<html><head></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; ">Bacevich was talking <i>only</i> about the effectiveness of the military, and how that has changed. He doen't go into the political aspects. I'm sure you are aware that he has criticized the Empire elsewhere, although I don't know whether he has condemned the global capitalism that is inherent to it. --mkb<div><br></div><div>See the article of Nader on Common Dreams which rather effectively describes what's happening in Afghanistan. </div><div><br></div><div><a href="http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/07/31-4">http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/07/31-4</a></div><div><br></div><div>Nader also neglects to discuss the motivations for our occupations, although one of his readers does:</div><div><br></div><div><div class="submitted"><i>Mr. Nader forgets to address the primary
reason the US went in Afghanistan, to secure the oil and natural gas
pipeline and therefore maintain the American hegemony in the region, as
determined by the Cheney's energy task force meetings in 2001.</i></div><div class="content"><p><i>…</i></p><p><i>The cost in dollars and blood means nothing to politicians and the
corporations when so much profit's at stake and when they're personally
out to make billions. Casualties, armaments and expenditures at record
levels mean nothing when compared to the financial goals already
achieved, and the ones which will be achieved in the next few years. The
US will not leave</i>.</p></div><div><div>On Jul 31, 2010, at 12:09 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><blockquote type="cite"><div>I don't think so. It seems rather silly to me. Bacevich argues that there's been a Fukuyamist change - "The End of (Military) History" - because of "the Failure of the Western Way of War."<br><br>But it hasn't failed. The US and Israel control the vast region from Palestine to Pakistan, from Central Asia to the Horn of Africa - home of the world's hydrocarbons - despite occasional setbacks (e.g., the US never wanted elections in Iraq, but the resistance of the population insisted upon them). Bacevich seems to think that the occupations have failed. On the contrary, it looks to be in pretty good shape, as the US Congress votes $33 BILLION more for escalation in Afghanistan.<br><br>It's important to see that the governments of the US and Israel want war, and the people of the region don't. The existence of the war justifies the presence of the US & Israeli military throughout the region. Add to that the significant social groups in both countries that depend on war - "defense" industries, oil companies, construction and mercenary outfits, settlers and employers of cheap labor, etc.<br><br>It looks as though the only thing that could stop the current success of the "the Western Way of War" is a revolt of domestic populations - and/or of the military - in the US and Israel. But there's little sign of that.<br><br><br>On 7/30/10 9:45 PM, Morton K. Brussel wrote:<br><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">A thoughtful analysis.<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><a href="http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/07/29-6">http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/07/29-6</a><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"> The End of (Military) History? The US, Israel, and the Failure of the Western<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"> Way of War<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">by Andrew Bacevich<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">"In watching the flow of events over the past decade or so, it is hard to avoid<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">the feeling that something very fundamental has happened in world history." This<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">sentiment, introducing the essay that made Francis Fukuyama a household name,<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">commands renewed attention today, albeit from a different perspective.<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">Developments during the 1980s, above all the winding down of the Cold War, had<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">convinced Fukuyama that the "end of history" was at hand. "The triumph of the<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">West, of the Western /idea/," he wrote in 1989, "is evident... in the total<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">exhaustion of viable systematic alternatives to Western liberalism."<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">Today the West no longer looks quite so triumphant. Yet events during the first<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">decade of the present century have delivered history to another endpoint of<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">sorts. Although Western liberalism may retain considerable appeal, the Western<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">way of war has run its course.<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">For Fukuyama, history implied ideological competition, a contest pitting<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">democratic capitalism against fascism and communism. When he wrote his famous<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">essay, that contest was reaching an apparently definitive conclusion.<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">Yet from start to finish, military might had determined that competition's<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">course as much as ideology. Throughout much of the twentieth century, great<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">powers had vied with one another to create new, or more effective, instruments<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">of coercion. Military innovation assumed many forms. Most obviously, there were<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">the weapons: dreadnoughts and aircraft carriers, rockets and missiles, poison<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">gas, and atomic bombs -- the list is a long one. In their effort to gain an<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">edge, however, nations devoted equal attention to other factors: doctrine and<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">organization, training systems and mobilization schemes, intelligence collection<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">and war plans.<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">All of this furious activity, whether undertaken by France or Great Britain,<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">Russia or Germany, Japan or the United States, derived from a common belief in<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">the plausibility of victory. Expressed in simplest terms, the Western military<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">tradition could be reduced to this proposition: war remains a viable instrument<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">of statecraft, the accoutrements of modernity serving, if anything, to enhance<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">its utility. … (read on)<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">*<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">*<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">_______________________________________________<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">Peace-discuss mailing list<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><a href="mailto:Peace-discuss@lists.chambana.net">Peace-discuss@lists.chambana.net</a><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><a href="http://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace-discuss">http://lists.chambana.net/mailman/listinfo/peace-discuss</a><br></blockquote></div></blockquote></div><br></div></body></html>