The United States has become a full partner in the genocide of Palestinians and the massacre of Lebanese civilians. There is one main reason for this. The US economy has tanked. The capitalists having failed with neoliberal economy policy are moving to a war economy. This has been going on for some time. US debt is larger than GDP. Americans are living beyond their means at the expense of the rest of the world. Of course there is no mention of this in the current presidential debate. But people must be thinking of it. Americans consume and others pay. consumption is driven by American debt.
On the other side of the Pacific, China’s solution to the US hegemony is to produce things that people want. China is about growth and wealth not conquest. The United States is not only stagnant the bulk of their wealth is owned by the top 1%.
There is a real fear in the US of China because Beijing is now making economic alliances not military alliances (i.e. BRICS). The American solution is war with China.
The interesting thing is that the US just lost a war but no one noticed. The US placed strategic naval assets in Red Sea against the Houthis blockade of the Suez Canal. The Houthis are demanding and ceasefire in Gaza, an end to the genocide. US naval assets are redundant because it is easier and cheaper for commercial shipping to sail around the Cape of Good Hope than to spend billions on a navy that is ineffective.
The US Navy can’t achieve military objectives, in particular they are unable to keep shipping lines open in the Red Sea.
China, a trading nation, needs shipping lanes to remain open. The US navy has been unable to close the South China sea. In response the US administration has invented a dispute over Taiwan in order to go to war with China. Most of the world recognises Taiwan as being part of mainland China.
So all the aggravation going on in the South China Sea is a nonsense. Not entirely. There’s a risk of nuclear war, to save nothing. Navigable and peaceful shipping lanes must remain open. This is also in the interest of all countries in Asia including Australia. Naval force can’t protect shipping lanes anyhow. The cost of going around the blocked lanes is far less than the cost of keeping shipping lanes secure by an expensive Navy.
As economist John Quiggan says: “… the failure of Prosperity Guardian poses an “existential threat” However, the threat is not to the world economy but to the US navy and, indeed, all the navies of the world. If keeping “vital trade routes” open is neither militarily feasible nor economically important, a large part of the rationale for surface navies disappears.”
“The closure of the Suez canal has, indeed imposed higher insurance costs on shippers using the canal, and has led much of the traffic to be diverted to the longer route around the Cape of Good Hope. But the overall impact on freight rates has been modest, and any effect on global economic activity has been too small to be observable.”
Palestine and Lebanon
The use of force by the US administration is very similar to that of Netanyahu. It wasn’t really Netanyahu who invented the strategy decapitation of the resistance, it was Obama. The President of Hope ordered assassinations across the globe where he thought American interests were at risk. This is mainly done with drones. Netanyahu has followed suit by assassinating Hamas and Hezbollah leaders with drones. Decapitation. Biden hasn’t ordered as many extra judicial-murders because Netanyahu has been doing the killing for him.
The irony of this tactic is that the Israel/US partnership accompany assassination with terrible punishment of the population by using missiles and bunker buster bombs. These are not precision weapons. They are to kill as many people as possible … as punishment for their peaceful resistance.
We don’t hear this in western media. These massacres are justified by calling Hamas and Hezbollah terrorists when the opposite is the case. Israel targets civilians whereas Hezbollah target military bases.
The United States is on the brink, yet it is the rich who benefits in inflationary times.
New alliances need to be made and old ones broken, particularly with the US.
Ian Curr
11 Oct 2024