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The New American Empire

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"The New American Empire" is an insightful overview of how G.W. Bush's unabashed neocon ideology has led to disastrous turmoil abroad, increased international tensions and a destabilized economy. This is clear to everyone who wishes America well; hopefully the American electorate will recognize this in time.

Which is it? A peace-loving democratic republic or a hegemonic imperial aggressor state? Of course, I'm talking about the United States which, under President George W. Bush with his aggressive Neocon policies of perpetual war, is becoming more and more a global military empire with no scruples about law or morality, and a genuine ally of international terrorism.

To begin with, the lunacy of declaring a "crusade" against a billion and a quarter Muslims seems to be taken right out of a book of horrors. Instead of isolating the small groups of religious fanatics around Osama bin Laden, the Bush administration chose instead to make heroes of them the very moment they attacked a Muslim country, Iraq, without any provocation whatsoever. In doing so, Bush became al-Qaeda's best recruiter and made Iraq an enlarged training camp for terrorists. Those are the facts that anybody not lost in wishful thinking can see all too clearly.

The book "The New American Empire" explains how such a self-defeating approach to Islamist terrorism came about and became U.S. foreign policy. -After Sept. 11, the "geniuses" around Bush and Cheney saw an opportunity to seize control of the entire oil-rich Middle East region. By linking Iraq to the attacks of 9/11, the American public would not object to an aggressive war, so they thought, if Americans could be made to believe that a military invasion of a Muslim country would make the U.S. more secure.

They designed a policy that they called the "Bush Doctrine", and embraced the myth that "The best defense is a good offense," in order to justify this mammoth departure from international law.

On September 20, 2002, the National Security Strategy document was published. It was nearly a verbatim reproduction of another document, published on September 2000 by the "Project for the New American Century", a group of Neo-conservative pro-Israel interventionists who had argued that the United States should not miss its chance to become a global empire and should assert the unilateral right to act as the world's policeman, especially in the Middle East.

Therefore, and this is important, the policy of turning the USA into an aggressor state did not come about after, but preceding the attacks of September 11, 2001. These devastating terrorist attacks were then used to implement a policy which had nothing to do with fighting terrorism but was rather a long-thought out plan to use American military power to subjugate the entire Middle East. Such a policy had been proposed previously, among others, by Ariel Sharon's Likud party in Israel.

The official story about attacking Iraq because this country supposedly had weapons of mass destruction or because it had links to al-Qaeda never made sense. And in fact, these rationales have been proven complete bogus. -What remains is the initial plan. -That's the reason why Bush does not have an exit strategy in Iraq: He intends to remain there forever and build 14 permanent military bases. In his eyes, Iraq is sort of an American colony and it will host permanent American military bases forever, for the greater benefit of American oil companies and for the greater benefit of the state of Israel.

That's the plain truth and this explains all the lies and the inconsistencies that the Bush administration has resorted to in order to sell this illegal and immoral war. And that's why the Bush administration will attack Iran, as soon as a new pretext can be created for doing so. That is also why the Bush administration, John Bolton at the forefront, does not have any use for the United Nations which has no military force of its own: The U.S. "is" the United Nations and the world has to be subservient to the new empire. But, you may ask, how many terrible crimes will the U.S. have to commit to implement such an imperial policy?

Sounds like a comedy or a comic movie.

Not in Bush's mind or in the Neocons' minds. That's their crazy plan that we see unfolding everyday under our very eyes.

Where do you fit in such a diabolic plan?

It's now obvious that Americans made a gross error in 2000, an error compounded in 2004, when they placed in power an inexperienced, ill-prepared and immature man. George W. Bush's legacy will be a long list of disasters that will linger on, long after his departure.

George W. Bush is an immature person who refuses to consider policy alternatives and possibilities and who is afraid of listening to dissenting opinions. Because he is weak, he surrounds himself with yes-men and yes-women who cater to his wishes and comfort him in his illusions. The problem is that most of these yes-men and yes-women are liars.

According to ret. Col. Lawrence Wilkinson, chief of staff of former Secretary of State Colin Powell, under Bush II, "some of the most important decisions about U.S. national security - including vital decisions about postwar Iraq - were made by a secretive, little-known [neocon] cabal," ..."not unlike the decision-making one would associate more with a dictatorship than a democracy."

There we have it. A highly placed official from within the Bush administration compares George W. Bush to a dictator.

One of the consequences of George Bush's amateurish approach to government has been his ruinous foreign policy based on "fixed" intelligence and facts "around the policy" and supported by ultra-neo-conservative foundations, many of them with ties with the Israeli government. Today, the entire world knows that George W. Bush presided over a campaign to lie to Americans, traumatized by 9/11, and lead them into a war against Iraq. This is now well documented. Why and for whose interests? This remains to be ascertained.

On August 26, 2002, for example, Vice President Cheney started his provocative campaign to frame Iraq for a military attack when he said: "Many of us are convinced that Saddam will acquire nuclear weapons fairly soon", even though the Bush administration knew this was false. Iraq had no active nuclear weapons program. The "weapons of mass destruction" argument was a fabrication and this has been confirmed by both the CIA and the Defense Intelligence Agency.

Nevertheless, on September 8, 2002, then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice repeated the lie:"We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud."

And, when former national security advisor and former Air Force general Brent Scowcroft warned against invading Iraq under such false pretenses, in August 2002, he was castigated by none other than Condoleezza Rice herself.

With the fiasco of the war against Iraq, it's no wonder that Bush's approval rating is 38%. It should be 0% if everybody knew better.

This is one of those books that opens one's eyes. Because it is a synthesis, it provides a wide picture of what's going on without being too obtuse. The clear message that comes out of this book is that George W. Bush will go down in history as a national catastrophe.

George W. Bush abuses the use of the word "democracy" in his rhetorical justifications for American military meddling in the affairs of other countries. In Bush's mouth, however, democracy rhymes with imperialism, militarism, gingoism, unilateralism and neoconservatism.

Everybody is, in principle, for guaranteeing a people's right to freely choose its own government. But, when rhetorical calls for democracy become a cover for one country taking over another country, they sound hypocritical and false. You do not kill tens of thousands of people and pretend you want to "liberate" them- especially when, as a result, as in the case of Iraq, you grab their natural resources!

Rather than bringing true democracy, such illegal wars of aggression set back the cause of democratic reforms in the countries thus victimized. Moreover, such military aggressions portray the U.S. as an international bully and as a ferocious rogue state.

The author of "The New American Empire" is right to point out that former President Gerry Ford and his then Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, were more responsible and more successful, in 1975, when they supported the Helsinki Accords. These historical agreements reaffirmed the principle of self-determination of nations and, by removing external threats, opened the gates to reforms within the former Soviet Union.

It would seem that current President George W. Bush has a lot to learn from former President Ford and from former Secretary Kissinger. I doubt very much that Bush II consults them any more than he seems to consult his own father, President George H. Bush.- This book is highly recommended.

I am deeply indebted to Dr. Tremblay for helping me understand the basics of geopolitics, as it relates to current affairs, especially regarding how domestic politics in the U.S. functions, how foreign policy is an extenion of domestic politics, and how American foreign wars nowadays are not defensive wars but wars of aggression. Here are some of the most crucial points the author makes:

1- President George W. Bush intended to invade Iraq even before he became president. In 1999, for example, he told his biographer Mickey Herskowitz: "If I have a chance to invade (Iraq), if I have that much capital, I'm not going to waste it. I'm going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and I'm going to have a successful presidency." In fact, former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill has confirmed that the discussion of a plan to oust Saddam Hussein and invade Iraq was the main topic from day one of the new Bush administration, in January 2001, nine months before the events of 9/11.

2- Bush's obsession with invading Iraq squared perfectly well with the 1997 Neocon Project for the New American Century (PNAC) and its agenda for transforming the Middle East in order to enhance Israel's security in the region. The pro-Israel cabal within and outside the government went full speed in pushing for a war against Iraq, on the flimsiest of reasons, most of them made up from scratch.

3- When Vice President Dick Cheney's energy advisory panel tabled its 163-page report on May 16, 2001, Middle East oil policy came to reinforce Bush's and the Neocons' desire to invade Iraq.

These facts go a long way toward explaining why the U.S. occupation of Iraq lasts so long, costs so much and has no end in sight. If you want to learn the fundamental truth about the Iraq war and other wars in the Middle East, Dr. Tremblay's book is what you need. It's a book that's easy to read and understand.

This is a very informative book and a must read for anyone interested in understanding why the Bush administration is so prone to launching wars in the oil-rich Middle East region. The author, a renowned economist, is very knowledgeable about the economics and domestic politics that support such warmongering efforts. He identifies the pro-Israel Neocon movement and its alliance with the lunatics of the religious Right as important forces in the push toward involving the U.S. in wars abroad. The military-industrial complex and the strategic importance of Middle East oil are represented by Vice President Dick Cheney in the Bush administration, and are also prime movers of war.

Probably the most original part of this book is its chronology of empires and how Western civilization started its ascendency after the fall of Constantinople in 1453. This chapter (chap. 16) is worth buying the book in itself. The author's style is direct and pulls no punches. An excellent book.

This geopolitical book covers all bases: On how the pro-Israel neocons succeeded in imposing "their" foreign policy on the Bush administration; on how the March 20, 2003 war against Iraq was planned over a ten-year period prior to 9-11, 2001, a cruel event which provided the "pretext" to move troops to Iraq and take militarily control of the Middle East and of its oil. Historians will like to read this book a generation from now.

The "New American Empire" is a shattering indictment of American militarism, neocon manipulations and the Bush administration's brazen lies, deception, wishful thinking and propaganda techniques. It identifies and documents the charade that led to the 2003 war against Iraq and how the U.S. is turning from a democratic republic into a plutocratic empire, under the tandem Bush-Cheney.

The book throws light on the neoconservative 'special interests group' which has dominated US foreign policy since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. It outlines how the neocon ideology, with its intense hatred of international agreements and organizations, succeeded in steering Bush's foreign policy in the Middle East in the desired direction.

A de facto alliance between Vice-President Dick Cheney and pro-Israel neocon high officials, within the administration and outside, is seen as the main driving force behind the 2003 war against Iraq. President George W. Bush's personal vengeance instincts against Iraq's President Saddam Hussein and official reports projecting a coming oil crisis are seen as important considerations in explaining a war which has no legal basis internationally and dubious constitutional legitimacy domestically. The Pentagon's plans to establish 14 permanent military bases in Iraq are also rationales that weighted in the balance.

On the whole, it is a well presented analysis of one of the most unnecessary military and geopolitical disasters in U.S. history. This is a book that will be still read years from now.

On page 180-81, the author of "The New American Empire" wrote:
--" In the spring of 2002, George W. Bush had already decided to "invade Iraq no matter what". Indeed, it was revealed by Richard Haass, the director of the policy-planning staff at the State Department, that George W. Bush had made the decision to invade Iraq well before July 2002. He was told by Condoleezza Rice, Bush's National Security Advisor, during the first week of July 2002, "not to waste his breath... the decision has been made." New information makes it more likely that the decision to attack Iraq was made within days after the September 11th suicide hijackings of 2001, eighteen months before the event.-

Well, this is precisely what highly classified British documents, published last May 1st (2005), have revealed. Half a dozen official memos and option papers, written by top aides to British Prime Minister Tony Blair, have indeed provided the definitive proof that President George W. Bush and his neocon advisors had decided to invade Iraq and oust Saddam Hussein, whatever the circumstances and whatever the costs, as early as the fall of 2001, and even before. That's the reason the author could say that the entire diplomatic exercise of going to the United Nations during the fall of 2002 and in early 2003, supposedly to avoid a war, was truly a charade and a deception.

As a matter of fact, the Bush administration and Bush himself were lying openly when they repeated ad nauseam that war was their choice of "last resort". We now know that war against Iraq was rather their first choice. Sir Richard Dearlove, the Head of the British CIA (called the MI-6 spy service) confirmed, after a visit to Washington, that the Bush administration was fixing "the intelligence and facts ... around the policy", which was to invade Iraq, whatever the legality or the morality of such a policy. They [the Bush administration] were "scrambling to establish a link between Iraq and al (Qaida)" and that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, knowing full well that this was false. But that's what they told Congress and the American people. Bush and his Neocons knew from the start that they were going to have to manufacture excuses to justify a war against Iraq.

What now? A lying President? a duped Congress? a misinformed American electorate? an illegal and immoral war?

"The New American Empire" is an eye-opener. Its author succeeds admirably in placing everything in the proper context, so the reader has a complete picture of the real motives behind a war which has already killed 1,741 American soldiers (more than 13,000 wounded) and brought death to as many as 100,000 Iraqis, directly or indirectly. I encourage you to read this book.

"Populus vult decipi; decipiatur." ["The people wish to be deceived; let them be deceived."], Caraffa.

Reading this book and its tale of how the Bush administration has hoodwinked the American people into supporting the very concept of wars of aggression, I was thinking about President Abraham Lincoln's (1809-1865) rule saying that "You may fool all of the people some of the time; you can even fool some of the people all the time; but you can't fool all of the people all of the time."

But again, as Goethe said, "We are never deceived, we deceive ourselves." -So maybe, just maybe, the American people may have wanted to be deceived and lied to. At the very least, they did not care very much about being lied to, since they reelected GWB in November 2004.

The hard fact remains that this first war of the 21st Century, the War against Iraq, was sold on false pretenses and on lies. An unhealthy thirst for post Sept. 11 revenge, a quest for regime change in Baghdad in order to secure oil supplies in the region, pressures from the pro-Israel AIPAC lobby to subdue an Israeli foe, the Pentagon's requirements for permanent military bases in the Middle East-all these factors played a role in pushing the U.S. into a war against Iraq. If the false pretexts of weapons of mass destruction or the fake links with al Qaeda had not been used, other pretexts would have been invented.

In a true democracy, a special commission would have been established in order to inform the public on why public representatives relied on deception and on lies in order to push the country to war. This has not been done. Of course, President Bush did set up a Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities, but this was one astute means for him to use the CIA as a scapegoat and to wash his hands of the entire mess.

Most people outside the United States saw the deception from day one. In the U.S., however, a conniving press and government propaganda persuaded a scant majority to go along with the lies and to approve an illegal and immoral war.

Dr. Tremblay's book is clear and concise on why this hoax was perpetrated upon the American people. Anybody who reads this book can see through the clouds of disinformation and deception and access the truth. for this bookdeception and acces I rarely give five-star ratings to books, but I have no hesitation in doing just that for this book.