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Imperial Overstretch: George W. Bush and the Hubris of Empire

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Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.Imperial OverstretchGeorge W. Bush and the Hubris of EmpireBy Roger Burbach, Jim Tarbell Fernwood Publishing and Zed Books LtdCopyright © 2004 Roger Burbach and Jim TarbellAll rights reserved.ISBN: 978-1-84277-497-7ContentsAcknowledgements, vii,Prologue: the Toll of Empire, 1,1 George W. Bush and the Reality of Empire, 9,2 Empire as the American Way of Life, 27,3 The 'American Century', 52,4 The Rise of the Bush People, 76,5 The Making of George W. Bush, 102,6 The Politics of Fear: Bush Hijacks 11 September, 125,7 The Drums of Pre-emptive War, 149,8 Iraq and the Imperial Dead-enders, 172,9 The Interregnum: An Empire in Descent Confronts a World in Upheaval, 193,Bibliography, 219,Index, 231,CHAPTER 1George W. Bush and the reality of empireThe history of the rise and fall of Empires teaches us that it is when their own citizens finally lose faith in the virtue of infinite war and permanent occupations that the system enters into retreat. Tariq AliOn 15 February 2003, one month before George W. Bush ordered the 'shock and awe' bombing of Iraq, his effigy, holding buckets of blood and oil, bobbed above the determined crowds in New York City on a frosty winter day. In Manhattan, the city borough that suffered the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001, 400,000 people besieged the United Nations, calling for no war. Nobel Peace Prize winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu told the crowd, 'We are members of one family ... the human family ... President Bush, listen to the voice of the people ... "Give peace a chance."'The demonstrators in New York joined citizens from around the world to call on Bush not to pursue his imperial wars in their name. The largest global demonstrations in the history of humanity took place that day. In London alone 1.5 million people turned out, in Spain over a million mobilized, in Berlin the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung estimated that demonstrators numbered half a million. Protests in the United States took place from coast to coast in over a hundred cities (Pitt 2003).In the nations of the South anti-war demonstrations were also widespread. In Jakarta, Indonesia, 100,000 marched on the US embassy, in Sao Paulo, Brazil, 30,000 turned out, and in Istanbul, Turkey, at least 5,000 demonstrated while thousands more mobilized in other Turkish cities, demanding that the United States not be allowed to station troops in their country to strike against Iraq. In the capitals of Egypt and Tunisia thousands protested against the impending US war, only to be beaten by local security forces. Even in Antarctica, fifty-one demonstrators formed a peace sign in the snow. All told, it is estimated that at least eleven million people demonstrated in seventy-five countries on that historic day. (See, for example, Internet F and Internet I.)The crowds in New York came to the United Nations to address diplomats questioning the American rush to war. Within the walls of this global contemplative body coalitions were forming to withhold the world's approval of pre-emptive war in Iraq. America's sanctimonious, unilateral aggression had sparked the creation of the largest countervailing alliance since the United States rose to global dominance with the end of the Second World War.On this sullen Saturday in Washington, DC, the President, who excelled in salesmanship rather than statesmanship, kept to himself. He had only fear to sell. In his weekly radio address he announced, 'Last week the national terrorist threat level was raised to "high" ... informing] the general public to be more alert to their surroundings and prepared for possible emergencies in the event of an attack ... Our enemies are still determined to attack America, and there is no such thing as perfect security against a hidden network of killers' (Bush 2003a). A month later on 16 March, Bush announced the 'moment of truth' for the world on Iraq. The next day he gave Saddam forty-ei