Obama Didn't Invent Permawar. He Just Perfected It.

Tomorrow, Barack Obama will make a speech to the nation about how the United States will fight ISIS.

It will be interesting to see how a president who won election on the strength of his OPPOSITION to U.S. war in Iraq will explain . . . resuming war . . . in . . . Iraq . . . .

Tomorrow's speech is really the continuation of the speech that Obama gave in May at West Point, when he defined a brilliant new twist on an old concept.

At West Point, Obama described how the United States would, in the future, rely upon a web of collaborators to fight for it, largely in "low level," counterinsurgency-type wars.  The U.S. will provide technology, know-how, and -- critically -- funding to these "partner" countries.

It was with this speech that Barack Obama could be said to have shown his true colors. He's all about that leverage. Why settle for just one war, or two, when you can provide the seed money to keep wars going on everywhere?

Tomorrow, expect Obama to stress several points:

* Somebody else (al Qaeda, ISIS, etc., etc.) started it.
* No American "boots on the ground."
* Technology (drones) is our friend in this fight.
* Anyone else who wants to be our friend has to ante up (i.e. fight in our place).
* As the provider of funding, the U.S. has the controlling hand. We provide "leadership." We're the "Big Daddy."
* Obama and his team is keeping you -- my fellow Americans -- safe.

They're calling it the Obama Doctrine.

This all sounds so convincing that there's one thing most people will miss.

This doesn't end.

Obama: 

He didn't invent #permawar. 

He just perfected it.

Watch and share this short video
from Brave New Films:
"How Does This End?"

September 10, 2014 in Chicago - Andy Thayer introduces speakers from
8th Day Center for Justice, Anti-War Committee of Chicago, Gay Liberation
Network, No Drones Network, Veterans for Peace, Voices for Creative
Nonviolence, and World Can't Wait, all speaking against the Obama
administration's latest war escalation.
 (Audio at "Demonstrators Hold Anti-War Protest Downtown" on CBS)
 (Photo courtesy FJJ.)

"We must say NO to that!"
Joe Scarry speaking on behalf of No Drones Network, emphasizing
the need to resist being tempted by government promises of "no-risk,"
"high-tech" (and unending) violence using drones and other modern weapons.
(Photo courtesy FJJ.)

More photos at Press Conference Denouncing Obama's Mid East War Escalation

Read "On Worthier Victims" by Buddy Bell, Voices for Creative Nonviolence

Related posts

More than anyone else, the beneficiaries of permawar are the politicians who thrive on the power to make and control wars. The number one prime beneficiary is the President, as well as presidential aspirants. But it doesn't end there . . . .

(See J'ACCUSE: The Beneficiaries of Permawar )






The U.S. narrative goes something like this: Somebody "bad" (e.g. ISIS) is doing bad stuff . . . . The U.S. wants to "help" -- without overcommitting. We'll just start with a few advisers (to instruct, not to fight) and a few drones (to survey, not to kill) . . . .One thing leads to another and there's yet another fight. (Lucky we were there . . . )  Does it every occur to us that we've got the narrative (and the causality) backwards?

(See Drones, ISIS, and Permawar )

It's important to recognize that Goldman, Bloomberg, and the CME -- and ALL of the entities and individuals that profit from the "vol" -- can live with more or less taxation, or more or less regulation, or more or less business-friendly legislation. The one thing they can't live with? Peace . . . .

(See Finance's Unholy Trinity of Permawar: Goldman, Bloomberg, and the CME )





The United States is very good at starting things . . . but seldom considers three moves ahead, much less how it will all end. Drones are a case in point. Now people are starting to talk about the problem of global drone proliferation.
(See GLOBAL DRONE PROLIFERATION: How does this end? on No Drones Network)






More related links

September 15, 2014: Howard Friel, Noam Chomsky, and Edward S. Herman wrote to The New York Times: "We owe the existence of ISIS in part to the Bush administration’s 2003 invasion of Iraq, which was in violation of the [UN] charter. President Obama now seems determined to match, or exceed, the lawlessness of that decision, which, without the establishment of proper checks on the president’s war powers, is likely to be repeated by the next president, and the one after that, with perpetual war (or worse) an assured outcome." (emphasis added)

September 16, 2014: Tom Engelhardt, "Power Drain: Mysteries of the Twenty-First Century in a Helter-Skelter World" on TomDispatch.com: "Nowhere, at home or abroad, does the obvious might of the United States translate into expected results, or much of anything else except a kind of roiling chaos. On much of the planet, Latin America (but not Central America) excepted, power vacuums, power breakdowns, power drains, and fragmentation are increasingly part of everyday life. And one thing is remarkably clear: each and every application of American military power globally since 9/11 has furthered the fragmentation process, destabilizing whole regions."(emphasis added)