[Peace-discuss] Why Obama makes war on Iran (part of the answer)

[Carl G. Estabrook]

[Note that, in the generally sound piece below, the term 'socialism'  
is used in its Modern American Sense. Like 'libertarian,' it's a term  
with a history of more than a century. But since Americans don't know  
that history, they've constructed new meanings for these apparently  
rootless terms. Socialism*(Modern American Sense) = a polity in which  
a command economy is run by a tiny elite (perhaps no more than 1% of  
the population), whose agents may pretend to be political party  
(Communists, Democrats, etc.)  Where could Americans have got such an  
idea? But it's not a problem, if all the participants in the  
discussion understand how the terms are being used. --CGE]



Killing Dissent with War\

by Jacob G. Hornberger

A point made by James Madison might well explain the U.S. government’s  
strangulation of Iran’s economy with ever-tightening sanctions: “Among  
the Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt  
was apprehended.”

What better way to rally people to the government than a war? Wouldn’t  
we expect many American dissidents, especially those in the Tea Party  
and Occupy movements, to immediately set aside their dissatisfaction  
with the U.S. government’s domestic policies, especially out-of- 
control federal spending and debt, if war were to break out with Iran?

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see that a large segment of the  
American populace is starting to realize that the U.S. government’s  
domestic and foreign policies are at the root of America’s woes.  
Socialism at home and imperialism abroad have led to ever-increasing  
spending and debt, anti-American anger and hatred, and infringements  
on our rights and freedoms here at home.

Look at the support that the Ron Paul campaign is garnering from a  
large segment of American voters. Look at the Tea Party movement. Look  
at the Occupy movement. Discontent is growing. Equally important,  
increasingly people are correctly aiming their dissatisfaction at  
Washington, D.C., because they’re realizing that it’s the U.S.  
government’s policies that are causing the problems.

But as Roman officials understood, there is a very effective way to  
suppress domestic dissatisfaction with the government: Start a war.  
Many people, out of sense of “patriotism,” will immediately set aside  
their complaints and rally to the flag.

Of course, one option is simply to attack Iran first, like the U.S.  
government did with Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya. The problem with  
that route is that it doesn’t inspire Americans to rally to the flag  
as much as when the United States is attacked. When officials want to  
go to war against another nation, the ideal is to maneuver that nation  
into doing the attacking. In that way, U.S. officials can exclaim,  
“We’ve been attacked! We’re innocent! We were just minding our own  
business! This is another day that will live in infamy!”

Of course, when the attack comes, people are expected to forget the  
maneuvering that took place prior to the attack — maneuvering that was  
intended to provoke the other nation into firing the first shot.

That, of course, was how FDR did it prior to the Pearl Harbor attack.  
He placed an embargo on oil to Japan, knowing that it would strangle  
the Japanese war machine. FDR also did his best to humiliate the  
Japanese in negotiations prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor. When the  
attack came, FDR appeared shocked but he had gotten what he wanted —  
America’s entry into World War II, thanks to the attack by Japan on  
the United States.

That’s obviously what the ever-tightening sanctions on Iran are  
designed to do — to cause Iran into responding to the strangulation  
with a military strike — not against the mainland of the United States  
but against some U.S. Naval vessel operating thousands of miles away  
from American shores in the Persian Gulf.

If that retaliation comes, the U.S government will have its excuse to  
do to Iran what it has done to Iraq, Libya, and Afghanistan — to bomb  
Iran to smithereens, with the aim of effecting regime change in Iran,  
as it did in those three countries and, for that matter, as the CIA  
did with its coup in Iran in 1953.

And with the exception of libertarians and possibly a small number of  
conservatives, liberals, and independents, the likelihood is that  
Americans will immediately suppress their complaints against the U.S.  
government and rally to the government in a display of “patriotic”  
wartime fervor.

Equally important, U.S. officials will be able to use such a war to  
continue strangling the freedoms of the American people. That’s  
another point made by Madison — that of all the enemies to freedom,  
war is the biggest, simply because war encompasses all the other  
threats to freedom.

As the possibility of war with Iran increases by the day, it would be  
prudent for Americans to ponder and reflect upon the following words  
of James Madison, the father of the U.S. Constitution:

Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be  
dreaded, because it comprises and develops the germ of every other.  
War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes; and  
armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing  
the many under the domination of the few.

A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long  
be safe companions to liberty. The means of defence agst. foreign  
danger, have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. Among the  
Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was  
apprehended. Throughout all Europe, the armies kept up under the  
pretext of defending, have enslaved the people.

Jacob Hornberger is founder and president of the Future of Freedom  
Foundation.

http://www.fff.org/blog/jghblog2012-01-17.asp


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