Robert Gates inadvertently predicts demise of USA - International Imperialism

Gates overtly cited Russia and China as ENEMIES -- that’s what I call real cooperation, Bob! It seems the idiocy of American logic will continue regardless of every other consideration. It’s the nature of the beast and the sooner the world wakes up to the fact the USA couldn’t give a shit about anything other than itself, the sooner free nations will unite and rid themselves of the murdering, invasive rogue!

Labelling Russia and China as enemies is the height of ignorance and American stupidity! The world’s strongest nations must either cooperate or destroy each other – the other option of course, is for an alliance of the world’s most powerful nations to destroy the (unilateral) ROGUE! The reader will note the Sino-Russian military alliance has existed for some time. NATO is loath to become a nuclear battleground so it’s really two superpowers against one – no competition, Bob!

In the past the economy was the province of civilians but as the evolution of the American military-techno complex evolved it swallowed the Pentagon! PRIVATISATION of almost every aspect of defence and security has occurred during the corporate free-for-all of the Cheney-Bush administration. Corporations like Halliburton and its subsidiary KBR have been given blank cheques to conduct the nation’s wars, a project they relish, all that untraceable money – Bonanza! As a result, Gates is now forced to address the economy or what’s left of it – it should now be apparent that only governments are able to regulate both the military and the economy; these two beasts should never conjugate! "The well-being of the global economy is contingent on ready access to energy resources;" stated Gates. It sure is Bob, pity the U.S. economy has already been completely ruined by neocon policies.

America is a liability not an asset; are you able to turn it around, Bob? The damage done in eight years is HORRENDOUS. Approximately one million dead civilians and so many failures -- while the whole world was watching! Zero credibility and competence rating, Bob!

The world watched as you bungled and fumbled your way to the point of paying off your enemies in Iraq – the war is not won for a minute. When the money runs out what then? Even the puppet Iraqi government has given you marching orders. With a little help from its friends, Iraq can ensure the internal collapse of the USA if you do not leave on demand – never underestimate your enemy, Bob – Saddam is beating you from the grave, remember his “quicksand” statement!

It helps if you first identify your enemy, Bob – and you have CREATED MANY – believing the witless and incorrect assessments of the RAND Corp and other fund devouring ‘expert’ organisations has PROVEN disastrous, Bob! O my, not a group or person qualified to help! But you should have known that your intellectual elites find your criminal, warring, unilateral policies, repugnant; the real talent has gone over – for fuck’s sake, you can’t even identify me, Bo(o)b! We’ve been teasing you for years, for the whole world to see; Bin Laden is your man, WE ARE NOT!

It’s downright awful when your ineptitudes have been paraded for the world to see; your incompetence exposed to the four corners of the world – it’s like one of those dreams, Bob, walking down a public street with your pee-wee dick hanging out!

Have you ever seen piranhas devour a buffalo, Bob? So many tiny little bites and no more buffalo. Would you like us to show you where the REAL FRONT is, you bunch of quarter-wits?

Give us an appraisal Bob, how many missiles is this paper worth? But don’t forget I’m only one tiny little fish – WITH TEETH!

How much longer will the world tolerate you printing (toilet paper) money; it’s part of the problem Bush and his handlers created, Bob. In a word, RUINATION!

It’s already over, Bob – you and your criminal government are FINISHED!

As for the FREE WORLD -- We are ONE.

"The well-being of the global economy is contingent on ready access to energy resources."

Good observation.. the idiot also made it clear the US military fights wars for the Corporations.. so much for the honor code of our brave fighting stooges!

White-collar execs love it, the poor dumb peasants die for their profits.

The USA has succumbed to an internal enemy that now demands that the government bail it out of trouble. They profit, we pay in good or bad times.

The bankers have destroyed the economy, they then attempt to recover THEIR losses by increasing rates on the public, that's 'fair' (in a thieves paradise).

Many official and unofficial proponents of a long-term U.S. military presence in Iraq are dismissing Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's demand for a U.S. timeline for withdrawal as political posturing, assuming that he will abandon it under pressure.

But that demand was foreshadowed by an episode in June 2006 in which al-Maliki circulated a draft policy calling for negotiation of just such a withdrawal timetable and the George W. Bush administration had to intervene to force the prime minister to drop it.

The context of al-Maliki's earlier advocacy of a timetable for withdrawal was the serious Iraqi effort to negotiate an agreement with seven major Sunni armed groups that had begun under his predecessor Ibrahim al-Jaafari in early 2006. The main Sunni demand in those talks had been for a timetable for full withdrawal of U.S. troops.

Under the spur of those negotiations, al-Jaafari and Iraqi national security adviser Mowaffak al-Rubaei had developed a plan for taking over security in all 18 provinces of Iraq from the United States by the end of 2007. During his first week as prime minister in late May, al-Maliki referred twice publicly to that plan.

At the same time al-Maliki began working on a draft "national reconciliation plan", which was in effect a road map to final agreement with the Sunni armed groups. The Sunday Times of London, which obtained a copy of the draft, reported Jun. 23, 2006 that it included the following language:

"We must agree on a time schedule to pull out the troops from Iraq, while at the same time building up the Iraqi forces that will guarantee Iraqi security, and this must be supported by a United Nations Security Council decision."

That formula, linking a withdrawal timetable with the buildup of Iraqi forces, was consistent with the position taken by Sunni armed groups in their previous talks with U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, which was that the timetable for withdrawal would be "linked to the timescale necessary to rebuild Iraq's armed forces and security services". One of the Sunni commanders who had negotiated with Khalilzad described the resistance position in those words to the London-based Arabic-language Alsharq al Awsat in May 2006.

The Iraqi government draft was already completed when Bush arrived in Baghdad Jun. 13 without any previous consultation with al-Maliki, giving the Iraqi leader five minutes' notice that Bush would be meeting him in person rather than by videoconference.

The al-Maliki cabinet sought to persuade Bush to go along with the withdrawal provision of the document. In his press conference upon returning, Bush conceded that Iraqi cabinet members in the meeting had repeatedly brought up the issue of reconciliation with the Sunni insurgents.

In fact, after Bush had left, Vice President Tariq al-Hashimi, a Sunni, said he had asked Bush to agree to a timetable for withdrawal of all foreign forces. Then President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, released a statement of support for that request.

Nevertheless, Bush signaled his rejection of the Iraqi initiative in his Jun. 14 press conference, deceitfully attributing his own rejection of a timetable to the Iraqi government. "And the willingness of some to say that if we're in power we'll withdraw on a set timetable concerns people in Iraq," Bush declared.

When the final version of the plan was released to the public Jun. 25, the offending withdrawal timetable provision had disappeared. Bush was insisting that the al-Maliki government embrace the idea of a "conditions-based" U.S. troop withdrawal. Khalilzad gave an interview with Newsweek the week the final reconciliation plan was made public in which he referred to a "conditions-driven roadmap".

Washington Post columnist David Ignatius further revealed in a Jun. 28 column that Khalilzad had told him that Gen. George Casey, then commander of the Multi-National Force - Iraq, was going to meet with al-Maliki about the formation of a "joint U.S.-Iraqi committee" to decide on "the conditions related to a road map for an ultimate withdrawal of U.S. troops". Thus al-Maliki was being forced to agree to a negotiating body that symbolised a humiliating dictation by the occupying power to a client government.

The heavy pressure that had obviously been applied to al-Maliki on the issue during and after the Bush visit was resented by al-Maliki and al-Rubaie. The Iraqi rancor over that pressure was evident in the op-ed piece by al-Rubaei published in the Washington Post a week after Bush's visit.

Although the article did not refer directly to al-Maliki's reconciliation plan and its offer to negotiate a timetable for withdrawal, the very first line implied that the issue was uppermost in the Iraqi prime minister's mind. "There has been much talk about a withdrawal of U.S. and coalition troops from Iraq," wrote al-Rubaie, "but no defined timeline has yet been set."

Al-Rubaei declared "Iraq's ambition to have full control of the country by the end of 2008". Although few readers understood the import of that statement, it was an indication that the al-Maliki regime was prepared to negotiate complete withdrawal of U.S. troops by the end of 2008.

Then the national security adviser indicated that the government already had its own targets for the first two phases of foreign troop withdrawal: withdrawal of more than 30,000 troops to under 100,000 foreign troops by the end of 2006 and withdrawal of "most of the remaining troops" -- i.e., to less than 50,000 troops -- by end of the 2007.

The author explained why the "removal" of foreign troops was so important to the Iraqi government: it would "remove psychological barriers and the reason that many Iraqis joined the resistance in the first place"; it would also "allow the Iraqi government to engage with some of our neighbours that have to date been at the very least sympathetic to the resistance..." Finally, al-Rubaie asserted, it would "legitimise the Iraqi government in the eyes of its own people."

He also took a carefully-worded shot at the Bush administration's actions in overruling the centrepiece of Iraq's reconciliation policy. "While Iraq is trying to gain independence from the United States," he wrote, "some influential foreign figures" were still "trying to spoon-feed our government and take a very proactive role in many key decisions."

The 2006 episode left a lasting imprint on both the Bush and al-Maliki regimes, which is still very much in evidence in the present conflict over a withdrawal timetable. The Bush White House continues to act as though it is confident that al-Maliki can be pressured to back down as he was forced to do before. And at least some of al-Maliki's determination to stand up to Bush in 2008 is related to the bitterness that he and al-Rubaie, among others, still feel over the way Bush humiliated them in 2006.

It appears that Bush is making the usual dominant power mistake in relations to al-Maliki. He may have been a pushover in mid-2006, but the circumstances have changed, in Iraq, in the U.S.-Iraq-Iran relations and in the United States. The al-Maliki regime now has much greater purchase to defy Bush than it had two years ago.

© 2008 IPS-Inter Press Service

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