Rohini Hensman’s Indefensible: The ISO discovers its muse—the CIA—Part 4
By
Alex Lantier
18 December 2018
The following is the conclusion of a four- part review of Indefensible: Democracy, Counterrevolution, and the Rhetoric of Anti-Imperialism. (see: Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3)
Imperialist propaganda backing assault on democratic rights
Hensman’s attempts to provide a moral-humanitarian rationale for supporting imperialist wars as “democratic revolutions” form an obscene political lie. The end of the Soviet Union did not spell the final triumph of capitalist democracy, as foreseen by Hensman, and leave US wars as a glorious mechanism to advance democracy worldwide. Rather, as the ICFI insisted, it was part of a mortal crisis of the capitalist political system, based around US world hegemony, that emerged from World War II.
Hensman, it has already been noted, supports US and European imperialism, because she sees in them “democratic states that allow working people to fight back against the forces exploiting and oppressing them.” Likewise, she considers their wars for regime change an attempt to export their political system. This is yet another falsehood, based on Hensman’s indifference towards democratic rights. In fact, her vicious attacks on left-wing opponents of imperialism align her with forces that are not only preparing for world war against Russia, but waging savage austerity against workers, and building police-state regimes, in America, Europe and beyond.
Hensman hysterically attacks Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks. Assange has been trapped inside the Ecuadorian embassy for six years, fighting trumped-up rape charges that are part of Washington’s attempt to extradite him to the United States and try him on espionage charges for…