The apoplectic reaction by the US political establishment to the latest Wikileaks dossier has been revelatory in its illustration of an empire in decline, via its increasingly desperate attempts to maintain its reach through a combination of overt military aggression, threats, espionage, smear and the subversion of democracy wherever and whenever deemed necessary.
Calls for the execution of Wikileaks editor-in-chief and spokesperson, Julian Assange, by various US officials and politicians have nothing to do with threats to US national security, but everything to do with panic over the true nature of the US establishment and its attitude towards its assorted enemies, satraps and so-called allies around the world having been so comprehensively and embarrassingly revealed. The news for example that US diplomats had been instructed by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to spy on UN officials explodes the myth of international diplomacy as a mechanism for reasoned negotiation in good faith between nations in the interests of global stability and peace. On the contrary, it reveals that where the United States is concerned the only stability that matters is one in which its writ runs everywhere on the planet, with any dissent or resistance to that writ viewed and dealt with as a matter of extreme prejudice.
Currently, the regime most in the crosshairs of US aggression is Iran. This we already knew. But the extent of dependency the US exercises over its various Arab ‘allies’ in the region is quite staggering. The exhortation of the Saudi kleptocracy to the US to “cut the head off the snake” in relation to Iran, calling for a military option to destroy Iran’s nuclear programme sends a chill down the spine in its reckless advocacy of a major conflagration that would undoubtedly spread far beyond Iran’s borders.
The revelation that other US client states in the region – Jordan, Egypt, Bahrain, the UAE, and unsurprisingly Israel – agree with the desirability of a military strike against Iran empathically illustrates the level of panic throughout the region on the part of the aforementioned regimes at Iran’s obdurate resistance to US and Israeli hegemony in the region. Excepting Israel, it also reveals the huge disconnect that exists between those regimes and their respective populations, the majority of whom, according to a recent poll conducted by the US-based Brookings Institute, view a nuclear Iran in a positive light.
Elsewhere we’ve been informed as to the dishonest and mendacious role the US played in the aftermath of the coup in Honduras in refusing to describe the forced removal of elected leftist president, Manuel Zelaya, as a coup led to US recognition of the ensuing election months later and its declared winner, Porfirio Lobo, of the conservative and pro-US National Party.
Despite the outpouring of relief and joy at the election of Barack Obama in 2008, the Wikileaks dossiers confirm that were US foreign policy is concerned the objective of maintaining its empire by fair means or foul continues unabated.
Revelations over the negative views held by US diplomats on the likes of Prince Andrew, David Cameron, Gordon Brown, Britain’s role and military effectiveness in Afghanistan and so on, should not come as a shock either. After all, Britain’s view of itself as a US partner on the world stage has never been one shared in truth by Washington, at least not since the end of the Second World War, even though the notion continues to indulge the vanity of the British political establishment.
Indeed, with over half a dozen US air bases located on British soil, it would be more accurate to describe the UK as a US aircraft carrier than an ally in the grand cause of freedom and democracy.
Though the machinations of the US government have focused most in the dossier, China’s relationship with North Korea has also been mentioned, albeit through second hand sources in the shape of South Korean officials and therefore open to question. Alleged links between the Russian government and Russian mafia at home and abroad have also been reported, though if true is this much of a surprise given Russia’s increasingly fractious relationship with the West?
With the dossier dominating the headlines over the past week, Julian Assange and everyone else involved with Wikileaks deserve much credit for their courage in revealing to the world the truth behind the mask of US diplomacy and how the day to day banal business of empire is conducted around the world. His effectiveness in doing so is reflected in the fact that an Interpol arrest warrant has been issued for Assange at the behest of the Swedish authorities, the Wikileaks website has been removed by its US server, previously mentioned calls for Assange’s execution within the US have mounted, and he has come in for condemnation from governments around the world.
With this in mind one can only surmise that he must be doing something right.
