Those running our expansionist military empire believe that ultimate force and the “American way” are superior to history and the local environment with whom they do battle for the riches of Afghanistan. The more robots and heavy ordinance and satellite guided weapons of devastating power will be used increasingly. We will hear little of the death toll or how many innocents are slaughtered or horribly maimed. Any who die will be labeled as “terrorists” as they do today.

The terrible flood of 2010, will be felt in Pakistan for decades. The USA military, and the local rich, only protected themselves no matter who they hurt or killed in the process to do so. Just as in Haiti, Pakistan was promised help but none is forthcoming by the USA and some other countries.

Firefly:  well said.
No apology needed for “tangent” you strolled off on .Strolling through history is one way to See a land; another, as you note,  is Rory’s Stewart’s: mostly solo walk, with mongrel “pye-dog” volunteering for valued company.  Yes, definitely;  his book, “The Places in Between”, should be the first step taken, required reading for anyone forming a view on our quest to join the list of Folly-Marchers Unwelcomed to Afghanistan.

As to why American minds are too often the Central Front in the War for Amnesia?

We need to look at places where people have retained a version of “the Past” in what must be called their Historical Memory – passed along to successor generations for good or ill—the latter once being, in some places,  most often the consequence, when people learn nothing from their Story but a chance to inflict on Others what was –or is believed to have been – inflicted on Them.  Vendetta raised to Inevitability.

AND YET, In other places with Memory still “existing”, where people still are able to “hear” the sound of foreign boots marching on their soil, and very often on their faces; where they still can “see”  the ruination and destruction physical and mental brought upon them by their own or others’ aggressive madness, THERE people have vowed to Never Allow It or worse,  Do It,  Themselves, Again. 

We can all name places & peoples that Can See Nothing, Know Nothing, Have Learned Nothing; but if you ask them How They Can Do to OTHERS What They Do Not Wish Done, or Done AGAIN, to THEM, they will tell you , Oh, But WE are Good, and They are Bad, 
It’s all so Simple if One is Happily Simple-minded.

****************

By firefly, September 28 at 10:21 pm

Thanks much for pointing me to the book, but
from googling and amazoning, the book is titled
‘Places In Between’. ‘Must get’ for me as I have
found that to really get a grasp of anything, then
nothing beats finding, reading, researching and
studying (you know those things education is
supposed to ‘teach’ us) the origins and
beginnings from learned and experienced
scholars {if one doesn’t want to do it him/her
self} of those things that most information of
today represents as ‘filtered’ and convenient
‘knowledge’ that does more to confuse the issues.

Of course, going to a place as this Rory Stewart
did is better so’s to circumvent the razzle dazzle
marketing that so often is used to ‘pre-educate’
people to how certain entities want those people
to think.

tony_opmoc and REDHORSE make excellent points here
(albeit a little depressing). I’ve often wondered how
a country such as the US, that is such a ‘melting
pot’ of so many different peoples can, at the same
time, generally speaking, seem so completely ignorant
of the rest of the world.

I’ve just finished reading a book by Rory Stewart – a
Scotsman who walked across Afghanistan. He delves
into the culture and the ancient history in a way
that changes the perception of Afghanistan and
realizes that once, before 40 years of war,
Afghanistan was a thriving culture, full of markets,
ancient monuments, beautiful gardens and a
fascinating history. Its history is dotted with such
famous names as Darius the Great, Alexander the
Great, Chandragupta Maurya, Ashoka, Attila the Hun,
Genghis Khan, Babur, Akbar, and Nadir Shah. Many of
those that came to Afghanistan rarely managed to hold
onto their victories for long.

Alexander the Great and his Macedonian army arrived
to the area of Afghanistan in 330 BCE after defeating
Darius III of Persia. His army faced very strong
resistance in the Afghan tribal areas where he is
said to have commented that Afghanistan is “easy to
march into, hard to march out of.” In a letter to his
mother, Alexander described the inhabitants of what
is now Afghanistan as lion-like brave people.  “I am
involved in the land of a ‘Leonine’ (lion-like) and
brave people, where every foot of the ground is like
a wall of steel, confronting my soldier.”

The City of Kabul is thought to have been established
some time between 2000 BCE - 1500 BCE and some of the
earliest records of mining anywhere in the world are
from Afghanistan, dating back over 6000 years.

It has been said that whoever owned the Koh-I-Noor
ruled the world, the most famous of all diamonds.
Legend has suggested that the stone may date from
before the time of Christ; theory indicates the
possibility of its appearance in the early years of
the 1300s; history proves its existence for the past
two and a half centuries. The earliest authentic
reference to a diamond which may have been the Koh-I-
Noor is found in the Baburnama, the memoirs of Babur,
the first Mogul ruler of India.

Excuse me, I went off on a tangent. But my point is
simply that if we Americans had a greater
appreciation of other cultures and their histories,
we may have more respect for their people and
understand why it is that they resist American
invasion and domination. Other countries seem to
understand this so much more.

Why is that?

Indeed, the Russian sacrifice of human life to defeat Hitler was immense. It is overlooked and undervalued in the West by hatred of the monster Stalin. Alexander Solzinitzens (sp?) accounts of the gulag, murder of brave front line Russian officers by the “secret police” and the serious dues paid by the Russian people trapped in police state horror should never be forgotten. For those who refuse to read, “Enemy at the Gates” is a fair movie.

    Now it has come to us. The American SHADOW is swollen like a boil and it can no longer be ignored. We are drunk on the stench of hidden graves, and legions of the innocent dead stand in testament against us. We are trying to waken but we’re bound inside a terrible lie. Forgive our desire to remember the now shredded moral decency we once carried to Europe.

    Comments indicating that American leadership, financial and foreign policy has made itself irrelevant to the European destiny can likewise be applied to its relationship to the American people. Its paranoid danger threatens everything including itself. It is corrupt and visionless.

    Comments about European concerns over crime, immigration and the export of violent criminal enterprise by Foreign Nationals to host countries with no intent of assimilation mirrors the international black market syndicate that now straddles the Mexican/American/Canadian borders. Corrupt desire by corporate American fascists for endless exploitable illegal labor and the huge money attached to the drug trade and attendent enterprises has ensured social/cultural disintegration and chaos. It’s easy to understand why the French or the Swedes wouldn’t want to become minorities in their own country but Americans who express the concern are “racists”.

    In the coming storm, to survive, the American people will need every friend they can find. I hope Europe won’t forget us.

Tony—re your sage remarks:
“America thinks it can control the World, but most Americans have no idea what the World actually is, and the only way they have travelled is from behind the barrel of a gun.
This is not conducive to making Friends or gaining trust and respect.”
Motion seconded. But I’m not sure our imperial myopics think they CAN control the world, just that They SHOULD – and with minimal bother to themselves.  They spend very little time actually thinking about it, or for that matter about anything beyond their immediate concerns & the microcosm of that tiny bit of America they call home.

Some 50 years ago, I heard a wise observer of the US body politic bluntly tell a group of professional Thinkers & Doers about The World beyond our shores: “Look, you people are Abnormal. You actually KNOW, have lived in, and CARE about, what happens in, the rest of the world. You are a miniscule percentage of our population, and are only kept around to be Blamed When Things Go Wrong. The rest of the time no one else here Cares.”
Only change is the growth of various Hatreds, far worse now for reasons of national pathology.

Personally I think “Europeans” get on with each other far better than do Americans, despite language and cultural differences and I include Muslims who live in Europe as well as other racial and religious groups within the definition of “Europeans”.

In contrast most Americans seem to be completely brainwashed, both by the extreme religious nonsense they believe in, but far more by the continual deluge of propaganda they are exposed to.

Around 50% of Americans are not only still living in a State of Fear as a Result of 9/11, but they actually approve of their Government Torturing “Muslims” - because they have been told continuously for 9 years - that these “Evil Muslims” did it.

Basically America is now very like Nazi Germany - and the “Muslims” - have replaced The “Jews” as the hate target group.

Meanwhile most Europeans work with and mix socially with Muslims and most Europeans Travel Extensively - throughout the World - and can make their own judgements about different cultures.

Only around 25% of Americans have a Passport, and hardly any of them have used it.

In the UK virtually everyone has been travelling abroad for the last 40 years.

America thinks it can control the World, but most Americans have no idea what the World actually is, and the only way they have travelled is from behind the barrel of a gun.

This is not conducive to making Friends or gaining trust and respect.

Tony

For clarity, a sentence toward the end of my previous post should read:
...beginning in September 1939, with the German invasion of Poland, against which country Germany did not bother to declare war, pretending instead that IT had been attacked first [in a staged incident, a ruse on the transparency level of Dubya’s pre-Iraq schemers].

Inherit The Wind,
Thanks for the tip. I agree with you IF you mean that there were People of Significance in US Govt and relevant “establishment circles”  who by 1941 were hoping to join the mainly Anglo/Soviet resistance to the Nazi Blitzkriegs before German dominance of Europe became physically perilous to the US.  Whether or not there was “surprise” on either side at that development is somewhat moot, but I’ll try to delve re the “Reuben James”.

Mr Paff, btw, did not [per your Comment on Sept 22] say the German DOW was “inexplicable”, though he did use an equally inaccurate word [to quote from Pfaff “...until Hitler unaccountably declared war on the U.S. on December 11, 1941, eighteen months after the war had begun.”].  That Hitler’s CHOICE to use the US’s DOW vs Japan in response to Pearl Harbour as HIS opportunity to indulge a desire re adding the US as an overt belligerent on the European front was irrational and extremely stupid strategically does not of course make it “Unaccountable”. Accounting for Adolf fills too many library bookshelves [& now cyberspace ] for discussion here. This aspect is anyway a sidetracking quibble from the main issue of Mr Pfaff’s column re current Euro-developments.
One might, however, correct his arithmetic— by Dec 11, ’41 WWII was officially 15 months old not 18,  as “A State of War Now Existed Between” (an accumulating list of belligerents) beginning in September 1939, with the German invasion of Poland, against which country Germany did not declare war, pretending it had been attacked in a staged incident [a ruse on the transparency level of Dubya’s pre-Iraq schemers].  This triggered a reluctant Anglo-French response to their recently agreed treaty obligations, and the Phoney War ensued from Sept 3, for awhile, until the blitzkriegs of ’40…. Et cetera. Et cetera. Et cetera…

Quoting C.Curtis.Dillon: “Again, the Europeans are
tired of following the American lead.  They are
tired of being dragged into essentially economic
wars.  They have paid their dues for American
assistance after the war and want to determine
their own destiny.  And, to be very blunt, they are
pissed about being dragged into the abyss with the
Wall Street crooks and then being instructed how to
recover by the same bastards who set the thing in
motion in the first place.  They are quite capable
of functioning in the world without some idiot in
Washington telling them what to do.

That, in a nutshell, is exactly the crux of the
situation: Europe has now lived with American
hubris for well over a half-century, has been
witness to and recipient of official American
hypocrisy and has largely stood by as U.S.
corporations have undermined not only European laws
but Europeans’ trust in the essential honesty of
their overseas trading partners.

Now, they’ve finally had enough, it seems. Not a
minute too soon.

Copernicist:

You need to look for a ship called the “Reuben James”, sunk by German U-boats in October of 1941.

Furthermore, the German Declaration of War against the USA was delivered on the morning of December 11, 1941 and immediately followed by a DOW by the USA on that same day.  Clearly both DOWs were the culmination and obvious end of process and neither was a surprise.

guacamaya & C Curtis
You both make valid points, Europe has borne the brunt of the last two World Wars and most people don’t want another. I grew up in Europe and still travel there often. The biggest difference now is that most European Countries are extremely secular. But recently they have become very concerned that they are losing their national character. There is a move away from Liberal immigration policies because it has become evident that many of these groups Roma, Muslim, Africans do not assimulate easily. In Spain over 75% of crime is committed by Africans, in Germany there are Eastern European Gangs so vicious and dangerous the German police are afraid of them, Britain has whole areas like Oldham, Leicester Bradford, that are controlled by Muslims and recently Christian Evangelicals were arrested for their own protection for preaching there. Sweden is having an epidemic of rape against Swedish girls by Muslims. These are liberal countries, very tolerant, but their patience with multi-culturalism, and the American melting pot is over. A dose of Nationalism is not only good its needed.  Hence the banning of burka, and this is only the beginning, these secular societies regard sex as a recreational past time between consenting adults. They have little time for conservative medieval beliefs, or macho African attitudes, that they can beat their women etc.

One scary trend in some parts of Europe is the rise of right wing authoritarians (but of a different type) who have replaced race hatred with Islam. The economic melt down if it continues could steer some of them like in Belgium*, Italy*, Austria, Sweden, Norway & Russia (and maybe others) in a more belligerent religious pattern as we see in the USA & Israel. Not a good trend. But the USA could find itself with new allies outside of the UN for more pirate imperial activities. If the USA becomes even more aggressive, vainglorious and cruel than it already is.

* Both are split one by wealth (northern Italy) and/or ethnicity (Belgium into Waloons & Flanders nation-states.)

Well said, Lafayette.
I too have worked, lived and travelled in very different parts of “Europe” for nearly 40 years.  Extraordinary changes have taken place since the End of History didn’t end our human tendency for ruining clever theories.  “Europe”, of course, like the US, & everywhere else,  is a far more complicated place than we of limited time & space for multi-volume tomes can convey.

Fortunately, this site, or Mr Pfaff’s latest column in particular, has attracted comment from readers whose outlook for the most part has moved beyond the Me-Good/You-Bad playground-level nonsense of the Dick & Dubya Show.

Whatever the definition of “Europe”, whether seen from inside or out, the diversity now is enormous.  No sweeping generalizations are ever true about anyplace; everywhere is a mosaic of varying design, dissolving when closely examined. One thing I think is permanent, though: the resistance of the human mind to reason. So, in “Europe” as elsewhere, competitive madness will continue, but on their playing fields not battlefields. The quip is germane that Europeans have now substituted sport for war, while Americans see war as sport.  Just listen to the way we talk.

But in some places, most of the time, most of the people old enough to think have learned to curb the destructive passions of nationalist dreams and/or religious rivalries, even when stoked by cynics in search of political advantage. Supremacy on the greasy pole is a game for fools..
End of sermon.

{Pfaff: Today’s relationship with Europe is again complicated}

Consider the US in the late 1780s when there was a great debate over state versus federal rights. Consider the consequences had the states won that tuggle. We would have in the US a situation somewhat similar to the European Union (EU).

Henri Kissinger is reputed to have said, “When I want to talk to Europe, I call who?” Well, there is one number today and one person – her name is Catherine Ashton and she has been in office since last December.

Does that mean that Europe speaks with one foreign policy voice? Ask that question to its 30 or so Foreign Ministers and you’ll get an unequivocal No.

So, on the ground, Hillary still has to make the rounds in Europe to get her point across and, as a lawyer, if there is one thing Hillary knows how to do, it is talk. She is very well accepted in almost all capitals – she and Billy-boy were both darlings in Europe during the latter’s administration. They both walk on water wherever they go here. And one can say the same of the Obamas.

But personal friendship is not a good corollary for Foreign Policy direction. The widespread feeling here is that Iraq was a devious error on the part of Bush the Son. He wanted Hussein’s skull as a desk souvenir. Why?

Because Hussein tried to have Bush the Father assassinated on a Victory Visit to Kuwait, after Bush had left office. The attempt failed but, in Texas, memories are very long. Bush the Son did everything in his power to get Hussein … and eventually did.

Such personal vendettas amongst chiefs-of-state are viewed with a dim eye in Europe—which has known its full share of inter-country strife over its long existence. Unlike the US, one might add, which had only one Civil War.

If Afghanistan is the Right War and Iraq was the Wrong War, should Europa blindly follow in Uncle Sam’s footsteps? Would Uncle Sam do the same for Europa? Nope. (Let’s remember that Boston and New York Irish largely funded the terrorism that fanned the flames in Northern Ireland, despite the pleadings of the British government.)

More over and far more importantly is the fact that the world has become multi-polar. It is no longer Snow White (the US) and the seven dwarfs (including Europe, Russia and China). Europe has a population and aggregate GDP that is larger than the US. So its destiny is to rival the US economically and therefore why should it not have its own Foreign Policy voice? So much of Foreign Policy supports, in fact, trade in goods and services.

I doubt nonetheless that Europe takes any less seriously than the US the obvious terrorist threat. On that point (of foreign policy) there is almost certain concordance. But translating that threat to Afghanistan is one that is increasingly more difficult to make. Particularly after America decided to play its hand with Karzai, who is well known for favoring his family’s pecuniary interests in that country.

ASK NOT FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS

[u_r:  I have a few Belgium inlaws who were around during those troubling times and don’t think the American effort during the war was small in any way.}

You are right to make this point. But, I suspect that the consideration is only military casualties. When considering civilian casualties the perspective changes considerably. See the breakdown here.

France alone lost nearly half a million of its people in WW2.

As a Yank who has lived in Europe for more than three decades, I can assure you that the memory of WW2 and particularly the American contribution to that effort is still remembered and commemorated – even though the number of American soldiers who survived in that war diminishes every year. (Yes, quite a few of these Yanks came back to live in France, having married French women.)

What is striking is the number of young, not born during WW2, that one sees as commemoration ceremonies (all over France, just ask any American consul office here). But Europe has a penchant perhaps for remembering history more vividly that Americans?

POST SCRIPTUM

Often, from the exterior, America appears like the country where history was five minutes ago and ancient history was yesterday. Let’s presume that such is an exaggeration … but that is the appearance given.

It is also difficult to understand visceral reactions in America regarding the Muslims (and, of course, 9/11). Most European countries have far more Muslims living in close proximity to fellow citizens.

We know these people better, here, than you do there. They are not rabid fanatics and the women are, for the most part, emancipated. Let’s not forget that attacks in Madrid, London and Paris also provoked some raw sentiments to be expressed. But, in Europe, we make a distinction between terrorists and people of a different faith. Much like the Muslims, in their country, will distinguish between the Crusaders and those of the Christian faith.

Ask not for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.

undercover_report,

Are you by any chance, one of those flag-waving
deluded folks that think the whole world would
collapse or die without America? Come on, get a
little realism. WWII is the last genuinely worthy war
America fought, so it feels that it has to take ALL
the credit for its success. The fact is, America was
ONE OF the Allied Forces, not THE Allied Forces and
the Europeans are rightly fed up with swaggering,
self-important, over-bearing Americans for good
reason. I think America is now grown-up and confident
enough to be able to show some modesty and humility.

I have just returned from an extended visit to Germany. Although I had known for a long time that “Europe” can be a misleading concept, it was reinforced again. There is Germany and then there is Greece. Germany experiences a mini-boom and Greece is a total bust. To discuss Europe as if it is the analog of the United States as Herr Pfaff does is grossly misleading. Germany is certainly not turning “inward” whatever that means. Germany no longer accepts the myth that the US is the “engine of the world’s economy”. Chancellor Merkel is aggressively promoting German leadership in the United Nations and elsewhere.

“undercover_report”, at 10:31 AM, 23 Sep, quite amazingly says: “Americans do not like war, like their European counterparts.”
Umm, friend,  which era are you living in?  Or which planet?  The “Europeans” have—with certain very localized exceptions of nationalist pathologies – given up the joys of killing each other while destroying themselves in the process.  After being chased out of their overseas colonies and/or bankrupted by trying to hang on, the former Great Powers have found other ways to pursue possessive greed, leaving the self-bankrupting to the two super-“winners” The Soviets of course, correctly reading the signals of US unwillingness to risk WW III by putting its troops where its mouth was,  got away with suppressions within their contiguous-land-Empire [East Berlin ’51,  Hungary ‘56 & Czechoslovakia ’68 requiring the use of Invading Tanks and Bewildered Soldiers],  but of course they terminally blundered into the Afghan-mire so cleverly replicated by our own eager march of eyes-wide-blinded folly. We have WON the Race to be Next in Line for Self-destruct…to the sounds of hollow mirth from the “loser”.

With a bit of reading and some slight effort at paying attention, undercover_report might find the rather lengthy list of the all the places American non-likers of war have showered with their beneficent belligerence [or was it belligerent beneficence?} requiring some uninvited visits of varying lengths by our increasingly men-who-came-to-dinner “imperial grunts”.  Or you could try, as has been mentioned [see “samosamo” at 11:56 pm 22 Sept] , the new book by retired Colonel/now Professor Andrew Bacevich, “Wahington Rules”; but I think “undercover” had better start with Bacevich’s “American Empire”  [Harvard UP, 2002], and especially useful for someone so deeply in need of enlightenment,  “The New American Militarism: How Americans Are Seduced by War,” 2005. And of course, Mr Pfaff’’s own recent book. “The Irony of Manifest Destiny” . You might also notice sometime how enthused our non-war-likers always are for sending other people’s children off to fight. Preferably against underarmed undernourished inferiors who MUST NOT DARE fight back….
Happy reading…

The problem is that the majority of Americans have absolutely no idea what war is and the suffering it causes, because the US has never been on the receiving end and had its towns and cities bombed flat. I was 17 when the war finished and experienced first hand towns and cities lying in rubble. Except for the majority writing on this website, most Americans no nothing about Europe or indeed the rest of the world except what they see in Hollywood gung-ho, flag waving films and on their TV. This shows in people like bachu here and his moronic statement .... “you mean to say that the Europeans will show some spine? Not a chance.”
Unfortunately it is these ignorant people which support US governments in their wars and do not seem to realize what all that money could have done if it had been spent in the US on such things as education, health etc..

With regards the EU what should be mentioned more often is that it has given Europe the longest period of peace in it’s whole history! Most Europeans today have never known war and particularly the British often moan about what the EU costs them. They seem to have completely forgotten what the last war cost them, not only financially but in death and misery. Whatever the EU shortcomings maybe it allows it’s citizens to freely cross borders, live, work, study, and receive free medical attention, including all operations and medicines in member countries. This is no small thing and well worth some sacrifice. The EU is an experiment in progress which has never been tried before and so it is to be expected that mistakes are made and that changes must be made as we go along. Some 30 years ago Spain was a dreadfully poor country under a dictator. Since joining the EU and receiving billions in finance the country is totally different with good education, health service, excellent roads and the world’s largest high speed train service. Today countries like Bulgaria and Romania are like Spain used to be and their citizens too will in time benefit. In the meantime 1 million Romanians are living and working in Spain like Spaniards once lived and worked in other countries. Who knows maybe one day the US will try the same in Mexico.

Being an American whose father was with Patton in Europe, I really wanted to believe that we made a big difference in the war.  At some level we did but to believe that we were the major force for victory is just arrogant.  The Soviets lost 7 million soldiers and as many as 20 million citizens.  They destroyed much of the German army as was noted in the article.  We contributed materials and equipment through lend-lease and they acknowledge that contribution but bristle when an American arrogantly proclaims that “we” won the war.  “We” only helped and didn’t enter the war until it had already been raging for some time.  “We” never really saw fighting on American soil other than Pearl Harbor (Hawaii wasn’t a state at that time so, technically, that wasn’t American soil either).  They saw unbelievable devastation of their homelands.

We like to point to the cemeteries in France and elsewhere as a display of our sacrifice but we don’t recognize the untold millions who have no grave to visit but made as large a sacrifice as any American soldier.  Most were buried in mass graves or unmarked graves because there wasn’t time to give them a proper burial.  In Stalingrad (now Volgograd )alone more than a million died in less than a year.  My wife lost her grandfather, a fighter pilot, and no one could ever tell his family where he died.  There just wasn’t time for such civility.  He just didn’t return after the war was over.  That’s how they found out.

Again, the Europeans are tired of following the American lead.  They are tired of being dragged into essentially economic wars.  They have paid their dues for American assistance after the war and want to determine their own destiny.  And, to be very blunt, they are pissed about being dragged into the abyss with the Wall Street crooks and then being instructed how to recover by the same bastards who set the thing in motion in the first place.  They are quite capable of functioning in the world without some idiot in Washington telling them what to do.

undercover_report,

By writing “As for not “there”—perhaps the author
should visit some of the WWII American grave sites in
Europe to get an idea of the sacrifice that was made. 
That remark is unbelievable, but understandable since
those who were there are old or dead now so people
tend to lose a bit of history……” you seem to have
missed the point William Pfaff is making.

He never claimed that America was NEVER there, simply
that they were not there for almost two years.

America did make sacrifices, but they were small by
comparison to European sacrifices.

The total global number of military deaths during the
war was between 22 and 25 million soldiers. The
number of civilians was between 70 and 80 million
people. If you discount all NON-European deaths which
would be around 5 million soldiers and 17 million
civilians (mostly Chinese), then European deaths
would be around 20 million soldiers (including
Soviets) and close to 50 million civilian deaths.

Compare that with American losses: 400 thousand US
soldiers and 17 hundred civilian deaths.

****************

The u.s. is the terrorist nation. Read Andrew
Bacevich’s new book ‘Washington Rules: America’s
Path to Permanent War’. He takes it back to WWII
about the time the cia was born and curtis
lemay’s strategic air command.

Particularly read what eisenhower said in his
farewell address.

Just a suggestion.

gerard,

I completely agree with you.

Europe gave back many of its colonies to its
indigenous peoples (when most African and Asian
countries got their independence). The colonies that
were never given back to their native peoples were
the Americas (and Australia, New Zealand, Israel(?) -
South Africa - for a while) and somehow that set them
on a path that was in direct contrast to the path
that Europe was on. Then WWII was the final clincher.
Europe shed its desire to occupy and colonize other
nations.

Undoubtedly the main reason why Americans go to war so willingly is ignorance.  They have not suffered from a war within their territory for more than 100 years and even today a major contingency of war-mongers here think they are fighting in Afghanistan to keep that war from coming here. Better kill other people than get killed ourselves, yes?  After all, it can be dressed up as “self-defense” and made to appear “just”.  Especially if you can make money out of it. And leave a bunch of wello-stocked bases behind. And teach people to speak English.
  WWII was more than enough for both Europe and Japan, and much of East Asia. Consequently they are more interested in peace and conciliation. They are miles ahead of us. In that respect we are barbarians at the gates of the world’s future.

At 0639, “undercover_report”, misunderstanding what was meant by “not there”, and apparently not reading the rest of the sentence, takes umbrage & writes:           
As for not “there”—perhaps the author should visit some of the WWII American grave sites in Europe to get an idea of the sacrifice that was made. 
That remark is unbelievable…
Don’t worry, friend “undercover”. Living in Europe, Mr Pfaff is well aware of the WWII [and even more the vast First War ] cemeteries in which rest many American, and quite a few Other, offerings to our gods of war.. Obviously, he wasn’t denigrating American “sacrifice”, just noting it BEGAN rather well AFTER—“eighteen months” as precisely stated—some Other quite large sacrifices had already happened. And would continue happening,  though mention or memory of these have subsequently been expunged from certain minds.  The Hollywood or Legionnaire- Rhetorical version, widely absorbed by innocently incurious Americo-centrics, is that The War Began on December 7th, 1941, and was thereafter Fought and Won more-or-less Single- handedly by various American leading men, occasionally helped by amusing character actors with foreign accents, 
I oversimplify, of course. 
This month, btw, has seen the usual war memorial rites, most recently one marking the 70th anniversary of the “Battle of Britain” a bit crucially fought in 1940, between not noticeably American RAF and Luftwaffe pilots, much of it in the skies above where I live. Below are bomb shelters from the later Blitz whose outlines are still visible .when the ground is dry.  Of course The Arrival of Americans in 1942/3/4 were then and are still valued as essential to the opening of second, actually multiple, Western fronts, the meat-grinder of the Eastern one having inflicted by then unrecoverable wounds to what was left of the Wehrmacht.
It seems, since there were none of us Americans around to “Save” them, The Locals just had to cope on their own. For awhile. Until the SUPPLIES arrived. And Didn’t do TOO badly, for non-Americans with funny accents, I mean.
Might there be a lesson somewhere in this woodwork?.

Chomsky is in Mexico City, where he gave a talk for the 100th anniversary celebration for the national university (UNAM).

In his talk, he indicated that only Europe and Japan are US allies—that all other countries are definitely NOT, and because of where the talk was given, he mentioned that a number of very visible Latin American countries (Brazil, e.g.) now have China as their primary economic partner.

He also mentioned Nixon’s comment that if the US could not control Latin America it had no chance at controlling the rest of the world.

And that the power of the US was eroding daily.

In short, the European Union countries are not so dazzled by Obama’s teeth that they won’t very soon read the writing on the wall.

The gringos will no doubt try to lobby for slipping on a banana peel as an Olympic sport for which they are entitled a gold medal, but who even cares?

The grossly self-centered idea that America is “special,” the sappy ignorance of “American exceptionalism” is one thing that has ruined us.  The other is perhaps the idea of “rugged individualism”—that anyone can make it alone if he/she is worth their salt. No need for cooperation.
  The majority of the population still chooses to believe these two lies.
  It is in the interests of corporate imperialism to keep promoting these lies in all popular media because people who believe themselves to be superior are easily led into wars against people they are told are in some way “inferior”. 
  In short, sad to say but as true as any other generalization—Americans are divided not only from the rest of the world, but also against each other as our elites pick the bones of us ordinary jerks and laugh all the way to the bank.
  Whose fault is it?  Everybody who does nothing is guilty of not doing something.

****************

I am surprised all of europe hasn’t pulled out of
the u.s.‘s wars. And I wonder what inducement,
lies or was it a threat, never know in diplomacy,
that got those europeans to participate. After
all w & dick were more than willing to go it
alone, unilaterally.

Glad to see them finally doing it. Listening to their populations who have been ahead of the leaders of those European nations who have been helping the USA hide it unilateralism behind a facade of multilateralism. It is the USA’s idea and too many others helped them do it.

Now they just need to wake up to the idea that the USA isn’t a big friend, but a big dangerous beast than needs to be caged and starved into some semblance of a normal rational state with a small army and no imperial ambitions.

This time who knows how well the elites will come out of their imperial actions. But most of us will not benefit and definitely not whomever they will attack now and tomorrow.

PS If we had stayed out of WWI things could have been better in Europe with an equitable peace. But the USA had to come in and chose the English to side with instead of the Germans and Austrio-Hungarians that forced the war on for another year and a most unequal if not egregious peace. (Either side wouldn’t have changed things much.) Which certainly paved the way for another war—-a continuation of the previous stupid and brutal conflict after a crushing global depression for 20 years.

In both cases the USA came out very good. Better after UK abdicated as an empire too. No fighting on US soil either* unlike the open abattoir that was Europe all the way to Russia. And the bloody fighting on various Pacific islands all the way back to Nippon itself. The two nukes were more than enough “payback” for the Japanese preemptive strike on Pearl Harbor base.

Unfortunately I see the USA involved causing far more carnage in wars of religious, resource and political needs. The GWOT will not end unless something or someone does it for us. The cycle of violence will perpetuate itself without end.

* Both Alaska and Hawi’i were territories and not properly called part of the US Union at that time.

Sorry, Inherit: it was The Wind provided by Japan’s egregious stroke of national hari-kiri,  the Day That Will Live in Infamy, that filled the sails of those [Anglo-philiac mostly East Coast WASPs]  who wished to join the war in Europe. More dominant were isolationist voices of influence [often Irish-&-German-descended Anglo-&-Franco-phobic opinion mongers—and Ambassadors] who were eager to avoid or block such an outcome. Hitler’s unexpected Gift to proponents of a Europe-First military strategy was not something he HAD to do because of an alliance with the Exception to Inferior Races – after all, alliances are made to be broken, as the Nazi-Soviet Pact rather shows. Hitler added the US to his declarations of war because contempt for that Jew-infested mongrel country egged his hubris to “Bring It On”.  Of course, one cannot know what would, could, or might have happened – because it didn’t; and counter-factual concoctions are best left for games playable by the bored.
So yes, Mr Pfaff is quite correct. Contrary to our Proud to be Ignorant chest-thumping, the US was NOT “THERE” in the way Hollywood fantasy would [& does] have it believed. To the growing crop of American kids the age of my [British] grandchildren, references to “The War” are to the Ones Now On, and historical knowledge is minimal.  Unless fathers were there, few know why we hear the echoes of nonsense from previous Theories of Dominoes,  of Ink-spots,  of faux-non-appeasement in Vietnam, or Korea.  Let alone the Pleistocene Era of Grandad’s Dad…

I hate how Pfaff likes to re-write history, like saying the US wasn’t there prior to Pearl Harbor and then contradicting himself by citing Lend-Lease, then tries to belittle it.  Lend-Lease was the major way supplies got to Britain.  He then says Germany “inexplicably” declared War on the US.  Really? Japan, Germany’s ally, had attacked the US and we were allied with the UK in Asia and supplying them AND the Russians in the Atlantic.

Then again he also misunderstands and avoids the whole history of the EU.  Following the War, the US ENCOURAGED the major western states, West Germany, Italy, France and the UK to form an economic union, which initially became the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC).  Two more communities were formed, the European Economic Community (EEC) and the European Atomic Energy Commission (Euratom).  Britain declined, but Belgium, Luxembourg and Holland joined as well.  The 3 communities shared their High Commission and were really one but for lots of paper work and were known to the US as “The Common Market”.  The idea was two-fold: Economic ties would end the cycle of wars between the Big 4 that had torn apart Europe since, well since the Roman Empire.  Second, a sound economic union would be a bulwark against Communism and the Soviet Union.

But now that the USSR is gone, European relations with Russia are very different, the 6 have grown to, what, 24 states, the 3 communities were united as the EU, and that same EU is one of the 4 biggest economies in the world, along with China, the US and Japan, and is technically as advanced if not more so than the US, it’s able to flex its muscles.  The EU doesn’t have to kow-tow to the US, and Bush, the jackass, pushed them further away making that assertion of independence not only easier, but NECESSARY!

Living in Europe I get the European perspective much more than the American.  They have this strange idea that everyone should try to get along, to negotiate in good faith although at least Germany is still genuflecting to the Israelis (that’s understandable given their shared history).  But the Europeans are now feeling they deserve an equal say in what happens in the world.  Even the Brits are getting edgy around the Americans.  Pretty soon we will stand alone and isolated in our stupid wars.  The Europeans are much more enlightened than we are when it comes to being members of the human community.

Perhaps one of the reasons Europeans no longer want to follow Uncle Sam, is because Uncle Sam has changed. The Uncle Sam of 1945 and candy bars, is not the Uncle Sam of today. And one of the reasons could be the massive influence of Israel in American foreign policy, which has now become Israeli foreign policy. The way America wages its imperial wars have now become Israeli brutal. When America attacks a country today it no longer maintains the country’s infrastructure as it used to so it can be used as a subservient trading partner later, it now attacks the population and destroys everything: hospitals, schools, refining plants, its energy resources, roads, intellectuals are assassinated, it even destroys the countries culture and erases its history flooding the country with mercenaries. It’s a modern day scorched earth policy. But much propaganda is made when some school is rebuilt.
Americans traditionally have always enjoyed kicking Mexican and Asian ass, but this is something new, even for them. Could this be the reason Europeans are slowly beginning to move away?

“Most Americans still seem to think that in both world wars the U.S. “was there” saving democracy from the very start.”

Nazi Germany lost WWII in the Soviet Union.  Eight out of ten Germans killed in the war died in the USSR.  At Stalingrad the Germans lost enough materiel to equip one quarter of their entire army.  The invasion of western Europe beginning on D-Day was not the seminal event of the European world war, even though most Americans like to think so.