“What is the War on Terror
and How to Fight It,” by Marilyn Vogt-Downey, 2016
Vogt-Downey is a former
member of the Socialist Workers’ Party, a Trotsky translator and now a
researcher. She will be speaking at a forum
on the topic of ‘terrorism’ at May Day Books Thursday, February 18 at 7:00 PM.
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| Sec of State Clinton Meets with Saudi King |
She wrote this pamphlet,
though the title misleads somewhat. It
is mainly about how the U.S.
has used Islamic fundamentalism to prop up its rule and that of local dictators
for years. In recent times, it started
with the war in Afghanistan,
when Jimmy Carter helped arm, fund and train the Taliban and Al Qa’ida in the
war against the Communist Afghan government and the USSR – though Vogt-Downey spends
little time on this. U.S. ally Pakistan played a key role in this situation, providing protection and aid to the Taliban
to this day.
As she emphasizes, state chaos
and increased Sunni/Shia antagonism’s were an expected and planned part
of this global strategy. The U.S. strategy is not just about protecting oil,
it is going further to gain full political control and dent any resurgent labor
movement anywhere in the Near East, Middle East or Africa.
This is the meaning of the defense of
‘little Kuwait” in the First
Gulf War and the invasion of Iraq
in the Second Gulf War. It was meant to
decimate secular regimes partly hostile to U.S.
interests like the Baath Party governments in Iraq
and Syria.
This would enable U.S. allies
– the fundamentalist Sunni theocracies in the Gulf - Saudi
Arabia, Qatar,
Kuwait, Bahrain and the
UAE – by increasing their power and security.
Vogt-Downey does not mention how Russia, Israel and Iran figure in this process, nor does she mention U.S. weapons ending up in the hands of Daesh, the Nusra Front and others in Syria. Turkey is also omitted, as is its support for Daesh by letting their oil and fighters through its borders while bombing Kurdish fighters succeeding against Daesh.
Vogt-Downey does not mention how Russia, Israel and Iran figure in this process, nor does she mention U.S. weapons ending up in the hands of Daesh, the Nusra Front and others in Syria. Turkey is also omitted, as is its support for Daesh by letting their oil and fighters through its borders while bombing Kurdish fighters succeeding against Daesh.
Vogt-Downey uses research
from the Brookings Institution and from reports in the press to show that U.S. Gulf
allies are providing funding, arms, leadership and sometimes even cadre for
Daesh (which she calls ISIS), for Al Qa’ida, for other fascist Islamic groups –
in Iraq, in Syria and in Libya. So the
U.S. has it both ways – it can promote fear of Daesh / Al Qa’ida and so promote
a police state at home and bombing campaigns abroad, while its allies use
undercover methods to create and support Islamic fundamentalist brigades in Syria,
Libya and Iraq. Don’t think the U.S. is unaware
of this process.
This is resulting in the
tragic destruction of the artificial states and regions in the Middle East and
now North Africa, and led to the Syrian
refugee crisis. Vogt-Downey quotes
Donald Trump as saying to the effect of: “Let them kill each other and we’ll
come in and pick up the pieces.” Well,
that is actually present U.S.
policy – Trump was just being honest about it.
Vogt-Downey points out that
the 5 monarchies in the Middle East contain a
vast amount of non-citizen workers with almost no labor rights. Saudi Arabia was the last country
in the world to outlaw slavery, but it continues in another form. 4 of these Sunni monarchies are made up of a majority
of non-citizens. The UAE has a population
of 9.2 million with 7.8 million non-citizens; Qatar, a virulent funder of
fascist brigades, has a population of 1.8 million, 1.5 million not being
citizens; Bahrain has a population of 1.2 million, with more than half not
being citizens; Kuwait a population of 4.1 million, with 2.8 million
non-citizens. Saudi Arabia has a population of
28.7 million, 8 million of whom are non-citizens. And remember, these numbers do not list the
citizens of the Shia religion, who have few rights even as citizens. Only Yemen
is outside this group, and is now being bombed into the stone age by the
Saudi’s, with U.S.
consent.
These numbers show that the Gulf States are actually
sitting on a powder keg of internal class struggle and ethnic oppression.
Please attend the forum on
Thursday. Ms. Vogt-Downey will be in
person.
Red Frog
February 15, 2016
PS: If the vast majority of the 9/11 hijackers were Saudi nationals, and that has never been investigated, isn't about time the U.S. actually looked into who was backing these people? And if they don't want to, why not? Could it lead in unexpected directions?
PS: If the vast majority of the 9/11 hijackers were Saudi nationals, and that has never been investigated, isn't about time the U.S. actually looked into who was backing these people? And if they don't want to, why not? Could it lead in unexpected directions?
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