Dear friends, <\/p>\n
It is time for my quarterly request for donations. As we agreed, my columns and this site will continue as long as your support is forthcoming. <\/p>\n
My column below for this Memorial Day makes it clear what is at stake. If you wish to fully escape The Matrix and see reality as it really is, you are brave and I am honored to have you as readers and supporters. <\/p>\n
If reality is too much for you, then I should cease putting myself at risk.<\/p>\n
Why War Is Inevitable<\/strong><\/p>\n Paul Craig Roberts<\/p>\n Memorial Day is when we commemorate our war dead. Like the Fourth of July, Memorial Day is being turned into a celebration of war. <\/p>\n Those who lose family members and dear friends to war don\u2019t want the deaths to have been in vain. Consequently, wars become glorious deeds performed by noble soldiers fighting for truth, justice, and the American way. Patriotic speeches tell us how much we owe to those who gave their lives so that America could remain free.<\/p>\n The speeches are well-intentioned, but the speeches create a false reality that supports ever more wars. None of America\u2019s wars had anything to do with keeping America free. To the contrary, the wars swept away our civil liberties, making us unfree.<\/p>\n President Lincoln issued an executive order for the arrest and imprisonment of northern newspaper reporters and editors. He shut down 300 northern newspapers and held 14,000 political prisoners. Lincoln arrested war critic US Representative Clement Vallandigham from Ohio and exiled him to the Confederacy. President Woodrow Wilson used WWI to suppress free speech, and President Franklin D. Roosevelt used WWII to intern 120,000 US citizens of Japanese descent on the grounds that race made them suspect. Professor Samuel Walker concluded that President George W. Bush used the \u201cwar on terror\u201d for an across the board assault on US civil liberty, making the Bush regime the greatest danger American liberty has ever faced.<\/p>\n Lincoln forever destroyed states\u2019 rights, but the suspension of habeas corpus and free speech that went hand in hand with America\u2019s three largest wars was lifted at war\u2019s end. However, President George W. Bush\u2019s repeal of the Constitution has been expanded by President Obama and codified by Congress and executive orders into law. Far from defending our liberties, our soldiers who died in \u201cthe war on terror\u201d died so that the president can indefinitely detain US citizens without due process of law and murder US citizens on suspicion alone without any accountability to law or the Constitution.<\/p>\n The conclusion is unavoidable that America\u2019s wars have not protected our liberty but, instead, destroyed liberty. As Alexander Solzhenitsyn said, \u201cA state of war only serves as an excuse for domestic tyranny.\u201d<\/p>\n Southern secession did pose a threat to Washington\u2019s empire, but not to the American people.<\/em> Neither the Germans of WWI vintage nor the Germans and Japanese of WWII vintage posed any threat to the US. As historians have made completely clear, Germany did not start WWI and did not go to war for the purpose of territorial expansion. Japan\u2019s ambitions were in Asia. Hitler did not want war with England and France. Hitler\u2019s territorial ambitions were mainly to restore German provinces stripped from Germany as WWI booty in violation of President Wilson\u2019s guarantees. Any other German ambitions were to the East. Neither country had any plans to invade the US. Japan attacked the US fleet at Pearl Harbor hoping to remove an obstacle to its activities in Asia, not as a precursor to an invasion of America.<\/p>\n Certainly the countries ravaged by Bush and Obama in the 21st century–Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Pakistan, and Yemen posed no military threat to the US. Indeed, these were wars used by a tyrannical executive branch to establish the basis of the Stasi State that now exists in the US. <\/p>\n The truth is hard to bear, but the facts are clear. America\u2019s wars have been fought in order to advance Washington\u2019s power, the profits of bankers and armaments industries, and the fortunes of US companies. Marine General Smedley Butler said, \u201c I served in all commissioned ranks from a second Lieutenant to a Major General. And during that time, I spent most of my time being a high-class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street, and for the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer for capitalism.\u201d<\/p>\n It is more or less impossible to commemorate the war dead without glorifying them, and it is impossible to glorify them without glorifying their wars. <\/p>\n For the entirety of the 21st century the US has been at war, not war against massed armies or threats to American freedom, but wars against civilians, against women, children, and village elders, and wars against our own liberty. Elites with a vested interest in these wars tell us that the wars will have to go on for another 20 to 30 years before we defeat \u201cthe terrorist threat.\u201d<\/p>\n This, of course, is nonsense. There was no terrorist threat until Washington began trying to create terrorists by military attacks, justified by lies, on Muslim populations.<\/p>\n Washington succeeded with its war lies to the point that Washington\u2019s audacity and hubris have outgrown Washington\u2019s judgment. <\/p>\n By overthrowing the democratically elected government in Ukraine, Washington has brought the United States into confrontation with Russia. This is a confrontation that could end badly, perhaps for Washington and perhaps for the entire world.<\/p>\n If Gaddafi and Assad would not roll over for Washington, why does Washington think Russia will? Russia is not Libya or Syria. Washington is the bully who having beat up the kindergarden kid, now thinks he can take on the college linebacker.<\/p>\n The Bush and Obama regimes have destroyed America\u2019s reputation with their incessant lies and violence against other peoples. The world sees Washington as the prime threat.<\/p>\n Worldwide polls consistently show that people around the world regard the US and Israel as the two countries that pose the greatest threat to peace. http:\/\/www.ibtimes.com\/gallup-poll-biggest-threat-world-peace-america-1525008<\/a> and The countries that Washington\u2019s propaganda declares to be \u201crogue states\u201d and the \u201caxis of evil,\u201d such as Iran and North Korea, are far down the list when the peoples in the world are consulted. It could not be more clear that the world does not believe Washington\u2019s self-serving propaganda. The world sees the US and Israel as the rogue states.<\/p>\n The US and Israel are the only two countries in the world that are in the grip of ideologies. The US is in the grip of the Neoconservative ideology which has declared the US to be the \u201cexceptional, indispensable country\u201d chosen by history to exercise hegemony over all others. This ideology is buttressed by the Brzezinski and Wolfowitz doctrines that are the basis of US foreign policy. <\/p>\n The Israeli government is in the grip of the Zionist ideology that declares a \u201cgreater Israel\u201d from the Nile to the Euphrates. Many Israelis themselves do not accept this ideology, but it is the ideology of the \u201csettlers\u201d and those who control the Israeli government.<\/p>\n Ideologies are important causes of war. Just as the Hitlerian ideology of German superiority is mirrored in the Neoconservative ideology of US superiority, the Communist ideology that the working class is superior to the capitalist class is mirrored in the Zionist ideology that Israelis are superior to Palestinians. Zionists have never heard of squatters\u2019 rights and claim that recent Jewish immigrants into Palestine–invaders really–have the right to land occupied by others for millenniums. <\/p>\n Washington\u2019s and Israel\u2019s doctrines of superiority over others do not sit very well with the \u201dothers.\u201d When Obama declared in a speech that Americans are the exceptional people, Russia\u2019s President Putin responded, \u201cGod created us all equal.\u201d<\/p>\n To the detriment of its population, the Israeli government has made endless enemies. Israel has effectively isolated itself in the world. Israel\u2019s continued existence depends entirely on the willingness and ability of Washington to protect Israel. This means that Israel\u2019s power is derivative of Washington\u2019s power. <\/p>\n Washington\u2019s power is a different story. As the only economy standing after WWII, the US dollar became the world money. This role for the dollar has given Washington financial hegemony over the world, the main source of Washington\u2019s power. As other countries rise, Washington\u2019s hegemony is imperiled.<\/p>\n To prevent other countries from rising, Washington invokes the Brzezinski and Wolfowitz doctrines. To be brief, the Brzezinski doctrine says that in order to remain the only superpower, Washington must control the Eurasian land mass. Brzezinski is willing for this to occur peacefully by suborning the Russian government into Washington\u2019s empire. \u201dA loosely confederated Russia . . . a decentralized Russia would be less susceptible to imperial mobilization.\u201d In other words, break up Russia into associations of semi-autonomous states whose politicians can be suborned by Washington\u2019s money.<\/p>\n Brzezinski propounded \u201ca geo-strategy for Eurasia.\u201d In Brzezinski\u2019s strategy, China and \u201ca confederated Russia\u201d are part of a \u201ctranscontinental security framework,\u201d managed by Washington in order to perpetuate the role of the US as the world\u2019s only superpower.<\/p>\n I once asked my colleague, Brzezinski, that if everyone was allied with us, who were we organized against? My question surprised him, because I think that Brzezinski remains caught up in Cold War strategy even after the demise of the Soviet Union. In Cold War thinking it was important to have the upper hand or else be at risk of being eliminated as a player. The importance of prevailing became all consuming, and this consuming drive survived the Soviet collapse. Prevailing over others is the only foreign policy that Washington knows.<\/em><\/p>\n The mindset that America must prevail set the stage for the Neoconservatives and their 21st century wars, which, with Washington\u2019s overthrow of the democratically elected government of Ukraine, has resulted in a crisis that has brought Washington into direct conflict with Russia.<\/p>\n I know the strategic institutes that serve Washington. I was the occupant of the William E.Simon Chair in Political Economy, Center for Strategic and International Studies, for a dozen years. The idea is prevalent that Washington must prevail over Russia in Ukraine or Washington will lose prestige and its superpower status. <\/p>\n The idea of prevailing always leads to war once one power thinks it has prevailed.<\/p>\n The path to war is reinforced by the Wolfowitz Doctrine. Paul Wolfowitz, the neoconservative intellectual who formulated US military and foreign policy doctrine, wrote among many similar passages:<\/p>\n \u201cOur first objective is to prevent the re-emergence of a new rival, either on the territory of the former Soviet Union or elsewhere [China], that poses a threat on the order of that posed formerly by the Soviet Union. This is a dominant consideration underlying the new regional defense strategy and requires that we endeavor to prevent any hostile power from dominating a region whose resources would, under consolidated control, be sufficient to generate global power.\u201d <\/p>\n In the Wolfowitz Doctrine, any other strong country is defined as a threat and a power hostile<\/em> to the US regardless of how willing that country is to get along with the US for mutual benefit.<\/p>\n The difference between Brzezinski and the Neoconservatives is that Brzezinski wants to suborn Russia and China by including them in the empire as important elements whose voices would be heard, If only for diplomatic reasons, whereas the Neoconservatives are prepared to rely on military force combined with internal subversion orchestrated with US financed NGOs and even terrorist organizations.<\/p>\n Neither the US nor Israel is embarrassed by their worldwide reputations as the two countries that pose the greatest threat. In fact, both countries are proud to be recognized as the greatest threats. The foreign policy of both countries is devoid of any diplomacy. US and Israeli foreign policy rests on violence alone. Washington tells countries to do as Washington says or be \u201cbombed into the stone age.\u201d Israel declares all Palestinians, even women and children, to be \u201cterrorists,\u201d and proceeds to shoot them down in the streets, claiming that Israel is merely protecting itself against terrorists. Israel, which does not recognize the existence of Palestine as a country, covers up its crimes with the claim that Palestinians do not accept the existence of Israel.<\/p>\n \u201cWe don\u2019t need no stinking diplomacy. We got power.\u201d <\/p>\n This is the attitude that guarantees war, and that is where the US is taking the world. The prime minister of Britain, the chancellor of Germany, and the president of France are Washington\u2019s enablers. They provide the cover for Washington. Instead of war crimes, Washington has \u201ccoalitions of the willing\u201d and military invasions that bring \u201cdemocracy and women\u2019s rights\u201d to non-compliant countries.<\/p>\n China gets much the same treatment. A country with four times the US population but a smaller prison population, China is constantly criticized by Washington as an \u201cauthoritarian state.\u201d China is accused of human rights abuses while US police brutalize the US population.<\/p>\n The problem for humanity is that Russia and China are not Libya and Iraq. These two countries possess strategic nuclear weapons. Their land mass greatly exceeds that of the US. The US, which was unable to successfully occupy Baghdad or Afghanistan, has no prospect of prevailing against Russia and China in conventional warfare. Washington will push the nuclear button. What else can we expect from a government devoid of morality?<\/p>\n The world has never experienced rogue states comparable to Washington and Israel. Both governments are prepared to murder anyone and everyone. Look at the crisis that Washington has created in Ukraine and the dangers thereof. On May 23, 2014, Russia\u2019s President Putin spoke to the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, a three-day gathering of delegations from 62 countries and CEOs from 146 of the largest Western corporations.<\/p>\n Putin did not speak of the billions of dollars in trade deals that were being formalized. Instead Putin spoke of the crisis that Washington had brought to Russia, and he criticized Europe for being Washington\u2019s vassals for supporting Washington\u2019s propaganda against Russia and Washington\u2019s interference in vital Russian interests.<\/p>\n Putin was diplomatic in his language, but the message that powerful economic interests from the US and Europe received is that it will lead to trouble if Washington and European governments continue to ignore Russia\u2019s concerns and continue to act as if they can interfere in Russia\u2019s vital interests as if Russia did not exist. <\/p>\n The heads of these large corporations will carry this message back to Washington and European capitals. Putin made it clear that the lack of dialogue with Russia could lead to the West making the mistake of putting Ukraine in NATO and establishing missile bases on Russia\u2019s border with Ukraine. Putin has learned that Russia cannot rely on good will from the West, and Putin made it clear, short of issuing a threat, that Western military bases in Ukraine are unacceptable.<\/p>\n Washington will continue to ignore Russia. However, European capitals will If Washington in its overbearing arrogance and hubris forces Putin to write off the West, the Russian\/Chinese strategic alliance, which is forming to counteract Washington\u2019s hostile policy of surrounding both countries with military bases, will harden into preparation for the inevitable war.<\/p>\n The survivors, if any, can thank the Neoconservatives, the Wolfowitz doctrine, and the Brzezinski strategy for the destruction of life on earth.<\/p>\n The American public contains a large number of misinformed people who think they know everything. These people have been programmed by US and Israeli propaganda to equate Islam with political ideology. They believe that Islam, a religion, is instead a militarist doctrine that calls for the overthrow of Western civilization, as if anything remains of Western civilization.<\/p>\n Many believe this propaganda even in the face of complete proof that the Sunnis and Shi\u2019ites hate one another far more than they hate their Western oppressors and occupiers. The US has departed Iraq, but the carnage today is as high or higher than during the US invasion and occupation. The daily death tolls from the Sunni\/Shi\u2019ite conflict are extraordinary. A religion this disunited poses no threat to anyone except Islamists themselves. Washington successfully used Islamist disunity to overthrow Gaddafi, and is currently using Islamist disunity in an effort to overthrow the government of Syria. Islamists cannot even unite to defend themselves against Western aggression. There is no prospect of Islamists uniting in order to overthrow the West.<\/p>\n Even if Islam could do so, it would be pointless for Islam to overthrow the West. The West has overthrown itself. In the US the Constitution has been murdered by the Bush and Obama regimes. Nothing remains. As the US is<\/em> the Constitution, what was once the United States no longer exists. A different entity has taken its place. <\/p>\n Europe died with the European Union, which requires the termination of sovereignty of all member countries. A few unaccountable bureaucrats in Brussels have become superior to the wills of the French, German, British, Italian, Dutch, Spanish, Greek, and Portuguese peoples.<\/p>\n Western civilization is a skeleton. It still stands, barely, but there is no life in it. The blood of liberty has departed. Western peoples look at their governments and see nothing but enemies. Why else has Washington militarized local police forces, equipping them as if they were occupying armies? Why else has Homeland Security, the Department of Agriculture, and even the Postal Service and Social Security Administration ordered billions of rounds of ammunition and even submachine guns? What is this taxpayer-paid-for arsenal for if not to suppress US citizens?<\/p>\n As the prominent trends forecaster Gerald Celente spells out in the current Trends Journal<\/em>, \u201cuprisings span four corners of the globe.\u201d Throughout Europe angry, desperate and outraged peoples march against EU financial policies that are driving the peoples into the ground. Despite all of Washington\u2019s efforts with its well funded fifth columns known as NGOs to destabilize Russia and China, both the Russian and Chinese governments have far more support from their people than do the US and Europe.<\/p>\n In the 20th century Russia and China learned what tyranny is, and they have rejected it.<\/p>\n In the US tyranny has entered under the guise of the \u201cwar on terror,\u201d a hoax used to scare the sheeple into abandoning their civil liberties, thus freeing Washington from accountability to law and permitting Washington to erect a militarist police state. Ever since WWII Washington has used its financial hegemony and the \u201cSoviet threat,\u201d now converted into the \u201cRussian threat,\u201d to absorb Europe into Washington\u2019s empire. <\/p>\n Putin is hoping that the interests of European countries will prevail over subservience to Washington. This is Putin\u2019s current bet. This is the reason Putin remains unprovoked by Washington\u2019s provocations in Ukraine. <\/p>\n If Europe fails Russia, Putin and China will prepare for the war that Washington\u2019s drive for hegemony makes inevitable.<\/p>\n The post Why War Is Inevitable — Paul Craig Roberts<\/a> appeared first on PaulCraigRoberts.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Dear friends, It is time for my quarterly request for donations. As we agreed, my columns and this site will continue as long as your support is forthcoming. My column below for this Memorial Day makes it clear what is…<\/p>\n The post Why War Is Inevitable — Paul Craig Roberts<\/a> appeared first on PaulCraigRoberts.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1220,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[461],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-120683","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-editorials"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120683","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1220"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=120683"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/120683\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=120683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=120683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=120683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nhttp:\/\/www.jewishfederations.org\/european-poll-israel-biggest-threat-to-world-peace.aspx <\/a><\/p>\n
\nhave to decide whether Washington is pushing them into conflict with Russia that is against European interests. Thus, Putin is testing European politicians to determine if there is sufficient intelligence and independence in Europe for a rapprochement. <\/p>\n