By Stephen Lendman – Chicago
Besides waging perpetual wars, nothing better reveals America’s imperial agenda than its hundreds of global bases – for offense, not defense at a time the US hasn’t had an enemy since the Japanese surrendered in August 1945.
So when they don’t exist, they’re invented as former US ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Charles W. Freeman, Jr., suggested in a May 24, 2007 speech to the Washington Institute of Foreign Affairs:
“When our descendants look back on the end of the 20th century and the beginning of this one, they will be puzzled. The end of the Cold War relieved Americans of almost all international anxieties.” As the world’s sole remaining superpower, “We did not rise to the occasion.”
“We are engaged in a war, a global war on terror, a long war, we are told….How can a war with no defined ends beyond the avoidance of retreat ever reach a convenient stopping point? How can we win (any war let alone the hearts and minds of millions) with an enemy so ill-understood that we must invent a nonexistent ideology” for justification.
In his 2006 book, “Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic,” Chalmers Johnson discussed the known number of foreign US bases by size and branch of service. According to the Department of Defense’s Base Structure Report (BSR) through 2005, it totaled 737 but likely exceeds 1000 today with so many new ones built since then – some known, others secret and always others planned.
Johnson also highlighted the fallout – unacceptable noise, pollution, environmental destruction, expropriation of valuable public and private land, and drunken, disorderly, and abusive soldiers committing crimes that include rape and murder that often go unpunished under provisions in US-imposed Status of Forces Agreements (SOFAs).
An excerpt from his book reads:
“Once upon a time, you could trace the spread of imperialism by counting up colonies.
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(Submitted by Ingrid Mork)