America Kills Peace

Editorial note:

Nothing scares the United States more than the possibility that peace might break out. Turkey and Brazil committed an unforgiveable sin, by finding a way to resolve questions about Iran’s nuclear fuel stocks. The U.S. pushed the agreement aside, preferring to move closer to war – as if that is Washington’s desired result.

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America Kills Peace

by Margaret Kimberley, Global Research, 27 May 2010


“Lula and Erdogan should be Nobel laureates instead of the man who slapped them both in the face.”

Every now and again there is some good accomplished in world affairs. That was certainly the case when Brazil and Turkey succeeded in bringing about a plan to stop, at least temporarily, the American/Israeli plot to demonize and ultimately to make the case for war against Iran.

Most of the world looked on in horror at the carefully planned campaign of propaganda meant to justify a future massacre of untold thousands of people. The United States and Israel never passed up opportunities to lie and ratchet up the case for committing another crime against humanity. The brazenness of the falsehoods was simply breath taking. Even the Iranians’ transparent and public announcements of uranium enrichment elicited cries of “secret weapons sites” by Barack Obama and his European allies.

Iran of course has every right to develop a nuclear energy or even nuclear weapons capability. As a signatory of the Non Proliferation Treaty, it was duty bound to keep the world informed of its activities. Conversely, Israel has a nuclear arsenal of unknown strength and number but will not even confirm its existence.

In the face of the oncoming catastrophe, Presidents Lula of Brazil and Prime Minister Erdogan of Turkey took it up themselves to find some means of respecting Iran’s rights and in the process making it clear to the world that the lying warmongers were just that. They reached an agreement whereby Iran would send its enriched uranium to Turkey, a decision which should have ended Washington’s saber rattling and threats.

“The United States and Israel never passed up opportunities to lie and ratchet up the case for committing another crime against humanity.”

The agreement did nothing of the kind. The United States ignored the will of the world’s people and instead pressed for and a new round of United Nations Security Council sanctions. If the Nobel peace prize committee was going to pick a head of state as its winner, then Lula and Erdogan should be laureates instead of the man who slapped them both in the face and demanded that the threats never end.

The United States is indeed the most dangerous nation on earth. There is no other country which reserves for itself the right to threaten other peoples with war, to tell lies even to its allies. Brazil and Turkey did what the Obama administration said it wanted in October of 2009. The leaders of those nations put themselves and their credibility on the line to find a peaceful solution they had every reason to believe the United States would accept.

Just 48 hours after the agreement was announced, secretary of state Hillary Clinton smacked down the will of the rest of the planet. The United States succeeded in corralling all five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council to undertake yet another round of sanctions against Iran. The Norwegian peace prize committee certainly ought to have a collective red face.

“Israel has a nuclear arsenal of unknown strength and number but will not even confirm its existence.”

Not only did the United States succeed in scuttling a plan meant to decrease world tensions, it also continued claiming a specious right to jail and hold anyone it chooses and to do so indefinitely. A court ruled against detainees held in a once secret prison at Bagram air base in Afghanistan. The petitioners were captured in Thailand and Pakistan and have been held for as long as seven years. The Bush administration argued that the right to habeas corpus did not extend to Iraq or Afghanistan and the Obama administration quietly sided with their predecessor’s position. The court ruled that the United States can “. . . evade judicial review of executive detention decisions by transferring detainees into active conflict zones.”

The president of the United States claims the right to interfere in relations between sovereign nations, target his own citizens for death and hold anyone prisoner indefinitely. This is the description of a nation that is for all intents and purposes at war with the rest of humanity.

There is no longer any question of culpability in world affairs. The United States occupies Iraq and Afghanistan, uses a proxy state to destroy Somalia, uses another proxy state to destroy Palestine and declares a “war on terror” which brings war to millions of people.

“The Norwegian peace prize committee certainly ought to have a collective red face.”

President Obama is definitely in the scuttling business. He destroyed any hope of a meaningful Durban II conference on racism and emerged from Copenhagen with a climate change agreement which allows the United States and other rich nations to warm the globe even more than they do now. He is more destructive to the peoples of the planet than was his predecessor George W. Bush. That charge is a serious one but there is more than enough evidence to back it up. The world is endangered and it is endangered by the actions of this country more than by the actions of any other.

Perhaps there should be a prize for war as well as one for peace. If there were any justice in this world, Barack Obama would have the dubious distinction of winning both.



* Margaret Kimberley's Freedom Rider column appears weekly in BAR.