ which Hudson underlines, is the understanding that western democracies no longer can field a domestic army through conscription. ‘And what that means is that today’s tactics are limited to bombing, but not occupying countries.Thus, Israel – whose forces are limited – can drop bombs on Gaza and Hezbollah, and try to knock out things, but neither the Israeli army, nor any other army, would really be able to invade and try to take over a country, or even south Lebanon – in the way that armies did in World War II – so the U.S. drew the lesson. It turned to proxies’.

“So what is left for the United States? Well, I think there’s only one form of non-atomic war that democracies can afford, and that’s terrorism [i.e positively seeking huge collateral deaths]. And I think you should look at Ukraine and Israel as the terrorist alternative to atomic war”, Hudson suggests.

The bottom line, he notes, is what then does this imply with Israel continuing to insist on engaging the U.S. in its regional war? The U.S. is not going to send troops. It can’t do that. The ruling cadre have tried terrorism and the result of terrorism is to align the rest of the world against the West, appalled by the wanton killing and by the breaking of all of the rules of war.

Hudson concludes, “I don’t see Congress being reasonable. I think that the State Department and the National Security Agency and the Democratic Party leadership, with its basis in the military-industrial complex, is absolutely committed”.

The latter might say “Well, who wants to live in a world where we can’t control? Who wants to live in a world where other countries are independent, where they have their own policy? Who wants to live in a world where we can’t siphon off their economic surplus for us? If we can’t take everything and dominate the world, well, who wants to live in that kind of a world?”

That’s the mentality with which we’re dealing; ‘Playing nice’ won’t change that paradigm. Failure does. [Emphasis Original]

I note Crooke linked to the transcripts posted at Naked Capitalism, which ought not to differ from those at Hudson’s website. There was little discussion about Crook’s essay in his chat with Judge Napolitano IMO because it contradicts the line held by the Judge and his advisors that Netanyahu’s the Boss. Deemed more important is the current situation in West Asia. It’s a shame because the history told by Hudson and seconded by Crooke is essential contextually to what’s happening now and what’s been happening since 1968. There’s an important summation provided by my colleague Outraged at Moon of Alabama that will help fill in the gaps for those who don’t remember and educate those for whom the history is new:

Israel IS doomed, and will be abandoned by Empire.

Israel only started on a path as a pampered expendable proxy of Empire only after the Fall of former primary proxy in the ME, Pahlavi Iran, and only minimally. '73 Yom Kippur was a limited Cold War proxy conflict between Empire/US & then USSR.
See: Iranian Revolution, prelude, aftermath, consequences. Previous status & role & relationship re Iran/US/UK as its most privileged Military Proxy in the ME.

Only after the unsuccessful utilization by Empire of Iraq under Saddam Hussein, through the slaughter & horror of the Iran-Iraq war (Ukraine is a redux) did Empire via US/UK/NATO & suborned Arab puppet rulers, then begin to transfer to Israel as a probable next primary expendable proxy.

See: Iran-Iraq war, 1980-1988.

Note: PRC became essentially an Iranian co-belligerent, arming and assisting Iran throughout the War, and ever since. A de facto, undeclared, low profile ally since 1980. Think on it.

Post peace treaty, 'cause Saddam refused to do a Zelensky with Iraq, when Iraq pulled on the leash & went rogue, had to be put down.

See: Invasion of Iraq I & II, subsequent Iraq War.

Ultimately a failure alongside Afghanistan War (Targeting USSR/'Stans/yet especially PRC), further shifting focus to Israel.

Israel minor wars & conflicts post '73 supported by Empire yet not major 'interest'.

Oct 7 '23 opening of hostilities is Empire enacted/protected/sponsored move due utter failure of Ukraine Proxy war, imminent conclusion.

Israel is expendable ... just as for all the rest ...

Empire, Global/transnational, not US vassal, only has 'Interests'.

See the forest beyond the trees, ignore the great wurlitzer & smothering distractions & ever present propaganda.

To misquote: Events matter, dear boy. Events!

Recall history folks & especially:
(1) to what Empires long term strategic Purpose/Objective
(2) Cui Bono ?

Empire never truly risks, mano a mano, a near peer, full peer, multi-peer contestation, that could result in conclusive utter defeat/collapse. Always refuses the gauntlet, and withdraws from the field.

Though now is Empire not only, naked & out of ordnance, with an extraordinarily incompetent & expensive yard workskop substituting for a nation State tech/industrial base/s, and only 25% of, ie US, possible enlistees let alone potentially draftees even minimally combat capable, historically a confirmed coward.
See: Brave, Brave Sir Robin. (Youtube)

PS further to previous posts on same theme:
US response, consequences, to '83 Lebanon barracks bombing, in response to direct engagement on the ground re Israel invasion ... bubkiss & withdrawal.

PPS Dougie MacArthur, Korean War, travesty of UN Command in Korea(still extant!) vs damned pinko commies in China: No Nukes for You! Oh, and, you're fired! 😉

History, most definitely, does indeed appear to, rhyme.

I hope his shorthand was understandable to most. To review, Iran was a tool of Anti-Communist containment while control of oil was presumed to be everlasting. The Zionists were hedges against Arab Nationalism that threatened control of oil. And given the Outlaw US Empire was a Settler State, it empathized with the Zionist adage that they were a people without a land who discovered a land without a people (Paraphrase of David Ben-Gurion) since that was the same story/myth the USA told itself and taught its children. And then there’s this very important point provided by Dr. Wolff in the most recent podcast:

By the way, this notion of “land hunger” is a replication of what the Nazis called Lebensraum: room to live. The Nazis moved east in Europe to get it; the Israelis move west to get it. But that’s what this has become, and it will take a radical change of the mentality of the Israelis to change it.

The Zionist Project is what it’s always been, the ousting of all from Palestine so it can be claimed as Judea. The Outlaw US Empire wants it to attain that goal as it eases its way forward in the Big Picture War against Humanity. In closing, I’m adding this very important point supplied by Dr. Hudson in the second most recent podcast:

And if you look at the neo-cons, they had a virtual religion. I met many at the Hudson Institute; some of them, or their fathers, were Trotskyists. And they picked up Trotsky’s idea of permanent revolution. That is, an unfolding revolution – what Trotsky said began in Soviet Russia was going to spread to other countries, Germany and the others. But the neo-cons adopted this and said, “No, the permanent revolution is the American Empire – it’s going to expand and expand and nothing can stop us for the entire world.”

So what you have is a more or less realistic military -if not at the top, which is sort of a political appointee, at least the generals who have actually done the war games – is realism against a religious fanaticism that has been back because fanatics are more willing to die to the last Israeli or the last Ukrainian than realists who look at the situation and try to do what, let’s say, President Xi and China talks about: the win-win situation. Well already, when this split began to occur in the 1970s, I actually heard discussions of the idea that: let’s rethink World War II, that it was really fought over was “what kind of socialism is going to be after the war? Is it going to be national socialism -Nazism- or democratic socialism emerging out of the dynamics and self-interest of industrial capitalism?” Well, much of the government was backing from 1945, the minute of peace, the American government began supporting Nazism. [My Emphasis]

In 1996 and again in 1999, the Neocon Doctrine emphasized above was put into print and published in Joint Vision 2010 and Joint Vision 2020—Full Spectrum Domination of the planet and its people being the goal, and another paper in support of that doctrine and goal suggested a “new Pearl Harbor” was needed to motivate the populous since it was mostly pacific and remains so. Many millions knew Colin Powell lied at the UNSC when he held up the vial of borax. How much more gaslighting will be done to residents of the Empire before they finally call the huge bluff that directly relates to the vast lie of their existence? As John Kerry recently confessed, free speech makes it hard to control America. So, here again we have the party of Control trying to contain the party of Movement, which is actually an unled, uncontrolled populism that has nothing to do with Donald Trump, although he’s hijacked some of it. But that amorphous mass knows too little about its genuine past, nor does the Global Majority know how it can help the mass overthrow the oligarchy that controls them and impoverishes the nation.

Not only does history rhyme, it’s vital to our current and future wellbeing.