[Peace-discuss] Banks Back US Intervention

Tue Oct 13 01:31:36 CDT 2009

	Assistant Secretary Details Banking Industry's
	Key Role in Foreign Policy	
	Posted By Jason Ditz On October 12, 2009

When covering America’s interventionist foreign policy, certain departments and 
agencies come up a lot. The Defense Department, certainly. The CIA, usually. The 
State Department, the NSA, the list goes on. Rarely does the Treasury Department 
come up, but maybe it should.

Speaking at a conference for the American Bankers Association, Assistant 
Secretary of the Treasury David S. Cohen went into excruciating detail about his 
department’s role in ensuring that the American banking industry is on the front 
lines of fights the world over.

And it really is the world over. From propping up Mexico’s government in what he 
called “a courageous fight against the drug cartels” to preventing Iran from 
“developing nuclear weapons,” there appears to be no overseas endeavor in which 
Secretary Cohen doesn’t envision a massive role for the Treasury Department, and 
for the ostensibly private organizations that make up the banking industry.

Though Cohen made some interesting revelations with respect to Afghanistan, 
including the somewhat surprising claim that the Taliban is much better financed 
than al-Qaeda, the bulk of his speech detailed a chilling ambition to see the 
banking industry pulled ever deeper into the war at home as well as abroad, and 
his claim that “routine suspicious activity” could be the centerpiece of 
uncovering international terror networks suggest that the average person’s 
financial transactions will be under ever-increasing scrutiny.

URL to article: 
http://news.antiwar.com/2009/10/12/treasury-department-at-the-center-of-us-invention-abroad/