It’s a Small World After All…

It’s a Small World After All…

How many people in the United States understand that we overthrew a democratically elected government in Iran to put in the Shah? Which then led to the Revolution. How many people in this country do you think know that?

-      Senator, and POTUS Candidate, Bernie Sanders, New Yorker

It is not working.  And pretending that somehow in the future it (US foreign policy in the Middle East & Afghanistan) is going to work by some unmeasured version (of success)...  It’s a form of fantasy that we simply cannot afford to continue to engage in.

-      Senator, and POTUS Candidate, Elizabeth Warren, MSNBC

By vetoing the War Powers Resolution, Trump has again proven that he is the servant of Saudi Arabia: the theocratic dictatorship that spends billions of dollars every single year spreading the most extreme and intolerant form of Islam around the world.

-      US Representative, and POTUS Candidate, Tulsi Gabbard

By JM Hamilton (4-20-2019)

Lisbon, Portugal -

Amsterdam, Netherlands -

While on vacation in Europe this week, I had the privilege to talk w/ a Scandinavian mother of three, during a lengthy flight.  The lady was fantastic – multilingual – and well versed on current affairs.  At first we talked about family and life in general.  One could tell by the way this individual talked about her kids – from the manner in which her eyes lit up - that she was a terrific mom.  She was deeply proud of all her children.

After a while, the conversation naturally veered towards economics and politics.  This lady related to me how much of her country had found it humorous, if not outrageous, that Fox News had compared Scandinavian countries to Venezuela.  (Of course, the former – Scandinavian countries - have wonderful mixed economies, w/ key elements of capitalism combined w/ a first tier societal safety net/economic foundation for all its citizens, including socialized medicine.  While the latter  - Venezuela – is basically, run by, and for, a corrupt dictatorship.  The former is highly functional – economically, politically, and democratically - while the latter, the dictatorship & the Venezuelan people, are in a great deal of distress, to put it mildly).

My fellow passenger talked about how happy she was that her eldest, her son, was becoming quite the businessman.  Apparently, her son – in his late teens - was building websites for small businesses, and earning real income; moreover, the young man and his girlfriend were considering starting up a clothing line.  That’s highly ambitious, I observed, and we both agreed that it was the social safety net, w/in her Scandinavian country, that allowed her son this tremendous degree of freedom & entrepreneurial drive (to start up a business w/out worrying about becoming sick or ill, because the state has already made prodigious provisions for its citizens' medical care).

By the way, the debt to GDP ratios of these three, primary, Scandinavian countries are: Denmark 36%; Norway 35%; and Sweden 41% (circa 2017).  By way of comparison then, the US debt to GDP ratio is a, highly, unenviable 105% (so much for crony capitalism versus the Scandinavian model).

Then, naturally, came the topic of her husband, and career paths.  Turns out, her husband is a software engineer, who works for a European firm, that in partnership w/ a major US defense contractor, had built a product that has had some problems.  I started rattling off a list of errors w/ said product & US foreign policy in general, and caught myself… not wanting to give offense.  She said, you know, many defense systems take a while to fully develop, which is true (but at what cost and must astronomical cost overruns always be part of the process?).

The whole conversation w/ my new Scandinavian friend - for me - was fascinating… and as the talk progressed, I couldn’t help but think how small the world was and how interconnected, economically & politically, the globe has become.

Needless to say, this fine lady's name, her country of origin, and the US defense contractor will remain nameless.  

Therefore, said US defense contractor is off this week’s menu.

But that doesn’t prevent JMH from writing about macro-foreign policy issues this week, and in particular, US foreign policy (FP).  US FP is something that is rarely, if ever, discussed by centrist politicians from either political party, Dem or Republican. 

Why is that?  Why isn’t US FP discussed and debated w/in the US Congress? 

Given the six trillion in debt the US has racked up in failed nation building, occupation, and in the furtherance of the US Empire… one might think US FP would be a hot topic (approximately a quarter of the national debt has been wasted on US FP, since 9-11).  At six trillion, and counting, to fight losing battles in Afghanistan and the Middle East – and given the huge sacrifice Americans, and future generations, pay & will pay (as defense spending continually crowds out domestic priorities) - as well as the debt incurred to fight these wars - one might think US FP would provoke an incendiary discussion.  US FP should be a key topic among our current political leadership, who are ultimately responsible, or better put, irresponsible, for our current FP fiasco. 

And if centrist politicians, Dem & GOP, don’t want to talk about it – it’s understandable that they don’t, as FP failure directly reflects upon them – one would think the voters would want to discuss this topic.  After all, it’s they and their children, and their children’s children that will be paying for this monstrosity - in ways too innumerable to count - for decades to come.

Here then, deploying a derivative of the Socratic method, a list of questions concerning US FP, which may, intuitively, provide answers to the very questions being asked. 

1)  How is it that the US – allegedly, the beacon of democracy & freedom of speech – backs right-wing dictatorships around the world, but in particular, supports oil rich despots located throughout the Middle East?

2)  At the risk of repetition (see above), how is it that US FP receives scant attention during congressional and POTUS elections?  Is that by design?

3)  How exactly does POTUS Trump campaign, and obtain higher office, on ending unnecessary wars & nation building, but Americans – rather than receiving a peace dividend – see US defense expenditures, as a percentage of discretionary federal spending, ever increasing…  now, North of 50%? (Depending upon how the deck chairs are aligned, defense expenditures --- including, but not limited to, VA, Homeland Security, National Nuclear Security Administration, intelligence & surveillance agencies and services too numerous to count, offline black budgets, and DOD slush funds – and particularly, if we factor in current and future interest to finance all this --- likely exceed a trillion dollars, per annum.)

4)  Why is it assumed that the US must, year after year, spend more than the G10 combined on the DOD/MIC?  How deficient is US military leadership that it feels the need to overcompensate with this absurd amount of money?

5)  Why is the DOD unauditable?

6)  How poorly does it reflect upon Congress, as stewards of the people’s money, and w/ the power of the purse, that they exercise zero control over ongoing DOD/MIC fraud & waste?

7)  Does all this war, and money spent on war, make the US any safer, or, as General Stanley McChrystal once stated, are we merely creating repeated generations of future terrorists (due to significant civilian casualties - aka collateral damage - caused by American military campaigns)?

8)  If we believe in freedom and democracy, why is the US doing the bidding one of the most notorious sponsors of terrorism on the planet, the Saudi regime?

9)  How precarious is the nation’s national security, when our debt to GDP ratio, as mentioned above, now exceeds 100%, and the Federal Reserve is still engaged in exigent efforts to placate Wall St banks, the stock market, and finance US FP?  If fiscal & monetary policies are tapped out, how precarious is the US' ability to handle the next economic or FP crisis (heaven forbid they happen simultaneously)?  Does our unacceptable fiscal & monetary position present a national security crisis, and how do we hold accountable the Congress and the FP establishment?

And, what of the mass migration out of Latin America to the US, and out of Africa & the Middle East to Europe… and how have US wars (the wars on drugs, terror, and in support of Big Oil assets and Middle East despots) played a role in these mass migrations? 

Last, what’s more patriotic: doubling down on the fraud, waste, and the instability created by the US FP establishment; or calling out US FP for what it is - a failure - and advocating a US FP reassessment?

If we answer these questions truthfully --- and please take note, it does not take a FP expert to answer them --- it’s not hard to see that US FP is not only ruinous for Americans and citizens around the globe, but is also highly instrumental in creating a great deal of the chaos in the world today.

Fortunately, for US voters, we have three great POTUS candidates – Senators Warren & Sanders, and Representative Gabbard – who aren’t afraid to ask these very tough questions, and then some, or provide answers.

These three highly capable candidates (Gabbard, Sanders, & Warren) are connecting the dots, w/ a new progressive foreign policy.  These three POTUS contenders realize backing dictatorships is not only antithetical to US beliefs and values, but is a direct threat to the men & women who serve and US national interests.

All three progressive candidates have set forth ideas, and policies, that call out the US FP establishment for what it is… in essence, treading where centrist candidates & politicians fear to go (as all too many members of Congress are beholding, or worse, owned by defense contractors).

Best of all, these three candidates see the link between our domestic economy and our foreign policy, and just how interconnected both are; as well as, how interconnected the world is, and most importantly, both the real - intended & unintended - consequences of our US FP actions.  The American middle class, and the poor among us, are systemically being robbed by an out of control DOD/MIC (and their FP establishment advocates), as POTUS Eisenhower so clearly, and presciently, warned in his farewell address to the nation.  Our founding fathers, too, frequently warned future generations against foreign entanglements, and specifically, against the debt amassed to finance standings armies and foreign wars.

These three progressive candidates know that the future of US domestic policy is not top-down, but rather, bottom-up.  And as it should be w/ domestic policy so should it be w/ foreign policy, that is to say, US FP too, should serve the interests of ordinary Americans, as well as, common citizens around the globe (as they too, suffer from the very same afflictions US citizens do: poverty, wage & wealthy inequality, oligarchy, kleptocracy, and C-Suite brass, in the service of defense contractors & Big Oil, lobbying for war to meet the next quarter’s earnings target). 

Thanks to a crony global economy - and a US FP that supports same - not only does the US citizenry suffer, but these very same problems (at the risk of being redundant: globalism, stagnating wages, wealth inequality, mass migration, and the criminalization & assault upon the poor) are magnified and exported/rebounded onto US shores, via foreign conflict, despots we directly support, & US trade policy.

After all, the world is becoming smaller all the time, and last I checked, it’s the only one we have.

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2019

Correction: An earlier version said the three primary Scandinavian countries included Finland.  The three primary Scandinavian countries are: Denmark, Norway, and Sweden.  Finland and Iceland are sometimes included, as well.