[Peace-discuss] "Master Plan for future access to and operations in Central Asia."

[Morton K. Brussel]

It's good to have Fox Fallon deconstructed. No peace-nic he.  --mkb


On Jul 22, 2008, at 6:15 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote:

> [From a recent Official Hero of the Anti-War Movement, Adm.  
> "Fox" (sic) Fallon...  --CGE]
>
>
> 	CENTCOM's Master Plan and U.S. Global Hegemony
> 	By Robert Higgs
> 	22/07/08 "Lewrockwell"
>
> Many people deny that the U.S. government presides over a global  
> empire. If you speak of U.S. imperialism, they will fancy that you  
> must be a decrepit Marxist-Leninist who has recently awakened after  
> spending decades in a coma. Yet the facts cannot be denied, however  
> much people's ideology may predispose them to distort or obfuscate  
> those facts.
>
> How can a government that maintains more than 800 military  
> facilities in more than 140 different foreign countries be anything  
> other than an imperial power? The hundreds of thousands of troops  
> who operate those bases and conduct operations from them, not to  
> mention the approximately 125,000 sailors and Marines aboard the  
> U.S. warships that cruise the oceans, are not going door to door  
> selling Girl Scout cookies. United States of America is the name;  
> intimidation is the game.
>
> Of course, the kingpins who control this massive machinery of  
> coercion never describe it in such terms. In their lexis, American  
> motives and actions are invariably noble. Listening to these  
> bigwigs describe what the U.S. forces abroad are doing, you would  
> never suspect that they seek anything but "regional stability,"  
> "security," "deterrence of potential regional aggressors," and  
> "economic development and cooperation among nations." Inasmuch as  
> hardly anybody favors instability, insecurity, international  
> aggression, economic retrogression, and mutual strife among  
> nations, the U.S. objectives, and hence the actions taken in their  
> furtherance, would appear to be indisputably laudable.
>
> Yet, from time to time, a U.S. leader lets slip an expression so  
> revealing that it warrants a thousand times greater weight than the  
> vague, mealy-mouthed banalities they routinely dispense. I came  
> across such a statement recently. In seeking funds in 2007 for  
> construction of a $62 million ammunition storage facility at Bagram  
> Air Base, Admiral William J. Fallon, then the commander of the U.S.  
> Central Command (CENTCOM), referred to Bagram as "the centerpiece  
> for the CENTCOM Master Plan for future access to and operations in  
> Central Asia."
>
> Pause to savor this phrase for a moment; let it roll around in your  
> mind: CENTCOM Master Plan for future access to and operations in  
> Central Asia. What an intriguing expression! What dramatic images  
> of future U.S. military actions it evokes! But can those actions be  
> anything other than the very sort that empires undertake? Ask  
> yourself: why does the U.S. military anticipate conducting  
> operations in Central Asia, a region that lies thousands of miles  
> from the United States and comprises countries that lack either the  
> capacity or the intention to seriously harm Americans who mind  
> their own business in their own national territory? Indeed, what is  
> the U.S. military doing in Central Asia in the first place? Have  
> you ever heard of "the Great Game"?
>
> When the Army sought the funds for the new ammunition storage  
> facility at Bagram again this year, its request echoed Admiral  
> Fallon's sentiments by stating: "As a forward operating site,  
> Bagram must be able to provide for a long term, steady state  
> presence which is able to surge to meet theater contingency  
> requirements." The statement's reference to "a long term, steady  
> state presence" would seem to be especially revealing because it  
> takes for granted that U.S. forces will not be leaving this part of  
> the world any time soon. Giving even more weight to this  
> interpretation, Congress approved not only the $62 million for the  
> ammunition storage facility, but also $41 billion for a 30-megawatt  
> electrical power plant at Bagram, a plant large enough to serve  
> more than 20,000 American homes.
>
> Along the same lines, Lt. Colonel John Sotham, commander of the 455  
> Expeditionary Force Support Squadron, which is now stationed at  
> Bagram Air Base, recently described a number of improvements his  
> squadron is making at the base, looking toward giving it "a more  
> permanent footprint." He added: "It's pretty clear that the U.S.  
> Air Force will be at Camp Cunningham [a living area at Bagram] and  
> involved in the fight against terrorism for a very long time." He  
> relished the opportunity to "help drive Bagram from expeditionary  
> to enduring!"
>
> The United States government divides the world into six military  
> regions called Unified Combatant Commands. (A separate Africa  
> Command has been created only recently. Once it is fully  
> operational, it will include all of the African countries except  
> Egypt. A few other northeastern African countries were previously  
> included in the Central Command's area of responsibility.) The  
> Central Command, abbreviated as CENTCOM, stretches from Egypt,  
> Saudi Arabia, and Yemen in the West to Kazakhstan, Kyrgystan,  
> Tajikistan, and Pakistan in the East. The easternmost reaches of  
> this combatant area butt up against India, China, and Russia.
>
> Looking carefully at the map, one discovers that Israel is not  
> included in the CENTCOM area, but in the European Command area. In  
> a sense, however, we may describe the twenty-one countries in  
> CENTCOM's newly defined "area of responsibility" as a sort of  
> logical complement of Israel: the people of every one of these  
> countries devoutly wish (and here I have chosen my adverb  
> carefully) that Israel had never come into existence and that it  
> will go out of existence as soon as possible. Thus, CENTCOM's area,  
> inhabited predominantly by Muslims, comprises a predominant subset  
> of Israel's avowed enemies.
>
> It comes as no surprise, then, that of all the unified commands,  
> CENTCOM is the one in which, in today's world, the U.S. empire's  
> rubber meets the road most abrasively. The command's area of  
> responsibility includes a great part of the world's known petroleum  
> and natural gas deposits, a preponderance of Israel's enemies, and  
> the places in which the George W. Bush administration has chosen to  
> focus its so-called Global War on Terror. Of course, the region  
> also includes Iraq and Afghanistan, where U.S. forces have been  
> fighting for years, and, sandwiched between these two battlefields,  
> Iran, where Dick Cheney and the rest of the neocons ardently desire  
> to extend the fighting at the earliest opportunity.
>
> The high imperial authorities are not embarrassed by the U.S.  
> empire; on the contrary, they are immensely proud of it. They  
> simply do not describe their activities as the maintenance and  
> exploitation of an empire. If you care to read an extended example,  
> I invite you to peruse Admiral Fallon's testimony of May 3, 2007,  
> before the Senate Armed Services Committee, regarding CENTCOM'S  
> "posture." This carefully prepared statement, written in impeccable  
> military bureaucratese, illustrates well how imperial commanders  
> wish to represent their forces' actions and, equally important, how  
> members of Congress wish to have those actions represented to them.  
> Of course, it's all a solemn farce, a polished and meaningless  
> charade staged purely for public-relations purposes―a ceremonial  
> hors d'oeuvres served in public before the diners consume the  
> entrée, which consists of a massive amount of the taxpayers' money  
> ladled out to the armed forces and their civilian contractors.
>
> "Our top priority," Fallon declares, "is achieving stability and  
> security in Iraq." Everyone knows, of course, that Iraq was more  
> stable and secure before the U.S. invasion, which suggests that  
> perhaps the quickest way to reestablish those conditions is for the  
> U.S. forces to leave the country. Certainly many Iraqis resolutely  
> oppose a permanent U.S. presence there, and some of them will  
> continue their violent resistance to U.S. forces as long as the  
> Americans remain. Intelligent adults also know that when Fallon or  
> any other U.S. official speaks of achieving stability and security,  
> he has in mind the achievement of those blessed conditions only on  
> terms acceptable to the U.S. government, and most likely in  
> accordance with its prescription. That the U.S. forces will ever  
> pull out of Iraq and leave the Iraqis to do as they please is  
> virtually impossible to conceive at this point. Indeed, a mere  
> pullout is nearly inconceivable, despite the great amount of talk  
> that goes on about it on both sides. On the Iraqi side, this talk  
> is sincere; on the U.S. side, it is all for show.
>
> Fallon testified that in Afghanistan, "the foundation of security  
> and governance is in place." He must have known how ludicrous that  
> statement was. Outside of Kabul, the U.S. forces, their allies, and  
> the puppet regime control hardly anything, and U.S. and allied  
> forces that move about the country are at constant risk of attack.  
> The Taliban has not been vanquished, and in fact it has been  
> rebuilding its ranks and its operational capabilities recently. The  
> likelihood that outside forces will ever impose their designs on  
> Afghanistan's backward but fiercely resilient tribesmen verges on  
> nil. Even Fallon has the temerity to observe that "parts of the  
> country have never known centralized governance." Great powers have  
> sought to conquer Afghanistan and bend it to their imperial will  
> for centuries, never with more than short-lived success. Eventually  
> the imperialists leave, and the Afghans remain.
>
> In an earlier day, Rudyard Kipling advised "The Young British  
> Soldier" who served in Britain's imperial army:
>
> When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains,
> And the women come out to cut up what remains,
> Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
> An' go to your Gawd like a soldier.
>
> It's probably still good advice. Alternatively, you can get  
> yourself killed by your own comrades and instantly become a Great  
> American Hero, thanks to the Great American Military Bullshit  
> Information Team (GAMBIT).
>
> Continuing his parade of politicking platitudes, Fallon declares  
> that "Iran's most destabilizing activity has been the pursuit of  
> nuclear weapons technology in defiance of the international  
> community." Of course, if the Iranians have undertaken any such  
> pursuit at all, which remains in doubt, it has been not in defiance  
> of the mythical "international community," but in defiance of the  
> United States and Israel, as everybody who reads the newspapers  
> knows. It is nothing short of astonishing that U.S. officials speak  
> in almost hysterical tones of the threat posed by nonexistent  
> Iranian nuclear weapons, yet never breathe a word about the  
> hundreds of such weapons already in the Israeli arsenal, not to  
> mention the thousands that remain at the disposal of U.S. forces.  
> Of course, members of Congress, who live in mortal fear of the  
> American Israel Political Affairs Committee (AIPAC), want to be  
> seen listening to this phony-baloney message, so military  
> politicians such as Admiral Fallon dare not disappoint them.
>
> Fallon arranged the bulk of his testimony around a description of  
> how CENTCOM's "initiatives are organized into five focus areas:  
> setting conditions for stability in Iraq; expanding governance and  
> security in Afghanistan; degrading violent extremist networks and  
> operations; strengthening relationships and influencing states to  
> contribute to regional stability; and posturing the force to build  
> and sustain joint and combined war fighting capabilities and  
> readiness." Notice that except possibly for the third item listed  
> ("degrading violent extremist networks and operations"), none of  
> this has more than a very remote connection with defending the  
> people of the United States against foreign enemies.
>
> Instead, it has everything to do with maintenance of the U.S.  
> empire in the Middle East and Central Asia. The U.S. government  
> maintains a lavishly financed Department of Defense, ostensibly to  
> protect Americans in their own country from foreign attackers. In  
> reality, however, this department acts as an overfed foreign  
> legion, operating around the world as an offensive or potentially  
> offensive force to bully other countries into submission to the  
> U.S. government's wishes.
>
> To read Fallon's testimony is to take a refresher course in U.S.  
> nation building. He speaks about "infrastructure development,"  
> "provision of basic services to Iraq's citizens," and improving  
> "local government performance and capacity." In Afghanistan, he  
> perceives that the "priorities are roads and electricity, followed  
> by agricultural development, microcredit, job skills, and  
> education." The occupation force, he testified, "is actively  
> pursuing initiatives in these areas, from building schools and  
> providing them with supplies to encouraging and stimulating the  
> growth of small businesses." Should we laugh or cry?
>
> Someone needs to remind the admiral and his audience that the  
> military is trained and equipped to dispense death and destruction.  
> Military leaders know nothing about nation building, and their  
> efforts along these lines result only in gigantic waste of time,  
> money, and lives. (Of course, we must never forget, especially when  
> discussing the U.S. empire, that one man's waste is another man's  
> fabulously enriching government contract.)
>
> To make matters even worse, "CENTCOM supports US government and  
> United Kingdom lead nation counter-narcotics activities." No U.S.  
> war is complete, it seems, without dragging the disastrous drug war  
> along with it.
>
> The imperial authorities constantly emphasize their efforts to  
> promote our security by suppressing "violent extremism" abroad.  
> Repeat after me: extremism always bad; moderation always good. If  
> Barry Goldwater were alive today and still telling us that  
> "extremism in defense of liberty is no vice," he might well be  
> placed on the Air Force's target list for the Predator drone. While  
> decrying the violent extremists in the Middle East, Admiral Fallon  
> notes: "Unfortunately, their tactics and radical ideology remain  
> almost unchallenged by voices of moderation." It takes a heap of  
> chutzpah to impose sanctions on a country, killing hundreds of  
> thousands of children and others with weakened immune systems, then  
> invade the country, killing hundreds of thousands of men, women,  
> and children by bombing, shooting, shelling, beating, stabbing,  
> suffocating, and immolating them, then create such chaos and  
> violence among the populace that millions are forced to abandon  
> their residence and rendered homeless, then announce your regret  
> that so few speak in favor of moderation. Next thing you know, the  
> Devil will express regret that so few denizens of Hell speak in  
> favor of fraternal kindness and Christian charity.
>
> Fallon aims at "de-legitimizing the underlying social and political  
> movements that support" the extremist groups. He fails to recognize  
> that such delegitimization is utterly impossible as long as the  
> U.S. forces continue to occupy Iraq and Afghanistan and to  
> brutalize their people. The admiral proposes "building capacity in  
> governance and security that helps at-risk societies address  
> problems that foster internal and local grievances." The  
> overwhelming grievance in the Middle East, however, is the presence  
> of U.S. forces and Washington's support for local dictators and  
> their legions of thugs. Fallon, however, looks to "empowering  
> credible experts to expose the flaws and internal contradictions of  
> the enemy's ideology; provide viable, competing alternative  
> worldviews; and contest the intellectual 'safe harbors' where  
> extremist ideas incubate." U.S. military leaders seem to have made  
> a little progress since the days when they lived by the motto, "If  
> you've got 'em by the balls, their hearts and minds will follow."  
> Yet the idea that in the midst of everything the U.S. forces are  
> doing in the Middle East they can employ "credible experts" to  
> transform the dominant ideology is sheer lunacy. Al-Qaida requires  
> no wily recruiting agents in Afghanistan and Iraq; its supporters  
> need only invite people to look out their windows.
>
> Fallon speaks glowingly of the various Middle Eastern dictatorships  
> with whom the U.S. government maintains cordial relationships.  
> (It's amazing how many "friends" you can win with a combination of  
> generous bribes and credible threats.) The United States' "close,  
> reliable partner nations" include such paragons of social and  
> political modernity as "Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Bahrain, and  
> Pakistan." Moreover, "Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia,  
> and the United Arab Emirates are important partners in maintaining  
> stability in the Gulf." An honest observer feels compelled to  
> recognize, however, that every one of the filthy-rich sheiks in  
> these desert despotisms would gladly cut Fallon's throat if they  
> weren't raking in such fabulous amounts of money from the current  
> arrangements.
>
> The admiral does recognize a few problems. "Our present inventory  
> of language and intelligence specialists (especially human  
> intelligence) and counterintelligence agents does not support  
> current requirements." Translation: because we don't speak or  
> understand Arabic, Pashto, Persian, or any other local language in  
> this part of the world, we haven't a clue as to what's going on in  
> the politics and social life of these countries, and therefore we  
> are constantly at the mercy of English-speaking collaborators who  
> will take the risk of feeding us lies and fabricated "intelligence"  
> long enough to get rich and then flee the country before their  
> infuriated countrymen kill them.
>
> Notwithstanding the many troubles that plague the imperial  
> crusaders in CENTCOM's area of responsibility, Fallon bravely  
> concludes, "we fight tirelessly against those who would do us  
> harm." He fails to mention, however, that the people of southwest  
> Asia would harbor no grievances whatsoever against Americans if the  
> U.S. government had only possessed the intelligence and the decency  
> to stay out of their affairs.
>
> Robert Higgs [send him mail] is senior fellow in political economy  
> at the Independent Institute and editor of The Independent Review.  
> He is also a columnist for LewRockwell.com. His most recent book is  
> Neither Liberty Nor Safety: Fear, Ideology, and the Growth of  
> Government. He is also the author of Depression, War, and Cold War:  
> Studies in Political Economy, Resurgence of the Warfare State: The  
> Crisis Since 9/11 and Against Leviathan: Government Power and a  
> Free Society.
>
> Copyright © 2008 Robert Higgs
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