Don’t just believe; think!
| DIE HARD III |
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| Herman Tiu Laurel |
At the recent anti-North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato) rallies in Chicago, a placard captured on TV and the Internet that caught my attention read: “Don’t believe them again!”
The US has invited more than 80 heads-of-state and heads-of-government to the Nato meet in Obama’s hometown. Rick Rozoff, journalist and “Stop Nato” movement manager, reports that the matters to be discussed range from how to close the book on the now Vietnam-like quagmire of the Afghan war — Nato’s first ground war and the US’ longest armed conflict to date; to the alliance’s defense capabilities as well as the US-Nato missile “defense” system; and to the expansion of the military bloc’s global military partnerships that would lead up to the consolidation of a Nato-oriented global intervention force. But not tabled for the talks is why Nato, an organization formed expressly for the defense of Europe, is in a war 5,583 kilometers away in Afghanistan, and why the US invited over 50 non-members to its summit.
Suspicions have been raised that the Nato Chicago summit is the beginning of the Global Nato, a fear that is very well-founded given the extra-European theater wars the US is bringing Nato into — from Afghanistan in Asia to Libya in Africa. Nato’s former secretary-general Jaap de Hoop Scheffer has denied the allegations of a planned “global policeman” role, pointing to a lack of material resources, which is the same problem befogging today’s secretary-general Anders Fogh Rasmussen as European countries suffer economic debacles while spending billions in Afghanistan and angering constituencies back home.
But that still won’t stop US Conservative think-tanks from continuing to argue and lay the basis for US shepherding of Nato into its global misadventures, such as in the case of Foreign Affairs magazine contributors, Ivo Daalder and James Goldgeier, who wrote: “The advent of a new global politics after the Cold War has led Nato to expand its geographic reach and the range of its operations. Now, Nato must extend its membership to any democratic state that can help it fulfill its new responsibilities. Only a truly global alliance can address the global challenges of the day.”
In September of 2010, Rick Rozoff reports that Daalder, also the US permanent representative to Nato, told Indian journalists visiting Nato’s Brussels headquarters: “I think it is important to have a dialog (with India) and deepen that dialog. It is through dialog, through understanding each other’s perceptions and perhaps by working on misperceptions that may exist, that we can strengthen the relations between India and Nato,” bluntly suggesting that India should abandon its policy of neutrality and collaborate with the US and Nato in developing an international interceptor missile system.
Last December, US President Obama declared the “re-balancing” of his country’s presence in Asia, announced US Marine deployment in Australia, followed in March by initiatives for a missile defense shield in Asia, with Japan, South Korea and even the Philippines ostensibly guarding against the North Korean “threat.” In Africa, Nato has been enticing the African Union to sign a partnership agreement and reinforcing the African Standby Force (ASF) which saw action in the Côte d’Ivoire coup against a sitting president in favor of an IMF man (reminds us of the parliamentary coup in Greece and Italy where Goldman Sachs men grabbed power).
It is no wonder that a placard imploring people to “Don’t believe them anymore” — a small but powerful message — has been suppressed violently, with over 300 protesters arrested in a martial law-like atmosphere in Obama’s hometown. The protests, attended even by a delegation of Afghan children, shows the world doesn’t believe the global powers anymore and has learned to think.
In the Philippines, we have countless formal and informal spokesmen for US geopolitical interests, starting with Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario and Defense chief Voltaire Gazmin, supported by a cast of hundreds in media and other institutions. One media talking head, for instance, said over radio that “Anyone who thinks of sharing the China Sea with China is a traitor,” with him, of course, saying nothing about the US-British swindle of the Filipinos in Malampaya, or the larceny that is about to happen in the Reed Bank with Monte Oro Corp. and MVP where nothing will be left for the Filipino nation — all invariably backed by Western mafias (like Carlyle or Goldman Sachs) that have been culprits in many Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) and National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP) deals that have shortchanged the nation. So is such posturing patriotic or a build-up to the acceptance of an Asian Nato?
As the global and local Establishment — the mainstream — is absolutely no longer credible, thinking Filipinos should thus declare, “Don’t believe them anymore,” as my radio program audience did in their texts.
The mainstream’s attitude is typified by what certain quarters have on the Corona impeachment trial, especially the forces pushing it, from Malacañang to the Ombudsman; to the haven of Harvey Keh, the Ateneo de Manila University and its Jesuits; to the Yellow evil society (who counts the ham-acting Heidi Mendoza as a member) worthy of being sued by the defense panel; and, most of all, Benigno Aquino III, who has not a shred of integrity and reliability as a democratic leader after two years of absolutely incompetent governance.
And since we ought to not believe them, too, something must be done about this, the sooner the better.
(Tune in to 1098AM, dwAD, Sulo ng Pilipino/Radyo OpinYon, Monday to Friday, 5 to 6 p.m.; watch Destiny Cable GNN’s HTL edition of Talk News TV, Saturdays, 8:15 to 9 p.m., with replay at 11:15 p.m.; visit http://newkatipunero.blogspot.com for our articles plus TV and radio archives)
(Reprinted with permission from Mr. Herman Tiu-Laurel)
Source: The Daily Tribune
URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20120525com5.html
