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ZNet Commentary

Axis Of Evil--in Washington, D.c. March 15, 2002

By Edward Herman

 

Coup d'etat president George W. Bush has designated three poor and unconnected

states as an " axis of evil, " reflecting this great moralist's sensitivity to

good and evil. He has been subjected to a certain amount of criticism for this

strong language even in the mainstream press, but nobody there has suggested

that, as so common in this post-Orwellian world, such language might better fit

its author and his associates.

 

There IS a political axis of evil running strong in the United States that

underpins the Bush regime, which includes the oil industry, military-industrial

complex (MIC), other transnationals, and the Christian Right, all important

contributors to the Bush electoral triumph, and each of which has high level

representation in the administration including, besides Bush himself, Cheney,

Rumsfeld, O'Neill and Ashcroft.

 

This REAL axis of evil is using 9/11 and the " war on terrorism " to carry out its

foreign and domestic agenda on a truly impressive scale, and so far without much

impediment at home or abroad.

 

What is notable about their agenda is that it flies in the face of all of the

requirements for peace, global democracy, economic equity and justice,

ecological and environmental protection, and global stability. It represents the

choice of an overpowerful country's elite, determined to consolidate their

economic and political advantage in the short run, at whatever cost to global

society.

 

They are accelerating all the ugly trends of militarization and globalization

that have led to increasing violence, income polarization, and the vigorous

protests against the World Trade Organization, IMF and World Bank.

 

Consider the following:

 

1. New arms race:

 

Even before 9/11 the Bush government was pushing for a larger arms budget and

that gigantic boondoggle and offensive military threat, the National Missile

Defense.

 

With 9/11 and the collapse of the Democrats, they are allocating many billions

to anything the MIC wants, and with their more violent behavior and threats

abroad, other countries will have to follow. This takes enormous resources from

the civil society, and will exacerbate conflict based on cutbacks and pain for

ordinary citizens. The same will be true across the globe.

 

Thus, the polarization of income effects of corporate globalization will be

increased by this diversion of resources to weapons. As Jim Lobe notes,

" Whatever hopes existed in the late 1990s for a new era of global cooperation in

combating poverty, disease, and threats to the environment seem to have

evaporated " (Dawn [Pakistan], Jan. 23, 2002).

 

The complete irrationality and irresponsibility of this arms budget surge is

reflected in the fact that almost none of it has to do with any threat from Bin

Laden and his forces. Weapons designed to combat Soviet tanks are going forward,

as well as advanced new aircraft and a missile defense system that are hardly

answering Bin Laden, but represent instead MIC boondoggles and a rush for

complete global " full spectrum " military hegemony.

 

2. The new violence:

 

The Washington Axis has found that war and wrapping themselves in the flag is

just what was needed to divert the public from bread and butter issues, inducing

the public to revel instead in the game of war, rooting for our side while we

beat up yet another small adversary, with perhaps others to follow.

 

As the great political economist Thorstein Veblen wrote with irony almost a

century ago, " sensational appeals to patriotic pride and animosity made by

victories and defeats...[helps] direct the popular interest to other, nobler,

institutionally less hazardous matters than the unequal distribution of wealth

or of creature comforts. Warlike and patriotic preoccupations fortify the

barbarian virtues of subordination and prescriptive authority...Such is the

promise held out by a strenuous national policy " (Theory of Business Enterprise

[1904]).

 

The Bush team is threatening to beat up anybody who " harbors terrorists " or aims

to build " weapons of mass destruction " without our approval. Israel is of course

exempt from this rule and has been given carte blanche to smash the Palestinian

civil society.

 

Bush and his handlers will decide who are terrorists, who harbors them, and who

can build weapons. It is easily predictable that anybody who resists the

corporate globalization process and tries to pursue an independent development

path, will be found to violate human rights, harbor terrorists, or otherwise

threaten U.S. " national security, " with dire consequences.

 

Because the ongoing globalization process is increasing inequality and poverty,

protests and insurgencies will continue to arise. The U.S. answer is spelled out

clearly in the " war on terrorism " and simultaneous push for " free trade " and

cutbacks in spending for the civil society at home and abroad.

 

The Washington Axis is also pursuing a " war on the poor " that will merge easily

into the " war on terrorism, " as the poor will be driven to resist and resistance

will be interpreted as terrorism.

 

This is in a great U.S. tradition, brought to a high level in the overthrow of

the democratic government of Iran in 1953 and installation of the Shah, the

assassination of Guatemalan democracy by Eisenhower and Dulles in 1954, the war

against Vietnam, and the U.S.-sponsored displacement of democratic governments

by National Security States throughout South America in the 1960s and 1970s.

They were wars allegedly against the " Soviet Threat, " but really against the

poor and the populist threat to " free trade.. "

 

The Bush team obviously threatens even more violence than we witnessed in that

earlier era. The military force they control is relatively stronger and without

the Soviet constraint. With the help of the more centralized and commercialized

media they have worked the populace into a state of war-game fervor.

 

They have brought back into the government some of the most fervent supporters

of terrorism and death squads from the Reagan years in Otto Reich, Richard

Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, John Negroponte, Elliott Abrams, and Lino Guterriez; men

who can now work in a more killer- friendly environment.

 

 

3. Escalated support for authoritarian regimes.

 

The United States actively helped bring to power and supported large numbers of

murderous regimes in the years 1945-1990, on the excuse of the Soviet Threat,

but really because those regimes were suitably subservient to U.S. interests and

willingly provided that crucial " favorable climate of investment " (especially,

union-busting). With the Soviet Threat gone, for a while there was a problem

finding rationalizations for the long-standing and structurally-rooted

anti-populist and anti-democratic bias, but now we have the " war on terrorism, "

which will do quite nicely.

 

The Washington Axis has already leapt to the support of the military dictator of

Pakistan, the ex-Stalinist boss of Uzbekistan, and it is clear that willingness

to serve the " war on terrorism " will override any nasty political leadership

qualities.

 

At the same time, as with Sharon in his escalated crackdown on the Palestinians

and Putin in Chechnya, cooperation with the war will mean support for internal

violence against dissidents and minorities, forms of state terrorism that will

readily be interpreted as part of the " war on terrorism. " Just as militarization

and war do not conduce to democracy, the effects of mobilization of countries to

support the Washington Axis of Evil's war will damage democracy globally.

 

 

4. Destabilization effects.

 

Corporate globalization has had a major destabilizing effect in the global

economy, causing increased unemployment, civilian budget cuts, large-scale

internal and external migrations, and environmental destruction. The more

aggressive penetration of oil interests, in collusion with local governments in

Nigeria, Colombia, and now Central Asia, and the new war on terrorism, should

intensify destabilization trends.

 

 

5. The fight against democracy at home.

 

At every level the Bush team has fought against the basics of democracy and

attempted to concentrate unaccountable governmental authority in its own hands.

Militarization itself is anti-democratic, but the team has attempted to loosen

constraints on the CIA and police, reduce public access to every kind of

information, and constrain free speech.

 

They have put in place a secret government and are moving the country toward a

more openly authoritarian government, and, if they can keep it going, their

planned open-ended war on terrorism should serve this end well.

 

 

6. The Bush " vision " versus the " End of History. "

 

This process does not comport well with Francis Fukayama's vision of the new

peaceful, democratic order that would follow the death of the Soviet Union and

triumph of capitalism.

 

Fukayama missed the boat on three counts. He failed to see that the end of the

Soviet Union and termination of a socialist threat would also end the need to

accommodate labor with social welfare concessions--in other words, that there

could be a return to a pure capitalism such as Karl Marx described in the first

volume of Capital.

 

Second, he failed to see that corporate globalization and greater capital

mobility would make for a global " reserve army of labor " and weaken labor's

bargaining power and political position.

 

Finally, he failed to recognize that without the Soviet Union's " containment "

the United States would be freer to use force in serving its transnationals,

forcing Third World countries to join the " free trade " nexus, and preventing

them from serving the needs of their citizens (as opposed to the needs of the

transnational corporate community).

 

As this entire process will involve further polarization and immiseration of

large numbers, insurgencies are inevitable, justifying more militarization and

an escalated war on " terrorism " in a vicious cycle.

 

What can be more frightening and dangerous to the world than facing the

Washington Axis of Evil as the overwhelmingly dominant holder of " weapons of

mass destruction, " which it is seeking to improve and make more usable, with the

elite's longstanding arrogance and self-righteousness at an all-time high, and

with no countervailing force in sight? Bin Laden's threat is nothing by

comparison.

 

What is more, the Bin Laden threat flows from U.S. actions, which played a

crucial role in building up the Al-Qaeda network, and policies which have made a

hell of the Middle East and polarized incomes and wealth across the globe. The

cycle of violence will only be broken if the Washington Axis of Evil is

defeated, removed from office, and replaced by a regime that aims to serve a

broader constituency than oil, the MIC, the other transnationals, and the

Christian Right.